It's a crazy town full of weird historical monuments and walls

Being in the state capital and all, and despite the let downs of Montgomery, we headed to the state capital building (pretty impressive) but only after a detour to the Parthenon. That's right. Apparently locals are very proud of their local, scale, replica of Athen's Parthenon. I would have thought, having gone to all that effort, you could match the colour of the stone, but apparently not.

Nashville, USA, 2012

Athens, Greece, 2008

We then toured the historical factoid wall where we found these little gems:

and particularly relevant:

But let's be honest, it's really all about the frozen drinks.

And the music.

If only there was a way to combine these two wonderful things (more on Beale Street later). So we spent the afternoon lounging in the sun and soaking up the music......... just divine.

Before the mandatory, and surprisingly veg friendly, east Nashville fried chicken pitstop for dinner we managed to run into Billy Joe again, this time at Layla's. It was all we could do to drag ourselves away. Especially when fellow audience members provided their own entertainment (this guy is a self-admitted Quebecois):

Alors! c'est un garcon vache!! 

Fried chicken is something Nashvillians can get worked up about like Texans and bbq - it even made an appearance in our Cat Bird Seat fine dining experience. So when we were having the (also mandatory) meat and three veg dining experience at Arnold's (it cannot be lieft unsiad that the banana pie here was amazing, although admittedly also the only banana pie I've ever had so can't compare it against anything) we did some research among our fellow patrons and decided Pepper Fire was the place to hit (ask us offline about the advice we received entirely unsolicited from our crazy Kentuckian cab driver, it's NSFF or indeed, NSFTI (not safe for the internet)). If you've clicked on the link you'll see that the serving counter at Pepper Fire is somewhat reminiscent of a jail cell and let's just say the tables stood in for petrol bowsers in the "dining area".

But by god was that chicken (and, in the case of our intrepid fellow travellers, fried cheese) good. I may have started to google house prices in east Nashville at this point....

And then on to some more amazing music, this time grass of the blue variety: check them out here (listen to "It's hard to stumble"). A little bit gospel-ly, but good so good.











Let's just say we were sad to say good bye....

Keep Austin weird... and Nashville just the way it is.

arrival in Nashville

the runners, complete with previously unseen  number plate

Hollywood with a touch of twang seems like a bit of a stretch but your intrepid reviewers fell in love with Nashville. Leaving our intrepid fellow travellers to "hang out at the hotel" (which apprently now means go for a 9 km run around the city),




we immediately hit up the fine Scotsman for some Jeremy-style "duty-free" booze; there may be stores offering a wider selection, or more helpful attendants, but none so perfectly named or, we suspect, able to offer 1.75 litres of Hornitas tequila for under $30.

that tiny blob between two enormous cars is Paul, carrying approx 4.5 litres of booze

We were sorry to have to pass up the Boot Country three-for-two deal on cowboy boots, but for some reason only one of your intrepid reviewers was keen and was unable to persuade the other intrepit reviewer or intrepid fellow travellers to join the party. And as that one intrepid reviewer already has a pair of cowboy boots that have probably seen more than their fair share of London, going in for three additional pairs seemed, at the time at least, a bit much.

We were already getting the sense that Nashville, despite it's reputation as the capital of Hicksville, is actually a more of a less self-satisfied Austin - possibly because it is (rightly, in the view of at least one of your intrepid reviewers) embarrassed about launching the careers of some truly awful musicians, and our visit to the spectaclar Cat Bird Seat (despite it requiring us to book at 5am a month earlier) cemented this view.

A separate post of our delicous meal and tastey drinks here will follow. 

Our verdict: Nashville has it going on. There's no risk of red wine being served with sushi here (sorry).

After dinner we followed the advice of Cat Bird Seat's very cool chefs and servers and dissed Tootsie's in favour of Robert's western world. And what a western world it was, with Billy Joe on the trumpet and any number of locals two-stepping away on the dance floor, the miller high lifes didn't taste too bad at all. The music, oh the music. Both your intrepid reviewers were in heaven (despite their sometimes diverging musical tastes).

