My purpose for being in Nashville was so I could take a day trip the Jack Daniels distillery in Lynchburg. Lynchburg didn’t seem to have much to offer past the distillery and I though Nashville would be a more interesting place to stay but it was not on my list of place I had to see. My first impressions weren’t great but in hindsight that was probably due to tiredness from riding the Greyhound overnight, an experience I am repeating as I type this unfortunately. Lets just say I am thankful my bus ride to San Francisco is a day time ride, even if all I see is the interstate. Thankfully a walk downtown and meeting some other hostel guests lightened my mood considerably and an early night finished the job.
Nashville turned out to be a city of surprises. I hadn’t really thought about what I would do there to pass the time on my non-Jack days and wasn’t expecting much from my visit, maybe that’s why I ended up having so much fun. I hadn’t expected that my trip round the states would involve bar hopping with random international folks. I never expected to visit the replica of a greek monument in November when it was 22C outside. I certainly didn’t expect to share my pilgrimage with new friends, or be interviewed on a dorm room floor by one of them. I didn’t expect any of it really but I’m glad it all happened.
On the day of the visit to Lynchburg I was really excited. I never thought I would get the opportunity to visit it and I think my companions were quite amused by how excited I got as we neared our destination. Before we reached the distillery we stopped by the town square and one of the first things I noticed were the bikes, which my man would have loved. Walking round the square my melancholy was over taken once more by excitement only to return when we enter the official JD gift shop. I agonised over a JD mug with his name on it but in the end I left it. It was hard because I know he would have loved to have taken that trip and of course I wanted him there but if he was still around then I wouldn’t have been there. Sometimes this widder lark really makes my head hurt. So buying gift s for folks back home was hard but also good (yes if you are a JD fan you can probably guess the theme of your present this year). It was fun to find things that would mean a little bit more than the usual gift. Post present buying it was time to go to THE distillery.
On our arrival at the distillery I literally bounded up the steps in my joy at being at the home of Jack and demanded someone, anyone, take my photo there. Inside the visitors centre I walked about reading about the history and brewing process and I had a few moments of melancholy but they soon passed. Having taken in all I could returned to my friends and waited for the tour to start. During the tour I was concentrating so hard to understand out guide I didn’t really have time to be sad though I had the odd moment, mostly though I enjoyed being in the home of Jack knowing that of everything I did in the USA this was the one that he would most have approved of, well after visiting my family that is. It really was a pilgrimage and I finished it off by buying a new bottle of single barrel JD. I guess there is some significance to that but again I know he would approve and hope he would have done the same in my place.
What made Nashville so much fun was the folks I met in the Music City Hostel. They were even friendlier than the folks I met in DC and when three of them said they’d be interested in coming to the distillery I was more than happy to have them along for the ride, especially as one of them agreed to do the driving, something I had not been looking forward to. Nashville: from random monuments to momentous occasions; from eating in fast food joints to dining in a steakhouse bar; from laughing in disbelief at the sleazy men in one bar to harassing the poor extraordinarily talented guys at the duelling piano bar it was all good fun. To end I think the best I thing I can say is that both literally and figuratively Nashville rocks.
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