The Feild's and the Carson's took a road trip to Memphis to visit the immersive Van Gogh exhibit at Graceland.
I had not been to Graceland in years and had no idea they now have a conference center with shops and restaurants. As usual, we arrived early, so got to explore before entering the first time slot for Van Gogh. While we had a good time, and I can say I am glad we went, it was a bit underwhelming, and a tad expensive. You first enter a room with screens of electronic paintings with a history of Van Gogh.
The next room is supposed to help your eyes adjust, but it was kind of a waste for me. Then you enter THE room where the walls are all screens
and Van Gogh's various paintings come and go--some starting out as line drawings
which then get colored in,
some have interactive movement, and all is put to music. You can sit on benches or on the floor, or walk around, but to get the full experience, you have to stay in one place for a while. From beginning to end, we were there about 45 minutes and saw it all.
You end in the obligatory gift shop with some overpriced souvenirs, which of course we bought.
Then we drove to Beale Street, parked the car and went in search of food. We had a good lunch at the Majestic Grill and then checked in early to our hotel. The guys rested, while Chris and I went exploring along the river, seeing the sites. It started to lightly rain, so we went into the Peabody
to enjoy the ambiance and see the ducks and have a little repast. A brother and sister from Glasgow just happened to sit next to us, so we had a wonderful visit and Chris got reconnected with her Glaswegian past! What a small world!
It was raining pretty good as we headed back to our hotel, but we had rain jackets and made it fine. After drying off and changing we went to dinner at a fabulous restaurant called The Flight Deck. You can order all courses in flights or just do solo choices as we did. The menu is diverse with interesting offerings including kangaroo, ostrich, as well as chicken and fish. I had the wild boar
with a berry compote, and it was delicious. We started with mini beef wellingtons for an appetizer.
Everyone's meal was delicious, and we were pleasantly stuffed when we left. We will go back there. The food was superb and so was the service. The rain continued all evening, but we ubered to dinner and back, so not an issue. We checked out the rooftop bar of our hotel and saw some gorgeous views in spite of the rain.
After a lovely breakfast we headed home with no issues. A quick but fun get away.