After breakfast at Brother Junipers, we headed about 15 miles down the road to Graceland. We all knew we were going. We’d talked about it for months. None of us were prepared for how fabulous it was.
TCB stands for “Taking Care of Business” – one of Elvis’s mottos.
The admission prices are ridiculous, but we knew that going in. Thankfully, the cashier reminded us we could have a AAA discount with a valid card.
As it was shortly after opening, the incoming crowd was steady. We were instructed to head to a theater which showed a 7 minute movie on the life of Elvis Presley. I got a little teary as Elvis always reminds me of my dad. We exited the theater and followed the directions of the staff to an outdoor queue.
They then took a photo of us they offered to sell to us for $35 an hour or so later. We queued for a bus over to the mansion. Upon entering the bus we were all handed headphones and mini iPads for our upcoming tours.
We boarded the bus for the mansion and again had to queue to enter the mansion. It was at least 95F and we not only had to wait for the bus in front of us to get the front-step-spiel, but a bus of VIP package guests also got to enter before us. We finally entered the mansion, and for the rest of the day we had no more waiting.
The iPad system is really cool. It occasionally didn’t detect where we were on the property, but for the most part it was fabulous. Major facts and cool tidbits were narrated by John Stamos. You could spend as much time as you wanted in each room, and there were little extra links on the iPad that you could hit if you wanted to. For example, when you were looking into a certain room, if you hit one of the camera icons, you might then see a photo of Elvis sitting on the couch in front of you playing his guitar.
Elvis designed this room on the first floor for his parents, including a walk-in closet for his beloved mother.
The narrator said Elvis would position himself for a grand entrance into the foyer when guests arrived.
This TV, though… LOL
The stairs to the basement.
I want this rec room! There are plenty of seats on these couches!
After we exited the mansion, we rode the bus back over to the main complex. We then realized we had barely scratched the surface of what was there. We spent the next few hours looking through his cars, clothing, and other memorabilia, including a section devoted to his military service. We also enjoyed the wide variety of shopping experiences. They sincerely enjoyed the shopping and Nigel had a very hard time deciding what to treat himself to.
I smiled to myself as I took this photo next to the Johnny Cash outfit in the area of people who were influenced by or worked with Elvis. Nigel had no idea where we’d be going later.
We thought about grabbing some ice cream, but decided instead to just get ourselves over to a Walmart for lunch food.
We enjoyed our first car lunch: sandwiches made at 75mph, with macaroni and potato salads, chips, and — cookies!
From there we lazily drove to Dyess, AR. No one under 46 knew where we were going.
Our GPS indicated we would get there at 3:05 P.M.
The website said the last tour left at 3:00 P.M. I called them about 10 minutes out and explained we were coming from NY and were likely going to be 5 minutes late. They joyfully offered to hold the tour for us!
Nigel saw the sign about five miles before we got there:
Johnny Cash Boyhood Home
This area boasts a rich history of swamp-land-turned-family farms.
From Wikipedia:
Dyess Colony was established in Mississippi County, Arkansas in 1934 as part of the New Deal efforts of Franklin D. Roosevelt to provide economic relief to ameliorate suffering in the Great Depression. The experiment was the largest such community-building experiment established by the federal government during these years.
Basically – families who met the criteria and were willing to take on the arduous work of converting swamp land into farms were given a house, a chicken coop, and a small barn.
The old theatre still stands
and the colony center administration building has been turned into a museum and meeting space.
They still have the original projector from the theatre house.
Can I tell you how much I love the fact that Nigel just happened to have on his Johnny Cash t-shirt?
After watching the movie that explained both the New Deal effort and how the restoration was completed (including oversight by Johnny Cash’s sisters) we looked around the museum before getting on the bus to head over to his house on Plot #266. We were joined by one other couple. The woman’s mother was raised in the house next door to J.R. Cash and she was eager to see what it may have looked like.
Our bus driver was the former mayor of Dyess.
We left Dyess around 4:30 P.M. and headed west to Fort Smith, Arkansas. We had planned to grab dinner at a KFC buffet, but we wanted to swim. A few miles out we called in pizzas, so after we got to our Homewood Suites, we unpacked the van, gobbled up pizza, and hit the pool and/or showers.
By the time we hit the bed, most of us had been up well over 24-hours except for some nap time in the van the night before.
Let the good times roll.
Dayspring Disciples 