Walkin in Memphis

En route to memphis we came to a triangle of states called Texarkana this is the point where Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas meet and an excellent photo opportunity!

Arkansas fun facts
- President Bill Clinton is from here
- Walmart started here
- Milk is the official state beverage
- A person from Arkansas is called an Arkansan

Then we arrived in Memphis, Tennessee to some hard core rain it was a nice change of pace and who doesn't love a free shower. With no time to waste we got dolled up and ready to eat and cruise down Beale street!

Memphis fun facts
- Known as the city of blues
- Elvis Presley's home, Graceland is located in Memphis. It is the second most visited house in the country
- Martin Luther King Jr was shot here
- Beale street is the Mecca of partying
- Famous drink, the hurricane
- FedEx was started here
- Birthplace of Justin Timberlake, Aretha Franklin, the lads from Kings of Leon and many more

Our first stop was Kooky Canuck's for dinner and I tried my first piece of catfish and an infamous southern appetiser deep fried pickles with honey mustard dipping sauce! A true southern experience om nom nom I thoroughly enjoyed it as well as my larger than life summer sunset cocktail! After that we (the wolf pack) hightailed it outta there to Beale st and found this awesome little bar with this crazy cat called big daddy singing a song called stroke it (100% naughty innuendo) and then he did a johnny cash cover which was to die for! After that we cruised down the street to a few more bars ending up at Silky O'Sullivans where you could buy a bucket of punch to destroy your life or the world famous hurricane consisting of:
Captain Morgan spiced rum, dark rum, passion fruit juice, mango juice, sweet & sour mix and a lime wedge aka Delicious!

Then we got up bright and early to visit the last home of the king, Graceland! The house itself was not as big as I thought it would be but nevertheless the decor was amazing each room had its own personality a lot of gold trim on block colours such as purple and blue I thought it was classic for the era. My favourite rooms were the jungle room and the pool room. The jungle room was literally shag carpet and the furniture was decked out in animal print. The pool room walls and roof were covered in multicoloured curtain similar to a chandelier spiralling from the roof down the walls it was so 60s! My other favourite part of the house was the awards hallway filled with every single gold record and a room full of all his movie posters, his Saturday midday movies were always my favourite! Then it was time to head back to town.

We headed to the Civil Rights museum which is attached to the motel where
Martin Luther King Jr was shot. This museum was so in depth and extremely moving you got to walk through the specific changing events of African American history that took place such as Rosa Parks sitting in the white section of the bus and the sit ins that took place throughout the south protesting segregation and the non violent marches led by Martin Luther King Jr. Then came the chilling moment, where you walk through the back of the motel room he was staying in and you can stand behind the corner of the balcony where he last stood before being shot on April 4, 1968. This museum is so important for everyone to understand the history of how people behaved in the past and the mistakes that were made to ensure that future generations never repeat these horrific acts of inhumanity ever again.

I then ventured to the rock n roll museum. There are many famous musicians who were born and/or started their career in Memphis, I found the introduction video the most interesting part of the museum and hearing the famous artist through the jukebox, there is also the Sunset Studios museum where artist recorded their music but I ran out of time getting to that one.

For dinner we headed to our bus driver Jerry's recommendation, Gus's Fried Chicken, World famous! It was a simple little restaurant pretty bare with the classic checkered tablecloth and food served in plastic baskets I thought it was really authentic. Obviously we had to order some deep fried pickles as appetizers and the family fried chicken meal for 4 with slaw and beans on the side (don't worry there was 4 of us) it was divine I particularly loved the smokey BBQ baked beans as baked beans are a staple for me back home of course I over ate and indulged in the refill lemonade but it was worth it!

For our final night we headed to BB Kings House of Blues to listen some awesome bands and have some dranks. I highly recommend checking this place out if your ever in Memphis it has an awesome energy. For our last stop we hit up the infamous Coyote Ugly bar this was the first time I didn't get up and dance on the bar true story.

