Rail USA 2025

Our room didn’t look any better in the morning than the previous night. I suspect the warehouse look might be trendy but if so it was wasted on us.

Breakfast in the Arcade Diner, oldest restaurant in Memphis, as used by Elvis, apparently. Having tried grits yesterday G went for another traditional dish, biscuits and gravy. Just as unsuccessful. Biscuits would be fine as scones with a dod of butter and jam but here they are served with fried eggs & sausages and are covered with a sort of lumpy white sauce. Gravy it certainly isn’t. And not to be repeated. Looking at the menu again it isn’t easy to avoid grits or biscuits & gravy. Some dishes have both, doesn’t bear thinking about.

We then had 2 hours to catch the Greyhound to Nashville from the bus station which was about 6 miles away. Checked on line. A half mile walk to catch a bus which took 40 minutes. Nae problem. Did the walk which took us to a suburban street with no sign of a bus stop. Mmm. No panic. Had plenty of time to walk to the previous stop which we hoped would be more obvious. A very friendly girl in a car stopped and asked us if we were lost. She didn’t know anything about a bus but offered to take us to the local bus station where we would be able to get lots of buses to the Greyhound station. Went with her but it took some time and this station was in the wrong direction. When we got there and asked it turned out that there was only one bus, it had left, the next one was in an hour, and would be too late for our Greyhound. Bother. Never mind, just have to get a taxi. Not so easy. Taxis here don’t take cash or Apple Pay, or credit cards. You have to set up an app, register a payment method, get it approved etc. No taxi. Eventually a security guard took pity on a couple of down and out pensioners and persuaded a supervisor for the bus company to give us a lift to the Greyhound station. Awfy nice of them both. Arrived with 45 minutes to spare which was as well because they started boarding 30 minutes before departure. Reasonable 5 hour bus trip although I do much prefer a train.

Pleasant mile walk through downtown Nashville to our hotel.

Receptionist suggested a local blues club for food, live music and drink. Slight hiccup as the bouncer wouldn’t let us in without ID. I assume because they check absolutely everyone rather than we look under 25 or 21 or whatever the limit is here. Had to go back to the hotel to collect driving licences. Worth it though.Читать далее