Wright and the Opry

While we were at Red Bay waiting for service, we drove up to Florence, Ala.  We wanted to see the Indian mounds (or at least I did) and the site was closed.  Well, there was a Wright house there and it was open.  We toured it and it took over an hour.  Our docent was full of knowledge.  That cover back there is a car port.

One side of the house was all windows.  This was the dining room.  A couple and their four boys lived here until the wife needed assisted living in 1998.

Her kitchen.  The first kitchen was about he size of a wet bar.  Four kids????

The halls were all shelves. The doorways were only 2 feet wide except for the front door.

We got finished in Red Bay and drove to Nashville.  It was Thursday so no show, but we took a backstage tour of the Opry.

This is where the stars check in and get their dressing room.

The place where your grandparents sat.  They were on the ground floor.

This wooden circle is from the original stage at the first theater, the Ryman.

Back of the stage

This is what a audience member might see on show night .I took pictures of some of the dressing rooms but they were too dark to share. 

 

We were in Red Bay for 8 days for 4 hours of service.  But the people were friendly while we all waited our turn.  At least I now have a working microwave. We're in Kentucky today.  We're heading out to Mammoth Cave National Park this morning.  We're in Cave City.  Tomorrow we head out to Bardstown and on to the Bourbon Trail.  We have six days before we meet up with the Derby Rally.  Sounds busy and a blast. 

Love, Mom and Dad

We spent Sat. and Sun. afternoons with  Sally and her family.  Pepper is a hoot.  She was so interested in how Uncle Sonny and her were related.  She asked all sorts of questions.  And she took to your dad right away.  He was delighted.

We're in Red  Bay, Alabama now at the Tiffin service center. While we are waiting to get into a service bay we took a tour of the Tiffin Factory.  It was loud but interesting. The guys build the inside before they put on the sides.

This a rig finished just before it goes to the paint barn.

Still waiting so we drove into Florence for lunch.  On the way back we went to the Coon Dog Cemetery.  It's out in the sticks.  And you have to prove your dog is a Coon Dog to get buried here.

There are tons of graves of dogs there.  Coon Dogs are very revered here.

 

 

We found out today that we will probably get service on Monday.  Cross Your Fingers!  There is not much to do here in Red Bay.  We could go to Mississippi to see Elvis' birthplace.  Or where Helen Keller was born.  Both of these are  a fifty mile drive round trip.  But the people here are really nice.  You all know how I hate to wait for things.  I've been really pretty good waiting this time.  Tomorrow we are going to an Indian mound site. We'll see what we will do Sunday.  But I'll bet most everything will be closed.

That's all this week.  Love, Mom and Dad

The end of our tour

While in Savannah we had a riverboat tour.  When we were taking off the Nina and the Pinta pulled into port. 

All tied up to the pier.

We had a trolley tour of the city.  We had the whole trolley to ourselves.

The houses are huge and from before the Civil War.

This is The Angel Oak just outside of Charleston.  It's at least 450 years old.

We visited the only tea plantation in North America.  We bought tea. Surprise

This is the machine that harvests the tea.

We tried to get to Patriots Point last Saturday.  The point was all closed off because of a fun run.  We wandered around waiting for the roads to open and were only one hour late.  It was a hoot.  This is an old diesel sub.

That is the Yorktown.  We also saw a destroyer.

Later on in the day we got on a ferry and went to Ft. Sumter where the first shot was fired in the Civil War.

The entrance to the fort.

That is a shell still in the wall from when the Union got the fort back in 1863.

We went to Asheville, NC last Sunday.  This is the last stop of the tour.  We had a free day so we drove on part of the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Nothing was green yet.  As a matter of fact part of the parkway was closed that day for a while because of snow.

Tuesday we went to Biltmore to visit the House.  It's huge and has 250 rooms.  We couldn't take pictures in the house, so I bought a book.  We climbed a lot of stairs from the third story to the basement.  I was pooped.

 

After we left NC we drove to Stone Mountain in Georgia to rest up for two days.  We camped in Stone Mountain Park.  It is really pretty.  We went to see the mountain carving and this is as close as we could get.  It really is huge and pretty.  The mountain is a large stone.  We drove around the four mile road that encircles the rock.  It's really weird; there is very little growing on the mountain itself.   Just one huge rock.

 

 

We are in Breman about 10 miles from Sally's right now.  We go to her house tomorrow.  We leave Georgia Monday morning to go to Alabama.  We're going to get a few things worked on at the RV factory in Red Bay.  That's all for this time

 

Love, Mom and Dad