Memphis

Happy New Year! The planned sleep in did not occur. With the clock being an hour behind, we were up and ready to go by 830am! We decided against waiting for Opry Mills to open as this would not occur until 10am. Instead, we left country music behind and pushed on to Memphis, home of the blues.

The first day of the year was to be a precious "do nothing" day! We arrived at the Homewood Suites and we were driven to the nearby mall by the free hotel shuttle. We pottered until the arranged pick up time by the shuttle. Our room was still unfortunately not ready. The friendly staff turned on the television for us and provided a basketball for the Malcolm and children to play with. As soon as our room was ready, we lazed the afternoon away reading, watching television, playing boardgames and doing three loads of laundry!

The laundry had Malcolm chatting to locals who were staying here and discovering some interesting information. We learnt that no one lives in Memphis by choice and that it was not a city where you would want to bring up children. We were not sure if it was circumstances of the particular people that we were talking to, but it was rather sad. One of them was staying here because her house had burnt down.

More importantly, we had the local's recommendation of the best pit barbeque place to go to. The sightseeing will begin again in earnest tomorrow!

One of our favourite chains

The fireplace makes for a nice warm change from the very brisk outside air!

Finished pottering at the mall. Waiting for our shuttle to pick us up

Heaven for a 5 year old. Watching television for nearly 2.5 hours without any disturbance from Mummy or his siblings

Playing with his newly bought boardgame