Off Day in Memphis

A big shout out to all the friends and fans of Brian Herms (which are many, but I am sure significantly less than the amount for his sister, Melissa)

When you go all the way to another part of the country in makes sense to see what the area has to offer. So, we planned a day away from the worksites and in hanging out in Memphis.

We began with a 9 am tour of the National Civil Rights Museum which is located at the Lorraine Hotel, where MLK was assassinated. It was a fascinating experience and the museum is great. I would recommend it to anyone visiting Memphis. The information was great and their interactive display were neat including a real bus like the one in which Rosa Parks refused to move. They even had the hotel room set up like it was the evening he died.

After the museum we headed over to Mud Island River Park. We rode a monorail over Wolf River to an island in between Wolf River and the Mississippi River. It was a great spot to spend a little over an hour eating our lunches. We got to wade in the 1/3 mile long replica of the Mississippi River which included informative information about the river's history. Although I think most of the youth liked sliding down a huge hill the most.

Afterward we headed out to the Memphis Zoo. They had great exhibits with the highlights being the Panda Bears and Polar Bear exhibits.

For dinner we had reservations at The Commissary, a local BBQ joint in Germantown just a street away from where we are staying. We had been told they had the best bbq in Memphis, and they might be right. It definitely rivaled the famous Rendezvous restaurant we ate at during our one night stop in Memphis last year. Although I better come back and eat each consecutively just to make sure.

We began worship, a little later on, by listening to Johnny Cash's (whose career started at Memphis's Sun Studio) "Folsom Prison Blues". Tonight we focused on the effects of prison life. In the song the narrator laments being stuck in prison while life passes him by on the train he can hear going by. We looked to see how the same effects of prison can be seen outside of prison as well, through economic, situation, bad neighborhoods, and even segregation (a special subject because of our Museum visit this morning.)

Tomorrow we will get back to work but the fun will continue. Thanks for reading.

The internet is so slow here that I can't load all the pictures in a reasonable amount of time. I did load a few from today and they can be found in the next post. I apologize, but I will try and load them all when we get back.

Blessings and Good Night,
-Nick