Day 25 - 9th November

The morning after.  It is good to note that the sun still rose this morning.  Donald Trump has been elected president of the United States of America and the world did not end.  Not yet at least J

And so starts, the post election analysis and hand wringing.  How did everyone get it so wrong.

We spent most of the day on the road, driving from Nashville to Memphis, via the Shiloh National Park, which is another Civil War battleground.  We did a self-drive tour of the park, stopping for photos as specific points in history, taking photos as and when opportunity presented itself.  Best that Joe fill in any details, I spent most of my time in the car with the air con running (it’s still very warm summer temps here) following the election coverage and laughing at the enevitable memes that have surfaced in the wake of the outcome.  There are some witty and creative people out there !!

[Joe] Shiloh was one of the bloodiest battles up to that time. In April 1862 there was a plan by the Union to try & cut Confederate rail links in the area, so Union forces were shipped down the Tennessee river and landed at Pittsburgh landing and encamped around Shiloh church. They were expected to be reinforced by more Union soldiers but the Confederates attacked before the reinforcements arrived.

Over the two days more than 50,000 Union & 40,000 Confederate forces clashed leaving over 23,000 as casualties. The battle progressed with troops being fed in, and seemed to be a terrible “slugging match”. In the end the Confederates lost a popular general and withdrew although the Union forces did not pursue.

Like Antietam & Gettysburg, Shiloh has become a byword for the type of terrible fighting that occurred in the civil war, and so the opportunity to see the ground for real and see the famous church site and “Hornets nest”.  Like most (maybe all) national battlefield sites, this one is run by the National Parks service, and entry is free. We picked up a map of the site from the visitor centre, where the staff were very curious as to our accents and, when told, how long it took to get to the US from NZ.

Driving around the park and stopping at various sites took at least an hour. The park meanders through lots of wooded areas and fields, and is dotted with markers, monuments and cannon to indicate the relative positions of various units. The preservation of civil war battlefields is, from what I have seen so far, excellent, and much effort must go into the research to be able to position these markers effectively.

The Shiloh church, which gave the battle its name, no longer exists as it was destroyed during the battle, but an exact replica was built using 150 year old wood, so is the next best thing.

After a good look at the site and the cemetery, we headed off to Memphis and the next stop on our tour. 

We arrived in Memphis just after 3pm and duly checked into our hotel (no Sleep Inn, we have learned our lesson) and are very handily placed in downtown Memphis, opposite the Peabody Hotel (more on this later).  We schlepped our luggage up to our room and then set out for a walk to get acquainted with the area.  It was a short walk to the Mississippi river, and we strolled along the river front and then made our way back down Beale (Walking in Memphis…… walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale – the lyrics of the song made famous by Mark Cohen).  This is the music and bar/restaurant part of town, similar to New Orleans and Nashville, though much smaller here than Nashville and the music has a blues/rock feel rather than country.  It is much quieter there than Nashville, we are definitely tail end of the season here, and shops and things seems to close at 4pm.  It’s also noticeably cooler, and we have finally broken out the long sleeve tops and may also have to upgrade to long pants and shoes rather than shorts and sandals.  Probably about time, I’ve worn the same sandals every day for the last 4 weeks and they are stinky.  No, really, they STINK.

We stopped in at the Peabody hotel to see the world famous Peabody Ducks.  Yes you read that right.  There has been a tradition since 1933 – the owner came home from a hunting trip, with his decoy ducks (real live ones) and after a few drinks, set them loose in the hotel fountain and went to bed slightly under the weather in the early hours of the morning.  When he got up next morning, the ducks had made themselves at home in the fountain and had not escaped, and so the tradition was born.  Every day at 11am, they ducks are brought down from their lodgings on the roof of the building, through the elevator, across the specially laid out red carpet to the fountain in the middle of the hotel lobby.  There they stay for the day, swimming in the fountain and quacking happily.  At 5pm, the reverse happens.  The ducks are lead from the fountain across the specially laid out red carpet in the lobby, up the elevator to the roof where they are bedded down for the night.  This has become a great tourist attraction, and when we got there at about 4.30, the lobby was packed with all the prime spots taken.  We were able to get a bit of a glimpse of the whole process from the upstairs mezzanine.

Dinner was at Rendez-vous – a renowned rib place conveniently in the alley next to our hotel.  They are apparently the best ribs in Memphis, and they were seriously good.  Then it was back to the motel for a bit more election result hand wringing and then an early night to make up for not much sleep the night before. 

By the way there are reports on Stuff of “rioting across America as people protest against Donald Trump winning the presidential election”.  Of course, we have seen none of this.  America is a VERY big country, and the reality is that there are a few hundred spoilt brats not able to accept a valid result, that are making a bit of a fuss.  How typical of the sensationalist media to blow things completely out of proportion !