Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig

This past week we travelled to Memphis - home of the blues, R&B and rock & roll. Memphis is really all about the music so we hopped on a 50s era bus

and were introduced to the city by a singing troubadour.

The history of Memphis was accompanied by live music; even the passengers were given percussion instruments so we could participate in the music as we toured the city. What a hoot!

Of course, no trip to Memphis is complete without a trip to Graceland.

The mansion is quite something, not as grandiose as we had expected but certainly had some unique decorating styles.

After Elvis purchased Graceland for a mere $100K in 1954, he made some changes, including the addition of a racquetball court. It was on a piano inside this building that Elvis sang his last song on the morning of the day of his death

The tour finishes at the Meditation Garden, the resting place of Elvis and his parents and grandmother.

Sadly, all good things must come to an end. After travelling more than 30,000 kms, setting up in 31 RV parks, fixing three flat tires and surviving one tow truck experience, we're safely back in Winnipeg with the RV parked at it's summer home in Stephenfield.

It's back to work this week but we're already thinking about our next RV adventure.

See ya next time! Jim & Lesley

Taking in the Tunes in Tennessee

We're in Music City USA and loving it! Everywhere you turn there are musicians plying their trade. We've danced at the Wildhorse Saloon, listened to up and comers at local honky tonks like The Stage and Tootsies but the highlight of this trip was our night at the Grand Ole Orpy!

The line-up of stars, both new and old, was outstanding! Newer stars included

Dierks Bentley

Aaron Tippin

and

Vince Gill

Of course, no show at the Grand Ole Opry is complete without a performance by Minnie Pearl.

And the stars of old were not to be outdone! Mel Tillis, Del McCoury, Little Jimmy Dickens, Connie Smith, Marty Stuart, Whispering Bill Anderson, The Whites, Jimmy C Newman, and Jean Sheppard performed many favourites and had the crowd clapping and singing along.

But the night belonged to Carrie Underwood as she was inducted as a member of the Grand Ole Opry.

And the night was made even more special for her when none other than fellow Oklahoman, Garth Brooks showed up, unannounced, to present her with her award.

While performing her last number, she was joined on stage by yet another fellow Oklahoman, Vince Gill

This leg of our trip has been extra special because we were joined by my Mom and Dad, and my Uncle Mac and Aunt June. After attending a performance at the current Grand Ole Opry House, we took a stroll down memory lane and visited the Ryman Auditorium, known as the Mother Church of country music and the building that housed the Grand Ole Opry for several decades.

(Note the coats! The temperature on Sunday did not get above 55F. Guess it`s preparing us for what`s ahead when we return home!)

The Ryman is said to have fantastic acoustics - second only to the Mormon Tabernacle. The self guided tour allows you the opportunity to go up on stage so Dad and I, and Dad and Uncle Mac grabbed guitars and made like country stars.

Today it's on to Memphis - wonder if we'll catch a glimpse of the King!

Surviving the Storm

Well, the weather has been interesting this week, to say the least. We had hoped to get a number of rounds of golf in while in Oklahoma City but that was not to be the case. The wind blew and blew and blew. At times I wasn't sure the RV was going to stay on the ground. On Thursday, we gave up on the idea of the wind ever letting up and hit the road to Little Rock, Arkansas. Well... I'm sure you're familiar with the saying, "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't". Truer words were never spoken in this instance. Friday morning we awoke to tornado warnings across the state of Arkansas. We are very thankful that when all was said and done, the tornadoes stayed northwest and southeast of our location. All we had to suffer through was a tremendous thunder and lightning storm with some wind. By late afternoon it had passed and the sun was out. Saturday we hit the road again and have stopped for a couple of days in Southhaven, Mississippi. The weather has improved greatly so we're off for a round of golf this morning. Next week it's on to Tennessee, a visit from my parents and my uncle & his wife, and our trip to the Grand Ole Orpy.

Gettin' our Kicks Along Route 66

Well, we've certainly covered a lot of territory since our last blog - 1000 miles to be precise! (Don't dare to calculate the gas costs (LOL)). As we moved from the Grand Canyon National Park through to Oklahoma City, we have ducked on and off of the old historic Route 66.

Our first stop was an RV Park just south of Flagstaff, Az. Man, was it cold! Jim had to disconnect the water hose each night as night time temperatures dropped below freezing. Daily temperatures weren't too bad. When you're sitting at 7000', you never know what to expect weatherwise.

While here, we took a day trip to Sedona, land of the red rocks. To get a close up view of the spectacular rock formations, we booked on off-road trip with Pink Jeep Tours. Two and one-half hours of bouncing around the high desert-what fun! The rock formations lived up to expectations, and we even managed to catch sight of our first road runner. Apparently they are nowhere near as friendly as the Bugs Bunny roadrunner!