No rest for the wicked it was time to head to Noleans! (New Orleans)

~JBomb

Grizzly bear

In my head

Two weeks, Grizzly bear

~JBomb

All my exes live in Texas

Texas fun facts
- Texas was an an independent nation from 1836 to 1845
- Dr Pepper was invented here in 1885
- Texas is the second largest state in the US behind Alaska
- Texas is the second most populous state behind California
- Texas’ nickname is the “Lone Star State” as a reminder of its struggle for independence from Mexico and to represent Texas as an independent republic.
- Texas is the only state to enter the United States by treaty instead of being taken over by the United States without choice.
- The frozen margarita machine was invented in Texas (what would I do without them!)
- The convenience store 7-eleven was started here
- One of the most popular state symbols is the Texas longhorn a type of cattle with extremely...you guessed it...longhorns!

Amarillo
So we arrived at our first stop in Texas and instantly my main man Drake's lyrics came to mind "all my exes live in Texas" as I was rapping this on the bus some actually asked if it was true and I said I wish!

So we had a small amount of time to complete our maximum look for one of the best American holidays ever, Halloween! I went with the Mean Girls approach, “In girl world, Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total slut, and no other girl can say anything about it.” This generally involves lingerie and some kind of animal ears, so I decided to go as a leopard, I'm pretty proud of my
leopard makeup as well! But first we had dinner at The Big Texan we all enjoyed a normal sized steak meal and two boys from the bus signed up for their 72 ounce steak challenge, that is 2 kilos of steak PLUS a bread roll, side salad, potato and shrimp. All had to be consumed in 1 hour in order to get the free meal and an insane amount of pride that comes with completing the plate otherwise you had to pay $72. So they attempted and did a great job however neither finished nor made it out past one drink I think they were feeling a little full...

So we raged on at the local bar the name of which escapes me probably because a scotch and coke was $3! it was a great night the costumes were epic and we got to play DJ all night with the awesome jukebox! Unfortunately there was no best dressed award otherwise I like to think I would have been in the running! And the hotel rooms were to die for they actually had saloon doors to enter the bathroom and the outside was decked out like old school cowboy saloons ours being light pink with a hot pink trim. Then it was time to get up too early with the worlds worst hangover and drive on a bus for what felt like eternity to arrive in Dallas!

Dallas
Where cowboys come from! Its not how I imagined it would be its a huge city with a massive skyline of fancy buildings but it was awesome. On the first night we headed to Gators for some delicious fajitas and "wine" which could only be referred to as gator blood because it tasted just like it. Then for the few that signed up for the worlds "scariest" haunted house aka a walk through Northbridge in my opinion with people jumping out at you and then asking for tips... actually come think of it I must have become thick skinned with all the crazies I've come across in my travels because I get scared walking down a peaceful street. Then it was back to Gators for the epic karaoke session. Piri opened it up with Rollin in the Deep, Adele and then the rest of us knew we needed to drink more if we wanted to think we sounded half as good as Piri. I signed up for my fave Heartbreaker, Mariah Carey with Piri just so I could emulate her voice. Then Phoenix got up to bust out Livin La Vida Loca, Ricky Martin raising the bar and then Simmons and Phoenix (part of our wolfpack completed by Eliza and Stacey) busted out their go to karaoke song ....the Grease megamix! And what a megamix it was complete with all the characters voices so the bar had been raised yet again and I decided it was time to bust some Juicy, Notorious BIG so Tommy boy and Bing got up with me and it was off the chain with Tom stepping in front of the monitor running off script because he is a such a baller and knows all the words. Then they invited girls to dance on the bar so I did my womanly duty. A great night indeed!

On our second day in Dallas we headed to the 6th floor museum which is a tribute to John F Kennedy's life and assassination on November 22, 1963. It is located in the building where the believed gunman shot from (a lot of conspiracies on that one very interesting). The 7th floor allows you to stand where Lee Harvey Oswald (alleged shooter) stood and peer out the window onto Elm street where a white X marks the point where he was struck by the bullets during the motorcade. This was one of the best museums I've been to, it was in depth but not overwhelming and you can do the audio tour which allows you to go at your own pace and absorb it all, highly recommended!