Pardon me, boy, have we stumbled into Georgia?

In the fine tradition of arriving at the border of Azerbaijan when we intended to be in Armenia, en route from Birmingham, Alabama to Chattanooga, Tennessee we found ourselves in Georgia. Georgia was disappointingly unwilling to welcome us with a formal sign, but as the i59 took us past Trenton and then through the Chattanooga valley, it became increasingly obvious we weren't in Kansas (or, more accurately, Alabama) any more, Toto (and neither were we yet in Tennessee).

Chattanooga seems to have been home to more than its fair share of civil war reenactors, and the battles which often preceded them; a scenic drive to the aptly named Point Park quickly showed how unsuited the rocky and mountainous terrain was for wandering around in woolen underwear hoping your gunpowder didn't catch alight...

It also left us wondering where these tiny little towns get the budget for the vast array of perfectly manicured public parks and sparkling new public art displays... at least according Parks and Rec, we thought middle America was in the middle of a funding crisis?

Isn'timmitation the main point of public art?

While being the low point in the accommodation stakes of our holiday (I'm looking at you Ramada Limited), Chattanooga was certainly the high point in the surprisingly pleasant and good food providing stakes. After making the most of said public parks and art, we jumped on the recommendations of Chowhound and had one of the most delicious meals of the trip at the Meeting Place -

Our new favo(u)rite restaurant

it's only new and you should totally get there now (well, if you're in the Chattanooga vicinity or 100 miles or so from there). The menu is packed full of top-chefesque lightly modernised American specialities (ramps, shrimp, grits and sweetbreads) all explained by the extremely helpful server in the future tense, which seems to be the standard construction employed in America - "there's gonna be some chow chow, and the chef's gonna take it and grate it, and then there's gonna be some hot sauce... " giving the menu descriptions the pleasing air of a session with a gypsy fortune teller, except when he employed the same phrasing to describe dishes already at the table, giving him the air of a very bad gypsy fortune teller.  But with fried chicken that's gonna be that good, who's gonna complain?

Alabama: Separate, but equal

Birmingham: A faded town riven by racial strife, with an American namesake.  No such problems have ever faced the US version, at least according to a succession of governors and mayors, who uniformly assert that any apparent problems are caused by "outside agitators"... which brings us to your intrepid investigators, who agitated vigorously in favour of racial equality and tasty soul food for all.

pickled veg, southern style

The tasty food, including some spectacularly good pickles, was provided by the good folks at Ollie Irene, who wasted none of their creative energies on naming the place.  The racial equality... let's just say it remains a work in progress.

Birmingham's civil rights museum paints a pretty terrifying picture of southern life from the late 19th century rollback of post civil war voting rights, up until the time when racist politicians stopped trying to disenfranchise minority voters, which we're hoping will be any day now.  It's very hard to listen to Alabama's unofficial national anthem proclaim "in Birmingham they love the (segregationist) governor" without remembering just how limited a definition of "they" is being used.

whipping into Tennessee at approx 80mph

Perhaps by way of karma, Birmingham now features a hollow, empty downtown and an inviting highway, heading north, to Tennessee...

Revenge of the alligators

It's no secret that the perry mason dixon investigators enjoy a bite of alligator from time to time.... so you can imagine our concern when we saw this guy next to out little airboat:

(Video credit to Fran, we were approximately 4 metres from this guy)

Boycotting Montgomery

In Moh-beel we embarked on our first foray into the suburban and incredibly cheap chain motel with the surprisingly extremely good Windgate by Wyndym and following another delightful sleep on an american king bed we utilised the motel's fine location in the middle of a mall and made for some shopping. Our jetlag facilitated a civilised recconaissance tour of the mall pre-opening which meant when the shutters came up we were ready to launch; Fran and Dyl into JC Penny, FootAction, Finish Line etc, us into The Limited (a favourite of mine for their special combination of name and mission statement - something about dressing a gal for the career of her dreams yet... well.. that name??) and Forever 21, only slightly deterred by their decision to brand as XXI down here in the south - I tell you that can  be confusing given the array of other stores perhaps targeted at that as a size rather than age...

