It has been a whirlwind of a week with getting everything ready for our trip. This included getting a ton of marking done, report card marks and comments ready, Tim/Faith and Def Leppard/Poison/Tesla concerts, Emceeing the Calgary Ukrainian Festival all weekend, 5-6 hours of landscaping, several ATA Meetings, a few soccer games, a whack of landscaping and planting garden, removing/replacing/repairing the kitchen sink and tap set, helping setup a play day for all grade 1/3 classes and oh - teaching as well. Phew!
It's been exhilarating and exhausting all at the same time.
Getting the boys setup for a week while we packed and prepped for our USA adventure got us to bed after 11 last night and asleep by midnight.
A quick 3.5 hour nap and the alarm went off after 3 and gone before 4 to pickup Randy and Jeannette. Off to the airport, parked in Park & Jet and into the airport. Check in of course has some grief attached as computers don't seem to cooperate with us. Eventually we got through security and grabbed a bite to eat at Chilis.
Our first plane was great - 3/3 with with video screens and movies. We got part way through Jason Bourne and nodded off for an hour. I got through an hour of Logan and we landed in Toronto. Hardly a cloud in the sky as we departed only to be halted in the narrow hallway 6 ft off the plane by a lady(used far too kindly) who felt obligated to stop and text. Seriously lady? My exact response to her as she made a slight effort to move 6 inches to the side. I think I may need a bit more sleep...
We got inside and were welcomed to the labyrinth that is Pearson International. We made our way up escalators and down hallways after a pretty good walk to arrive at security. Thank you NEXUS cards for the super fast line that we breezed through.
We decided to try a baguette place and we vowed to try lots of unique food on this trip. So looking forward to getting to Memphis!
We walked duty free shop and Krista found a 3 pack of mascara for a smoking hot deal and I splurged on a Reese's Peanut butter cup package... big spender...
We wandered a bit longer before heading to gate 90 way way way at the end of the earth. It was neat to see all the smaller hub cities that Air Canada flies to like Indianapolis, Rochester NY, Memphis and others. After we checked in, we walked outside on the tar,AC and boarded our little 20 row 2/2 rinky dink plane and had to wait for almost half an hour to depart.
Is it odd that Air Canada flights take off directly over a cemetery? I thought so...
Once we got on the air, the countryside was quite beautiful as we made our way to Memphis.
We arrived about 445 pm and got our luggage. We headed to the car rental and Randy rented a beautiful brand new Toyota Avalon. We programmed our GPS for our hotel and 10 minutes later we arrived at the Vista Inn and Suites. Nice and affordable and only a couple blocks away from the Westin where Randy/Jeannette are staying. We Facetimed the boys to get an update about their day and some tests and all was well. We unpacked and then walked downtown a mere 2 blocks.We stopped in eat the beautiful Peabody hotel - extremely high end and very similar to the Palliser in Calgary. We took the elevator up to see the famous Peabody ducks - a half dozen of them that march down from their roof patio and splash in the fountain all day and then back up in the evening. The view from the roof over the mighty Mississippi River and downtown core was breathtaking. We grabbed a quick nibble at Subway and took a peek at the Canuck bar on 52nd st.
We met Randy/Jeannette and headed to the famous Beale street - home of the Blues/Jazz sung about in countless songs by BB King/Marc Cohn/Elvis. Coincidentally there was a Motorbike Rally / Show & Shine with several hundred bikes parked over 4 blocks. Bars with live in at Silky's Irish pub for some refreshments and nibbles and met the two resident goats who came down from their tower to visit us.
We wandered down the street taking it all in and stopped In at Coyote Ugly for a quick game of football and started heading back. We popped in to a tshirt store and then walked over to the Westin for a bit. We stopped in at Jerry Lewis' Entertainment Emporium to watch a few minutes of a live music performance of a character banging on the piano and running around the room. Most bars had someone playing live music.
Gibson guitars has a factory store across the street and coincidentally 5-6 guitars in a case pun are allowed to try out. After a bit of a jam and tickling the ivories on a baby grand, we headed a few blocks away to the Blues City Cafe for some of Memphis' finest ribs and catfish! Quite simply a finger lickin experience.
We walked back to our hotels as 11pm after having been up at 3 on 4 hours sleep. A long fulfilling day of sights and sounds, food and drink.
We listened to he sounds of racing motorbikes until about 1130 when it quieted down quickly and off to dreamland we went... great start to our adventure of music in June 2017.
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