From Flagstaff, we veered a little south to the small town of Datil, New Mexico. Here we spent the night, visiting with Evelyn, Dave Diakiw's aunt (Dave and his wife Joane, are our friends and next door neighbours in Wpg). Evelyn runs a fantastic bed and breakfast, with suites that have a very European flair. We had a wonderful time! Zoe and Benji took advantage of the wide open spaces and ran all over the place, with Evelyn's dog, Sarge, keeping a close eye on them.

Next it was a stop in Albuquerque, NM. The weather didn't really cooperate too much here. On Sunday we were able to visit the Old Town and get in a little shopping, and of course, have a wetalong the way in the Old Church Cantina.

Then we took a ride on the world's longest tram up to the top of Sandia Peak. Needless to say, the view from the top was magnificent. We were pleasantly surprised to find a ski resort on the otehr side of the mountain. Another plus for New Mexico on the "where we might want to spend our winters"list!

Now we're back in Oklahoma City. Got a round of golf in yesterday and took in a AAA baseball game on Friday night. High winds have been a constant since we arrived. Hopefully they will die down as the week progresses.

Awestruck at The Grand Canyon

There are many words that have been used to describe the Grand Canyon; words like awesome, magnificent, inspiring, overwhelming. None do justice in describing how you feel when you first view this geological wonder! We stayed at the South Rim and spent the first day walking along the upper edge of that rim.....

trying to catch a glimpse of the Colorado River twisting its way over a mile below us. Can you see it?

Perhaps if I zoom in....

By the way, that's the start of some Class 5 rapids, the highest classification of river rapids.

We awoke the next morning to an extremely strong wind. Did not want to be up on the edge of the canyon in that weather so we took a tour into the village and viewed the Grand Canyon movie on the IMAX screen. It's amazing how real its feels when you watch that big screen!

Later in the afternoon the wind died down a little and we got a little more adventurous. Obviously the Grand Canyon is a hiker's paradise. We decided to tackle one of the more well-travelled trails known as Bright Angel Trail. This trail leads all the way down to the bottom of the canyon, but if you decide to travel that far you really must stay overnight. The rule of thumb is 2 to 1. For every minute you travel down the canyon, it will take two minutes to climb back up. Given the late hour of the day, we went down for 30 minutes and then took the full 60 to return to the rim.

It's difficult to capture the essence of what we did, but to try and give you an idea, we started at the buildings in the top left-hand corner of the photo and travelled down to the the edge of the steep canyon wall in the botttom left-hand corner.

Had we had more time (and stamina), and continued down the trail this is where we would have travelled.

eventually reaching Phantom Ranch and the Colorado.

Grand Canyon Village has an excellent shuttle bus system for travelling around the park so you don't have to drive, and bonus - the drivers don't get lost! The park also has huge ravens - so big that you have to cover your sewer hose or they will destroy it!

Our last few days in Vegas were quite a bit of fun! We went to see Spamalot - a Broadway musical spoof of Camelot. It stars John O'Hurley, the current host of Family Feud. It was a hoot. We've decided that as far as the Vegas experience goes, we prefer Fremont Street to the Strip. While everything on the Strip is glamourous and expensive, it is also so expansive that you can walk for three blocks and still be alongside the same hotel. Fremont St is much more compact so you can pop in and out of the different casinos and bars with ease. I even managed to win $45 on the 5 cent slot machines - look out pension plan, here I come!

That's all for now. See you next week, probably from somewhere in New Mexico.

Viva Las Vegas

We're still here! Took in two shows this week - standup comedian Rita Rudner (very funny) and the American Superstars show. The second show was performed by Elvis, Tim McGraw, Rod Stewart, Michael Jackson and Christine Aguilera wannabe's. They were very good! After the show we went to the top of the Stratosphere Tower to see the lights of Vegas from above. The Tower offers a number of top of the tower amusement rides. I'm not brave enough to go on these rides when they are on the ground, let alone when they are situated 800 ft above ground. The daredevil of the family, however, does not share my fear and as such had to try at least one of the rides. I couldn't get a good photo but the ride shot him out over the edge of the tower (remember he's 800ft above ground), and then pulled him back, shot him out again, this time with a drop, and pulled him back once again. Not very long but I'm not sure my heart could have stood any more (and I was on the ground).

Travelled to Boulder City to golf this week and to see the Hoover Dam. Absolutely amazing! Perhaps not such an engineering feat with today's technology but to accomplish this back in the early 1930s is something else.

Notice where the water line is. The level on Lake Mead is down to a point where one of the government boat launch areas had to be closed.

The view looking down from the top of the dam.

They're building a new State highway across the Colorado River that will allow travellers to bypass the dam and permit larger vehicles to travel along Route 93. Jim says we'll have to come back when the two ends meet!

The last road trip for this week was out to the Valley of Fire. The valley derives its name from red sandstone formations, formed from great shifting sand dunes during the age of dinosaurs, 150 million years ago. The colors found in that area are outstanding and the pictures below do it no justice. We stopped for a picnic supper before returning to the city.