Shanna and Hanna Take Nashville!

The first weekend of August I took off on a little road trip to Nashville, TN with one of my dearest friends, Shanna. Shanna and I were both raised country girls listening to country and bluegrass music and lived on roads way off the beaten path in log cabins. We didn’t meet until we were adults, but I’m pretty sure God made us for each another. We are so incredibly alike and also so incredibly different. Plus, our names rhyme, perfect right?! ;)

Anyhow, we traveled to Nashville last summer and decided that a repeat trip was necessary this summer also. I left my husband to start a new police job while we were away and she left her two adorable and rambunctious little boys with their very capable daddy for the weekend.

We went directly from the highway to the historic Ryman Auditorium. We loved it!

This is us by the windows on the second floor!

 

We then headed over to Nashville’s very own Parthenon. It was built in 1897 for the Tennessee Centennial Exposition and is an exact replica of the Athenian original in Greece.

I didn't bother editing out the people, they gave scale. :)

We then headed over to Marathon Village to check out Antique Archaeology. Have you seen the show, American Pickers? Well, this is the place where you can purchase some of their finds. It was a neat little store.

 

After 5.5 hours of driving, tours, and shopping, we checked into our hotel. Which we dubbed the vampire room as it was black and red décor. Awesome room! We then spent the evening at the honky tonks on Broadway listening to some really great bands. Lots of fun! J

Here we are at Tequila Cowboy on Broadway listening to a band. Shanna will have to remind me of the name, but they were great! (We had a pink picture from the same place the year prior when we had lunch there)

We woke up bright and early in the vampire room on Saturday morning and headed over to the Carnton Plantation. The history of this beautiful place is really interesting. Here is a link to their website that tells parts of the history: http://www.carnton.org/carnton_history.htm. To tell it briefly, there was an unplanned and extremely bloody battle of the Civil War basically in the backyard of this house. The home was turned into a hospital for the Confederate soldiers. The blood stains that seeped through the carpets can still be seen on the hard wood floor in the house today. It was said that the doctors performed amputations every 15 minutes for hours. The amazing thing was, they had a 90% survival rating. If you are ever down near Nashville, the Plantation is in Franklin, about 30 minutes from Nashville. Totally worth the visit and here are some photos I took while there. We arrived when when they opened, so we were able to take several pics without other visitors in them and it rained while we were there. It went well with the somber history.

 The above image is actually the back of the house

 The brick shows where the original structure stood.

There are no images of the house from this side showing the original home.

 This is one of the old slave houses

 Front of the house

 Front walk

 One of the garden entrances

 Spring house, we went through the weeds to take a look at the creek on the other side.

The back of the spring house is falling down pretty badly.

 More of the gardens

 Its so pretty here.

 The soldiers cemetary. The family donated 2 acres adjoining their family plot to the confederate soldiers that died in the battle.

 The back porch

 Some of the headstones.

(I love the bird on the tall headstone)

The headstones in this photo are the family plot

 We left the plantation and headed into downtown Franklin. Had a great lunch at Puckett’s: http://www.puckettsgrocery.com/franklin/index.php. Then walked their main street and did some shopping.

Saturday evening we were of the lucky few that were able to get a reservation at The Bluebird Café. This show literally sold out within 7 minutes on the prior Monday. Reservations opened at 9am, by 9:03, Shanna had reserved us a table and by 9:07 it was sold out. There was a due called Granville Automatic, and 3 other guys that are all songwriters, Pete Sallis, Jon McElroy, and Travis Meadows. Each person has had some success with their songs. Sallis just a song he wrote that was recorded by Phillip Phillips go platinum, Meadows just sold the song “Riser” to Dierks Bently that will be the title track of his next album, and Jon has had several songs do really well including one that will be on the show Nashville this coming season. Here are a few pics that I snapped during the show.

 

 The girls of Granville Automatic and the back of Pete Sallis

 Travis Meadows

 The man in the ballcap is Jon McElroy

Two happy girls after the show! :)

We did a few other things after the show and made a few pit stops on the way home Sunday, including the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln.

 

Overall we had an awesome weekend in Nashville. Not everyone is so lucky to have a friend that has the same love of music, history, travel, culture, and so many other things as I have shared with Shanna. Our next adventure has yet to be determined, but wherever we end up, I know we will make great memories! 

 

Hanna :)