Dallas cowboy stadium was our next stop for the day

- Costs to build the stadium totaled 1.5 billion dollars which makes it the most expensive sports venue ever built
- The video screen weighs a ginormous 1.2 million pounds
- Full capacity combining seating and standing room is 100,000
- Guinness World Records awarded Mitsubishi Electric and the Dallas Cowboys the title of World's largest High-Definition Video Display
- With the roof closed the entire statue of Liberty could fit inside the Stadium

We got to take a tour of the entire complex pretty much just reminded me of a site inspection for work, however the locker rooms were fun got to see the cheerleaders uniform that I aspire to fit into, well the mid section anyway because my top half could easily fit and then we saw the players change room which smelt like delicious buff men, I even got to don a players uniform shoulder pads and all! Then we hit the playing field and got some snapshots on the famous Dallas Cowboys star and scored some touchdowns!

The next adventure was dinner and a rodeo in Fort Worth, now this place looks like the Texas I imagined! Wooden buildings, vintage signs, saloon doors it was awesome. We had dinner at Riscky's Barbecue where I had my first cut of brisket!
~ Brisket is a cut of meat from the breast or lower chest of beef or veal. The beef brisket is one of the nine beef prime cuts ~ Wikipedia
It was rather delicious served with mash potato, slaw and a pickle! I also drank a margarita the size of my head for $4 people! Then it was time for the rodeo! Not gonna lie it was a bit repetitive cowboy comes out on a bull for few seconds then falls off, the clowns in the pit distract it with props whilst the cowboy on a horse lassos the bull and drags him to the pen basically an animal activists dream date. The cowboys also lasso calves and tie their legs together in time trials and they get the kiddies in the pit to chase a baby calf and sheep to get the sticker off their back and win a prize...to each their own.

Texas we had some crazy times from Halloween to Gators, football and cowboys but I can hear Memphis calling my name!

~JBomb

Utah, Colorado & Old New Mexico

On our way to Colorado we stopped at Monument Valley in Utah which has a lot of Native American history and some beautiful rock formations on the borderline of Arizona and Utah.

Fun facts of monument valley
- Red sandstone cliffs and spires are predominantly made of Cutler Formation sandstone from the Permian period of around 160 million years ago.
- Monument Valley's rock formations are noteworthy mainly because they resemble animals or other familiar images and need no further explanation.
- Monument valley was the backdrop for the scene in Forest Gump where he has been running and turns to his gaggle of followers and says "I'm pretty tired I think I'll go home now"

Native American Facts
- When America was discovered the land of the Native Americans was taken from them
- They have a 45% unemployment rate
- 51% graduate high school
- In 1924 Native Americans were recognised as US citizens
- In 1948 Native Americans were allowed to vote in the state of Arizona and Utah
- With the help of native Americans the US was able to win WWII by using their native language to send messages that could not be decoded
by the Japanese.

Durango, Colorado
We got to do some line dancing! We learnt the electric slide, the cuban shuffle and the classic cotton eye joe, it was so much fun! We worked up quite a sweat then headed to dinner afterwards we ventured to Walmart for last minute supplies and then had a few beverages at the local watering hole. We got up bright and early for a jeep drive through the Durango countryside learning about the history it was FA-REEZING!!!!! But luckily I had my trusty bomber jacket with me. Then we hit the adorable main street and had the most delicious pizza, rocket parmesan salad and artichoke dip paired with some awesome red wine which assisted our nap on the bus as we headed to New Mexico!

Albuquerque, New Mexico
Once we arrived in Albuquerque we headed out to dinner for some mediocre tacos and a few drinks then we hit the hay to get up bright and early for the hot air balloon ride! We have been anticipating this since the beginning of our trip and it was beautiful. I got to help inflate the balloon with my super strong arms and then we went up in our giant picnic basket and coasted over Albuquerque as the sun was rising then after landing we enjoyed a beautiful breakfast champagne.

Santa Fe
We had a quick lunch stop in Santa Fe which was absolutely beautiful it was like a mini Mexico with beautiful terracotta/sandstone buildings. I picked up an amazing fajita from a streetcart and maybe some lil gifts for peeps back home. Then we made a quick pit stop to vandalise property at the cadillac ranch where cars have been have buried in the ground for people to stop by and get artistic (BYO spray paint) we decided to go with our favourite quote of the trip #Emerica! Then it was time for Texas!

~JBomb