Nashville with Danahey on the Loose

 

 

If my recent trip to Nashville taught me anything, it’s that visiting tourist attractions on the third and final day of a three-day holiday weekend is a grand idea.

See, we headed down for the Labor Day weekend. That sounds like a Jimmy Buffett lyric. But he went to San Francisco.

We spent most of the rest of the trip hanging out with friends, either in their backyard, by their pool, playing Uno inside or hitting a nearby disc golf course.

I wound up getting hit in the head with an errant disc on one round and falling on my ass flinging a disc another time. I’m that talented.

Come Monday, we journeyed to downtown Nashville from Mt. Juliet. Mt. Juliet was the adopted home of country music hall of famer Charlie Daniels.

Daniels lived in Mt. Juliet for more than 55 years. The town named a parkway named after him, and a small outdoor mall. The mall holds a Christmas store. Artificial trees are going for $500 – $1,000.

 

 

Reba McIntire lived nearby, too. Her former home, the Estate at Cherokee Dock, is a wedding venue now.

Of course, you’re gonna hear about country music stars in a travelog about Nashville.

Non stars, too. On Monday, after parking the SUV in a lot near a mural of civil rights icon John Lewis, we walked past a couple of street musicians.

A cherubic, mustachioed white guy who looked a bit like Mr. Pringle picked his banjo not far from the Ryman Auditorium, the former home of the Grand Ole Opry. An older black man dressed in black jeans, a red shirt and a cowboy hat played guitar and sang Ring of Fire not far from that.

Across the street from the Ryman, I noticed the National Museum of African American Music.

Sure, we were along Broadway, AKA Honky Tonk Row, with its shops for tourists and bars named after country stars.

Let’s not forget that American music of all sorts is a mashup of sounds and styles. Country has roots in Celtic and Black music.

 

 

Anyway, we ambled over to one of those star’s bars, Friends in Low Places: Bar & Honky Tonk, the Garth Brooks-themed spot that opened in March. The spot’s marked by a g.

Brook’s bar is cashless, which means those low-placed friends need credit cards.

We were there by 11:30 a.m. and the place wasn’t crowded at all. In fact, downtown Nashville was quite navigable during the day on Labor Day – hence, what I said above about the best time to visit a usually bustling place.

At the Friends bar, a friendly young bartender waited on us. He struck up a conversation with me  based on seeing my $5 Walmart-bought replica 1914 Chicago Cubs cap. I told him I was a White Sox fan by birth, but that’s become a sad story.

So we started talking about baseball. The bartender hailed from Champaign, IL, where he grew up as a Cubs fan, the St. Louis Cardinals be damned. The bartender kept our Diet Cokes flowing. Turns out, soft drinks are free at Garth’s place.

However, the band  – working for tips – wanted $100 for them to play Charlie Daniels’ The Devil Went Down to Georgia, their favorite tune. This being a cashless bar, I wondered if the band took Venmo.

Apparently, people still had dollar bills with them, as the jar filled enough for the act to play the fiddle-heavy number.

Even though the band was less than 30 feet away, if I didn’t want to turn from the bar to watch, I could view the act on a TV above the bar.

Another convenient touch – the back bathrooms had a huge photo of Trisha Yearwood and Garth Brooks about to smooch leading to them. Yearwood’s face was on the women’s side, with Garth’s on the men’s side. East enough for tipsy patrons to remember which way to go to go!

The back wall held among its decor a neon Irish harp/Guinness sign. Brooks does claim Irish ancestry, not to mention the popularity he has in Ireland.

Speaking of Irish, we tried to hit a pub the day before our downtown visit. Alas, McNamara’s is closed on Sundays.

 

 

Instead, we ate at Edley’s Bar-B-Que. That turned out to be a very good choice. The brisket melted in my mouth. The chicken was tender. The pork was juicy. The cornbread popped with jalapenos. Great green beans, too. Yeah, I had the combo. I was on vacation, not on a diet.

Speaking of food, after wetting our whistles at Garth’s, we headed to Sixty Vines for lunch.

Sixty Vines is one of those places where you have to look up the menu on your phone. On its website you learn it’s an upscale casual chain with 11 locations, all in southern states.

The expansive Nashville location offers a great view of the Ryman and Broadway below. Its menus offered clues that Nashville, like most big cities, has a lot on its plate.

Being from Chicago I bring this up because I am tired of any time a TV show comes to town, they almost always mention hot dogs, deep dish pizza and Italian beef.

Ok. There have been weeks where I have had two of the three, plus tavern style pizza. But still. Chicago is a great town for gourmands, with world class eats beyond the cliches.

But back to Sixty Vines.

 

 

I almost had a Jack Nicholson Five Easy Pieces moment. See, we mistakenly ordered off the online lunch menu. Turns out Labor Day is a brunch day. The things you learn on vacation.

So the BLT I ordered wasn’t available. I asked if they had bacon, lettuce and tomato in the kitchen, but was told it had to be something on the lunch menu.

I found something called a “breakfast sandwich” on the brunch menu. You guessed right if you guessed it had bacon, lettuce and tomato on it.

