Meridian and Tupelo

 

This morning we woke up surprisingly early (still on Eastern Time, I guess) and got going. We knew one of the highlights of Meridian, Mississippi was an antique carousel, so we drove to see it, but it's inside a building that was locked on a Sunday morning. We looked through the windows at it.

However, it was in a very nice park with gazebos, fountains, and ducks.

These are muscovy ducks.

This is your basic domestic duck.

And some sort of mallard hybrid?

More muscovy ducks.

Notice that "Duck Rules" don't include the #1 rule we usually have in Wisconsin: do not feed the ducks.

There was also this carousel horse.

And this statue of a guy who was president of the city's parks commissions a very long time ago.

A memorial to Jimmie Rodgers, the Singing Brakeman, who was famous for yodeling in his songs.

And there was a little train.

Then we went to downtown Meridian and walked around, admiring the architecture and the carousel horses all over the place. We also checked out the Mississippi Walk of Fame, which has a lot of stars like this:

There sure were a lot of famous people from Mississippi! Here are some more photos.

The beautiful, tall building is the Three Foot Hotel. That must mean something in town, since there is a Three Foot Brewing Company, but of course they weren't open on Sunday morning.

Details on the Three Foot Hotel.

This is a memorial for a soldier who died in World War I in the battle of Muese-Argonne.

This church played music that could be heard all over town. It was very pleasant.

We walked to St. Patrick's, since I had read they had Mass at 8:30 and 11:00 so it should have been in-between Masses. However, the 8:30 Mass was at a church called St. Joseph's. Still, there was nobody around but the church was open, so it was perfect for taking photos.

And guess what? There was a carousel horse outside of it!

The bathrooms were in the school next door, and this is the gym.

Here is a shot of the outside.

We couldn't find local bougie coffee downtown, but there was a Starbucks in the Three Foot Hotel, so we did get to go into that magnificent building. They had this entertaining sign:

We were well down the road in Macon, making a pit stop, when Travalon realized he didn't have his swim trunks and beach towel so he would need to go to the War-Mart just up the road to replace them. I didn't care about the swim trunks, but the beach towel was a souvenir from Miami Beach with an art deco design, so I was bummed about that. I called the hotel, and they said they would look for it, but they wouldn't mail it to us even if we paid the postage. We went to War-Mart, where they only had kids' beach towels so Travalon had to buy a regular towel. They also only had swim trunks with either a Friday the 13th design or a Nascar design, and Travalon decided he hated race cars less than horror flicks. As we drove down the road, it occurred to me that I might be able to find the beach towel online, so I searched for "beach towel Miami beach art deco pink" and got a bunch of hits - and one of them was our towel! So I ordered it. Then the hotel called and said they couldn't find the swim trunks and towel, so the mystery deepened - where could they be? Travalon looked in his backpack and suitcase but couldn't find them.

Our next stop was Tupelo, the birthplace of Elvis Presley. We got some stuff at the gift shop and took the tour of the museum and the house he was born in, which his father built.

We asked the lady at the front desk what was open for lunch on Sundays, and she directed us to a lovely sit-down but not too fancy restaurant, where we had blackened catfish. As one of my sides I had smoked gouda grits with jalapeños - oh man, were those good!

In Mississippi we listened to Elvis, but when we got to Tennessee, we switched over to Johnny Cash. I had wanted to go to an antiques shop to get a rosary, but we doubted any would be open on Sunday, and we had passed a bunch that weren't... but suddenly we passed one that was! No rosaries (the guy said there were no Catholics in the area), but Travalon got a really cute miniature Texaco gas pump. I did get a cheap plastic rosary at the church in Mobile, but the one in Meridian didn't have free ones for the taking. At least now I do have one Southern rosary.

We stopped for gas at a weird place that had three-fourths of its pumps out of order - how do they stay in business? Travalon wanted an iced coffee to stay awake, but we couldn't find any in the cold drinks case, which seemed really odd. Finally we found them in a small cooler off to the side. Boy, was that place different!

Since it is Sunday and things tend to close early, we decided around eight that we'd better find some dinner, even if we weren't hungry yet after our late lunch. We went to Zaxby's, a Southern chicken chain, and almost everything on the menu is over a thousand calories, but the Asian "Zalad" was 530. Sold! It was pretty tasty, but I am already hungry again. However, it's nearly bedtime, and it's Lent, so I'll just offer it up. 

We got to our hotel in Paducah two minutes before the pool closed, so we will swim first thing tomorrow morning. When we unpacked the car, Travalon found his suit and beach towel underneath his suitcase, where he hadn't thought to look, but of course they were still wet, so it's a good thing he has a new suit and towel. We are staying at a very nice Holiday Inn overlooking the river (not our room, though) so after swimming, we'll take a walk down by the river. That should get us some exercise before our long drive home.

Famous Hat