Nashville

I spent my last morning at Steve's getting my blog up to date, uploading photos and generally all the things that you don't want to do, but in my case need to. I don't want to forget what I felt, the impressions I had and the people I've met. Despite appearances to the contrary I don't take photos of everything and even when I do take photos I often forget of who or what they are. I left some beer in the fridge for Steve to say thanks and went to catch the local bus to the Greyhound station. The bus driver was great, let me off at the nearest stop and gave me directions. On the last part of the walk I was getting worried, I couldn't see the station and it looked an unlikely location for a bus station. Normally the bus station is in town, a bad part of town to be sure, but town. This one was set off the road behind a trailer park opposite the local, small airport, basically in the middle of nowhere. I got my ticket and sat down to wait for the bus. The bus arrived on time from Atlanta but was already full, the ticket guy was in a foul mood and just shouted at us "You'd better get on this bus or you'll be here till 9.30". None of us knew what the hell he was talking about, we didn't know that our direct bus to Nashville was full. It turned out that we were being put on the bus to Knoxville in the opposite direction and would then catch a connecting bus to Nashville.A two hour bus journey took me six hours so I didn't arrive in Nashville until after 10pm. I caught a cab to my CS house and Jim was waiting to let me him. I apologised, but he totally understood and showed me to my "apartment", he has turned the second floor of his house into a separate apartment. I would have my own private bathroom and sitting room. We shared a beer and chatted for a while before I wanted to put the day behind me. I know I have endured longer bus rides before but in this case I hadn't expected such a long bus ride. Instead of taking the shortest side of the triangle to get to my destination I had had to travel around two sides of the triangle. I'll be glad when I don't have to rely on Greyhound again.

Jim dropped me off in town in the morning and I went to the Ryman Auditorium, the former home of the "Grand Ole Opry". Before coming to Nashville I hadn't known that this was just a radio program broadcast by an insurance company. The company would let people come to listen to the broadcast and in the 40's they had needed a bigger venue to do this from, they moved to the Ryman. The Ryman, like the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, had been built with another purpose in mind. It had been built has a worship hall for a local evangelist preacher and still has all the original pews in it. It's such a cool place, I only recognised half the people who have played there. The lady giving the tour kept asking me if I knew such and such and I would have to say no. I wouldn't say that I am a fan of country music, I only know the people whose records have made into into the U.K. charts. It's such an amazing place, so much history. I wandered around for a bit after the theatre and then went to the Capitol building and took a tour. This is the first Capitol building that I've seen that doesn't have a rotunda, it does have a small round tower on the roof though. And they have two people buried in the building and a president buried in the grounds, according to the guide they're the only Capitol building where this has happened.

When I left the State Capitol the weather had changed from just cloudy to rain. It was exactly like a British winters day I had to smile. I went to the Tennessee State Museum, which being free and warm made it the perfect place to go. At the moment there is an exhibition charting the segregation protests of the early 60's. The best part of the exhibition is that they have photos of some of the protesters as they are now and what some of them are doing now. One of the guys is a US Senator. Awesome. I spent an hour in the public library before catching the bus back to Jim's. The next days weather was no better and I spent the morning in the house, I didn't want to go out but I forced myself and went to see the new home of the "Grand Ole Opry". It's a modern looking theatre that doesn't have half the charm of the Ryman. It isn't helped by being located on the same site as a mega mall and the "Gaylord Opryland" hotel. It has all the charm of a KFC at midnight. I went out that night with Jim, we met some of his friends for a few beers and then went to watch a band play.I drank too much, but what you gonna do?It was Friday night and I didn't have to get up the next day.