And then it was back to downtown Moh-beel for a wander through the delightful architecture and some attempted The Band Perry spotting (sadly unsuccessful).


Since Nawlins, food has not, unfortunately, managed to be the highpoint of our days. But the one thing to be said for the Gulf Coast is it` knows how to produce a delicious oyster, and the restaurants seem to know that natural (or raw as they prefer it) should be an option. And so it was that we started our recent run of successful dining experience at the Oyster House

we  were so happy to see these we ordered three plates

Montgomery, as the title may imply, was not an overwhelmingly awesome state capital and we could see why it was accident rather than intention that led to the Freedom Riders ending up there.

not very inspiring

But we circled round and before making quickly for Birmingham we stopped by possibly the most famous bus stop in the world...



and before jumping into our dodge and leaving dust behind us, we made time for a photo op with the trojan the mascot of the no doubt prestigious Troy university.

Gettin' Mobile on the Bayou

Following a sadly julep-free breakfast your intrepid reporters set off through cajun country, in search of airboats and alligators.

Mission Accomplished

Sterling Archer famously described riding in airboat as "what having sex with me must feel like" and, after an hour of whipping through the swamps at high speed, we could only agree.  Those fans generate a surprising amount of forward momentum and can completely ignore a carpet of weeds and moss than stops just short of actual dry land.  There are the expected, but still impressive, gators, and unexpected wombat-sized swamp rats. (Awful American) beers were consumed and a bald eagle, symbol of American majesty, soared gracefully above, looking for a giant rat to eat...

This boat is travelling in this direction at approximately 60mph

Long story short, airboating is awesome and you should try it out as soon humanly possible.  Somewhat less impressive: The Mississippi gulf coast, which is the sort of place that lets Brighton residents feel superior about the quality of their beach.  We made a beeline for the border, stopping only for an oversize bourbon at a terrifying cirrhosis-factory of a strip mall bar, and to admire the stars and bars of the state flag.

I'd probably cling to the past as well...

There are not many places from which entering Alabama feels like a relative return to culture and sophistication, so it was perhaps Mobile's good fortune to be located so close to the awful, awful Mississippi casino strip, where the gamblers lose simply showing up.  But, even if it was benefiting from the soft bigotry of low country expectations, we rather liked Mobile, with its interesting mix of architecture and christianised-New Orleans feel. The "Mexican" food was about as good as you would expect, but the beers were cold, the people friendly and the incongruous metal concert pleasingly raucous.

Even the pawn shops are pretty

Fried Green Magnolias at Midnight in the Cold Mountain Garden

Easter Sunday began with a petting zoo, stocked with some very cute ducklings and an alarmingly duck-hungry rabbit, who had to be put in timeout after vicious attacks on several of his fellow attractions.

The subsequent easter parade felt a bit half-hearted, but did feature some impressively hatted ladies distributing stuffed toys to children and one of your intrepid investigators (not the one you're thinking...)


We sampled the staples of the (nomenclature-disputed) Gambia, which was surprisingly delicious  and then met with our second Bosnian cab driver (???) and embarked on one of those extremely painful try-to-find-place-located-on-XYZhighway-number-abillion and hire our DODGE CHARGER. That's right, after only a small amount of making the most of southern hospitality we were hitting the road to our plantation house sans the"or similar" aspect of car hire that haunts the cheap and un-pushy.

We arrived at the stunning (and oddly, owned by Sydney healthcare-magnate Paul Ramsey) Nottoway in time for a sunset stroll of the grounds, sipping mintless juleps on our balcony and saying (well, declaring) "well, I do declare" in an attempted Kentucky accent. There followed a brief period explaining that veal was probably not a key staple of a vegetarian's diet and dinner on the private bowling alley built for the original owners' 11 children.... I do declare it was a very fine experience indeed.  In keeping with the emerging support-our-troops theme of the holiday, we were somehow granted a military discount on both room and dinner.  Semper fi!

