Monday, May 08, 2006

Memphis Trip Part II: Walkin' In Memphis

This is Part II in a multi-part story that will detail our recent road trip to Memphis. To follow along with the pictures that accompany this blog, click here

The Peabody Hotel

Saturday morning came far more peacefully to Duke and me than to those who had stayed out til near dawn. We woke comfortably around 8 and cheerfully made our way downstairs for some breakfast at the Denny’s attached to the hotel. We debated roaming in search of a more Memphis-y breakfast, but since I don’t eat meat, we decided pancakes and eggs are pretty much the same no matter where you go. We opted for ease.

Our main goal for the morning was to witness the march of the legendary Peabody Ducks at the Peabody Hotel across the street. I must admit that this is truly a mysterious phenomenon of Memphis and even after watching it and snapping way too many pictures of it…I still don’t understand it. On the roof of the Peabody Hotel there is a cage filled with trained ducks. They live up there in relative splendor with a padded duck house and a heated pond replete with a duck-shaped fountain. Every day at 11am, these trained ducks are marched to the elevator, ride down to the main floor, and then march themselves down a red carpet to a fountain in the middle of the lobby while the speakers blare a march by John Phillips Sousa. Hundreds of cameras flash in unison and the collective sound of “aaaaawwww” can be heard even over the Sousa march. The ducks then swim around in the fountain until 5pm, playing celebrity and posing for pictures. And then they march back to the elevator with just as much pomp and circumstance and retire for the evening in the “penthouse” pad. This odd tradition has been going on since 1933.

The website explains that the whole thing started out as a joke. So the real question is, why do we keep flocking to the lobby at 11am and 5pm. I mean, sure, the ducks are freaking cute waddling down the red carpet. But so is my dog Arlo when he plays with his chew ring, and yet I doubt I could attract hundreds of people to my house to watch th event. Basically, I figure others go see it for the same reason I did…because we’re oddly fascinated that such an event occurs. We flock because we’re amazed that others are flocking. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle that does at least allow these five ducks to continue to living in the luxury to which they have become accustomed. It’s silly and utterly meaningless, but somehow it made perfect sense as Duke and I waited on the balcony, awaited a glimpse of waddling ducks.

But lest you think the ducks were all the Peabody had to offer us, there was also the tailor. The gentleman who owns the clothing store inside the hotel was once Elvis’s tailor and has one of the largest personal collections of autographed guitars in the world. He displays them on the walls of his store and it’s worth going into the Peabody just to look at all the names. Johnny and June Carter Cash, Kiss, Dave Mathews, VanHalen, the wide range was truly stunning.

Red Birds’ Stadium

After we were finished aawwing at ducks and gawking at guitars, we strolled in a random direction. As recently arrived tourists, we couldn’t help but see new sights no matter which direction we went, so we just meandered to the…I think it was to the right. As luck would have it, our random direction led us to Autozone Park where the Memphis Red Birds play. I just wanted to see the stadium since it really does look like a scaled down version of the new Busch Stadium, but as we got closer it was clear that the front gates were open. So we strolled inside. As we went inside it was clear that we could walk right up to the empty seats. So we did. We wandered the park for a while and marveled at the fact that they kept the stadium open and that everything seemed intact. It always makes me happy when people are left to their honor and behave responsibly. However, the complete lack of supervision and total lack of signs to discourage us did eventually lead us onto the field. I assumed they wouldn’t be happy to see us there, but we were careful not to damage the grass and tried to be good citizens despite our probably trespassing. We walked the grass and enjoyed a few photo ops in the dugout and were about to continue our street wandering when Jet finally called to let me know he was up and about.

“Where are you guys at?” he asked.

“We’re on the baseball field”

Jet’s voice when muffled as he relayed the message to someone else, “He says they’re over at the stadi…wait. Did you say ON the field?”

Literally a minute and a half later, Jet and the gang rushed down the stairs of the stadium. The boy can move when properly motivated. They instantly headed for the locker rooms and I handed him my camera. While I had no intention of pushing my luck that far, I certainly wanted to see any pictures he came back with.

Ultimately, a friendly security woman caught Jet and his friends on the field and felt that some form of back-up was going to be necessary to remove the guys from the field. I was able to talk her into not calling whoever it was she wanted to alert about the trespassing and motioned everyone off the field. It seems we weren’t supposed to go into the seating area, although how they expected us to intuit this barrier I have no idea. I was pretty sure we were pushing it on the field, and clearly the locker rooms were a violation, but I’m still not sure why they didn’t lock the gates of at least put up some ropes if they were so serious about keeping people out of the seats. Ah well. No harm done and we got some great pictures out of it.

Graceland

Our next stop was the home of the King. It’s another one of those things that I can’t explain the appeal, but which fascinated me. I’m not a big Elvis fan and the house isn’t that spectacular, really. However, Elvis is undeniably one of a handful of American Royalty, more like a Greek god than a human in the legacy he left behind. So, when given the chance to take the holy pilgrimage to Graceland, I couldn’t help but go. And I’ll admit to being impressed with both the place and with the man. I still don’t own any Elvis music, but as with the ducks…it just makes sense while you’re there.

I’ll not bore you with a description of the tour. But, I will say that the decorating styles of the 1970s got more bizarre and outlandish the more money you spent. Having grown up on shag carpet, I had made my peace with the home décor blunders of my parents’ generation. But Elvis’s wealth allowed him to take these bad ideas to whole new levels of hideous. Shag ceilings, man…shag ceilings

Pre-Beale Drinking

We returned from Graceland with tired feet, so we lounged about the hotel for a while. Since half of our party had shown no interest in Elvis and had instead gone golfing, we had some time to kill before their return allowed us to head to dinner. The frat boys characteristically chose to spend this time filling up their beer reserves after the three torturous, alcohol-free hours at Graceland. What most amazed me about this period was their ingenuity for beer transport. The once-hidden keg had now found a place of honor on a wheeled hotel cart. This allowed the party to easily roam from one room to the next and added a touch of class I must say. Andy had taken to drinking his beer from a hotel coffee carafe. This allowed him to carry twice as much beer as his peers with no fear of confusing his drink for someone else’s. However, the small bit of class added by the brass keg cart was quickly washed away by Andy’s presentation

Soon, they were all sporting a comfortable buzz and were ready to hit Beale Street again. And this time Duke and I would tag along…for a little while.

CONTINUE in PART III

4 comments:

Moksha Gren said...

[Moksha hides his head in shame] But...but..everyone knows about Graceland. I didn't know what to say about it without sounding like a tour guide. The Peabody Ducks, on the other hand, needed some set-up to be appriciated as the oddity they are.

However, I would be thrilled to see the results if you are able to turn our headphone lead tour of Graceland into an interesting narrative ;)

Anonymous said...

Yeah...the shag carpet ceilings and the tour guide (we had a real person) insisting that Elvis did not die on the toilet is what I remember most.

Moksha Gren said...

Now THAT I would have talked about. But the headphones never even mentioned the word toilet.

Anonymous said...

That tour was probably why they switched to the headphone tour. We had a pretty insistant guy arguing the toilet theory as well as much drug abuse which the tour guide adamently denied. I'm guessing there isn't much arguing with the headphone tour, although that would spice it up:)