1st April 2026

Hello and greetings on this, the first of my travel blog entries on my US Road Trip 2026!

No sooner had I published my last travel blog entry on my February trip to Moldova and thus got all caught up with my travels for the first time since July 2025, I was on a plane again the next day flying westwards once more to my favourite country – the US of A!

I had already visited the United States three times before 2022, but after having jumped through hoops to get a ten-year tourist visa in early 2020, as my travels to Syria in April 2011 made me ineligible for an ESTA, I decided at the time to make the most of it.  Since April 2022, every Easter holiday, I have done trips to New England, Florida, California and South-West USA.  This time I was heading to the Deep South, also known as the Southland and more archaically “Old Dixie”, and I was excited!

I decided to begin my trip in Nashville, as it was the closest planned stop on this trip to London and thus came with the shortest flight – eight hours there, and only seven hours back again!  My plan was to spend two nights in Nashville, before picking up a car to spend a night up in Gatlinburg in the Great Smoky Mountains, two nights in Atlanta, two through Alabama and Mississippi, two in New Orleans, back through Mississippi again via Vicksburg, to Arkansas, Memphis, and then back again to Nashville to fly home again!  In the end I managed to fit in eight US states into my 15-day journey – it was one heckuva Road Trip, and I thoroughly enjoyed it!

On a late March day, it started out really well with a great flight from Heathrow involving a free cabin upgrade to Premium Economy!  With so much more space, a great seat, champagne before flying, upgraded food, a small cabin, and the seat next to me also being free, it was a really high-flying start to the trip – wahoo! I watched two films, “Driving Miss Daisy” and “Walk the Line”, both to get me in the mood for my Southland trip.  It ended really well too, with a quick exit, seriously friendly people in Nashville Airport with that lilting southern drawl already, and only five minutes through immigration – the fastest I’d ever experienced in the USA!  Took an Uber to my hotel, to settle in for my first night, and I was excited to explore Music City the next day.

Aside from a cracking headache for most of the next morning, I didn’t really have any jet-lag, and by lunchtime and a few swigs of Coca-Cola, I felt my usual self again.  I started the day with a bus into town, to explore lovely little Nashville.  Whilst being the largest city in Tennessee and home to just over two million people, the city and Downtown area had more of a small-town feel to it.  While I have been to many friendly places in America, I think this one has to be the friendliest so far to me.  I absolutely loved hearing the accent, and whenever someone spoke with it to me, I just couldn’t help beaming ear-to-ear, it’s so heartwarming.  And so many people wished me a “Welcome to Nashville”, or “the South”, or similar.

First up was a visit to the Tennessee State Capitol building to include a fascinating guided tour.  Nashville was the first Confederate capital that fell to the Union in 1862, and Civil War history is particularly in the air there.  I felt it would be similar throughout my trip through “Old Dixie”, and it was indeed to be so.  Presidents Andrew Jackson, James Polk and Andrew Johnson all began their political careers in this building, while Polk’s tomb is also located there – the only State Capitol building in the country to house the final resting place of a former president. American legend and native Tennessean David (Davy) Crockett is also honoured with a bust in the building, due to his involvement in the Tennessee House of Representatives in the early 19th century, before he became involved in wider US politics and ultimately and tragically ended up in the Alamo, Texas, in 1836.

The tour guide was great, and I just couldn’t get my head around simply being able to wander freely through the several corridors and rooms of the building, including the Senate and Representative Chambers, with government workers and officials just going about their duties around us.  The openness of government and democracy to the people in America is noticeable.

I then took a bus to the south of the Downtown area, a place called Fort Negley, whose Visitors Centre had a really interesting and informative video of how the city was captured by the Union Army.  It also told of how this fort, along with Fort Morton and Fort Houston, were built to protect the newly-conquered city.  I was particularly surprised at how Major General George H. Thomas, once he had taken the city, quickly claimed land from the locals to build the forts, often giving residents as little as two hours’ notice to leave.  Something I appreciated on this journey was how Civil War sites such as this one often gave the local Southerners’ experiences, which I appreciated.  After all, it was often not their fault that they happened to fall on the wrong side of history as it were.  A lot of the time there was really great suffering down there which is often overlooked by historical accounts of the war which often proudly, of course not wrongly, praise the triumph of the North.

Fort Negley today felt rather forlorn, unkempt and seemingly unloved, but the view over the Downtown area’s skyscrapers was memorable, especially the “Batman Building”, which was actually the main reason for my visit.  The “Batman Building” is actually called the “AT&T Building”, but just looking at it one can understand why it got its nickname!  I also met and got talking to a great guy from Wisconsin up there, a teacher like me, but shortly heading into a leadership role.

From Fort Negley I walked back into central Nashville, heading first to the fantastic Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.  I have actually quite recently gotten into country music, with my favourite singers being Joe South, Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash, and I was actually quite surprised with how many stars I recognised in the place.  Highlight themes playing around the Museum were Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs’ “Ballad of Jed Clampett” from the fantastic “Beverley Hillbillies” series, Jimmy Dean’s bittersweet story of “Big Bad John”, and Bobby Gentry’s tragic and rather mysterious “Ode to Billy Joe” – I actually drove along a bridge over the Tallahatchee River in Mississippi later on in my trip.  Probably not the bridge, and I also didn’t throw anything off it!

I finally headed for a wander through the main streets of town, mainly along and around seriously happening Broadway.  Even though it was mid-afternoon, practically every venue had a bar with a live band playing, often with an open window so you can watch them even from the street.  I imagine you could spend all day and evening hopping from live music venue to venue, as I believe many people were doing.  Cowboy hats and boots a plenty, it had a really jovial atmosphere, felt completely safe (as opposed to Beale Street in Memphis later on in my trip), and I really enjoyed my wandering in the Country Music capital of the world!

After a bus back to my accommodation for a whisky and a microwave meal, I finished the day contemplating what a fantastic first day I had just spent on this Southland adventure, and how much I was looking forward to the rest of it!

The next day I was picking up a rental car, heading east and up into the Great Smoky Mountains – I was excited!  More on that in my next.