Past that, though, it was a delicious dining experience. Appetizers included bacon-wrapped dates, crisp fried brussel sprouts and super tender and tasty beef rissoles. The beef was almost as mouth watering as the grilled steaks our hosts served upon our arrival Friday at their humble abode.

After lunch, we walked off our meal by heading toward Printers Alley.

 

 

First I took a quick look inside the aforementioned National Museum of African American Music, which was right next door to the restaurant.

I liked the One Nation Under a Groove artwork that greets guests. I spotted one of BB King’s guitars on display in the gift shop. One of the t-shirts for sale read 773-9311, and underneath that #IfYouKnowYouKnow.

I didn’t. My phone informed me it’s a Prince-written song from The Time, circa 1982. That’s not to be confused with 867-5309 from 1981. If you know you know.

Back on the street, fitting for the holiday, we saw striking employees picketing in front of the AT&T building.

Our walk was hillier than I thought it would be. I am too used to the flatness that is downtown Chicago. I need to get out more.

 

 

Speaking of, we were heading toward Printers Alley in part because of a recommendation of Chicago scribe Dave Hoeskstra. He suggested hitting a place called Skull’s Rainbow Room there. Dave wrote about Skull’s back in 2016.

It seemed worth checking out – and yet another reminder that cities are more than the bromides told to tourists. On a prior trip, we had stopped into the joint right next to Skull’s, the New Orleans-themed Bourbon Street Blues & Boogie Bar. That was fun, so we had a backup in place, just in case.

Alas, on Labor Day, both didn’t open until later that afternoon.

 

 

So we walked back to the car then drove to West Nashville to one of Dave’s other recommendations, Bobbie’s Dairy Dip. The soft serve place, which dates back to 1950, had a long line. Bobbie’s is across the street from Wendell Smith’s Diner, which Dave said was a favorite of the late, great singer songwriter John Prine.

Hattie B’s Hot Chicken  is close to Bobbie’s, too. In fact, Nashville and its suburbs have more chicken places – hot, fried or otherwise – than you can shake a drumstick at.

We opted out of waiting for a cone or milkshake and wheeled back to Mt. Juliet.

I emailed Dave some photos and to thank him for his recommendations. It was cool to see a Nashville neighborhood, one that for some reason reminded me of Chicago’s south suburbs, like Oak Lawn.

I also had a recommendation for Dave. He told me his brother down in Nashville is a vegan. Earlier on Labor Day we made a pit stop at the Nashville Farmers Market. Among its eateries are Lilly’s Hot Chicken, a stand hawking Chicago Style Gyros and a spot called Succulent Vegan Tacos.

Go figure.

I forgot to tell Dave about the brussel sprouts at Sixty Vines, or the beet salad Best Fest Buddy Tom had there. Don’t worry, carnivores. Tom added chicken to his salad.

The Farmers Markets is adjacent to Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park. That reminds me. Nashville has a lot of places with really long names.

 

 

The park itself is a long, narrow one. It offers a great view of the capitol building, which is up a hill. The park holds walls holding tidbits of information and quotes about Tennessee – and a World War II Memorial, too, Sadly, the park’s carillon bells were out of service.

The giant granite map of Tennessee was fun to explore. My favorite town name – Big Lick.

Flashing back forward, we left Nashville, sans soft serve, for one more dip in our friends’ pool, one more game of Uno, one more round of disc golf (minus injury-prone me).

Tuesday Morning is a fine Pogues tune (and 31 years old now!!). For Best Fest Buddy Tom, his brother and I Tuesday meant it was time to drive back north.

Our culinary adventures continued, though.

Intrigued by the hype the growing business has been getting, we stopped near Bowling Green, KY at an almost brand-new Buc-ee’s.

Staff noted how busy they had been on Labor Day, with all the travelers heading home. After all, Buc-ee’s has become a tourist destination across select parts of the nation.

 

 

Buc-ee’s aren’t truck stops at all, but have similar merchandise in bigger and better quantities. Nice bathrooms, too.

They sell souvenirs of all sorts for the kids, mom and dad. I picked up a sweatshirt for the impending fall. Tom bought the grandkids hats emblazoned with the Buc-ee beaver.

You can also find fresh-cooked meats, including brisket, prepared in a space for all to watch. There’s a stand where they make their own tortillas. At the candy stand, I bought a small square of some fresh blueberry cheesecake flavored fudge.

After checking out, I was so excited, I tripped over a curb stop on the way back to the car, skinning my knees and palms. So far, that hasn’t turned up as a viral video on social media.

Anyway, our final food stop was a chain place called Slim Chickens in West Lafayette. A polite college-aged guy took our order and brought us our food.

Maybe he’s an engineering student there at Purdue. He wasn’t tall enough to be on the basketball team or beefy enough to be a football player. Besides, those guys can get paid to play these days – and rightly so.

Either way, a college kid at work in a college town was another sign it was past Labor Day and fall is on the way.

Like my trip, summer went by fast. Faster than it may have taken you to read this post, even.

Happy trails. Or what this guy from Bell Buckle says on this wall.

Mike Danahey is a freelance writer living somewhere near Chicago. He’s available for hire and can be contacted by leaving a message for this post.