Who dat who say dey gonna beat dem hornets?

This season, approximately 80% of the New Orleans' opponents have correctly predicted dat dey would be among the large group of teams who would prove capable of besting the suddenly lowly Hornets, and I suspect most of the remainder at least thought they were going to win.

Such was the case with the unfortunate Minnesota Timberwolves, who couldn't quite hold off a hornets team that had been granted an extra dose of patriotic fervor on "military appreciation night", which appeared to consist exclusively of dressing the cheerleader in ill thought-out khaki bikinis.  All six Hornets fans in attendance were suitably excited about their (rare) victory over a superior team (very common).

Winding back a bit... Nawlins is definitively on the manic side of the United States' bi-polar relationship with the demon drink.  Not only are they allowed to sell it, as will not be the case in some parts of the South - Lynchberg, for instance, whose name serves as a reminder of the potentially dangerous consequences of getting a bunch of economically disappointed white folks liquored-up -  but they can mix you some of the finest craft cocktails this side of our lounge room and then dejectedly pour them into a plastic "go cup" so that you can get hammered without missing a moment of the action.

And such action!  Bourbon Street, in particular, is well paid to think of itself as the vomit repository that never sleeps (in close competition with the tube, were it to stay open past midnight), even if that means half-heatedly yelling "party!!" at tables of Eastern European tourists just trying to have a chat over their cups of hurricane-flavoured syrup. Four of us were able to dominate a dance floor during the not-much-in-demand 2-3pm shift (following a n\helpful round of test tube shot masquerading as "cocktails", to a version of Jay Z's "on to the next one" so bowdlerized that even "cojones" had been bleeped out, and a version of Mystikal's "shake dat ass" so unbowlderized that the title is the only portion I can reproduce in this (allegedly) polite company.

Your intrepid investigators were also able to put a significant dent in the seasonal crawfish stocks, sample the uniquely creole  basketball treat of nachos in a spinach and artichoke sauce, accompany an eldery lady on the maracas and pay $5 to listen to an elderly black man complain about his life, despite the fact that such experiences can be had for free on any corner in the city.

 The night ended with a suitably ironic pabst blue ribbon and a well-earned collapse into a giant, American -sized bed.


(Days since last food poisoning/lost items incident: One)

Laissez les bons temps rouler !

So our day of persuading ourselves that 6am London time was actually 6am Central time ended with complimentary three-gin cocktails from an indulging waitress and a reunion with our (yes, already) lost camera. First day - not too bad.

Paul had started the morning with an item-by-item inspection at Heathrow and continuing this streak of lucky special attention from security we all had our first ever experience with the controversial milowave scanner at Houston airport - suffice to say a design that didn't require you to assume the execution pose immediately on arrival in death-penalty enthusiastic Texas may have had a warmer reception! (Oh, and of course Paul was subjected to full body pat down by a man wearing cowboy boots.)

But all was well on touch down in New Orleans (the main risk to date: that someone takes badly to Paul's insistent impersonation of a Cajun, which consists mostly of using the word "dat" and attempting to "guar-on-tee" things. Hopefully our airboat tour driver on Monday can extend his vocabulary a little....)

And of course the highlight of the first day: seeing our gorgeous Houston family who had driven across to join us - the star of show:

Oh and of course going to John Besh's restaurant August wasn't too bad either. You can't go wrong with an amuse bouche of cavier, truffle and seafood foam.... followed by amazing crawfish tails with country ham foam, then Christian's favourite dish the spring onion soup with bacon croutons and peas, confit yellow fin tuna with chick peas,then rib eye steak with oyster bourdelaise, oysters and oyster mushrooms and a take a on affogato for dessert - all just lovely!!!