It’s taken awhile but here is my full travel report from Memphis. I have been sick all weekend and doing nothing but sitting on my laptop, so it’s longer than expected but hopefully it’s somewhat entertaining. I’ll tell you what was entertaining for sure- the city Memphis! This is a city with lots of great places to eat, good culture, and fun options for nightlife. I’d have no problem with coming back as many times as possible, I definitely don’t think it would ever get boring. So here is the day by day breakdown to go along with 200 pictures!

If you don’t care to read the travel blog portion feel free to skip right on to the PICTURES or VIDEOS.

DAY 1: Thursday Dec 27th

ARRIVAL & CORKY’S

Our afternoon flight up on Airtran was loaded with UCF fans. It was a good way to start our Memphis trip.

After checking in to our hotel (Gen X Inn) downtown and getting situated we made the drive down Union past the grocery store we are meeting at before the tailgate and then past the Liberty Bowl. We drove by the Univ of Memphis but didn’t really explore since it was already dark by then.

We headed over to the team hotel and looked at the merchandise table they had setup there before meeting up with some friends to say hi. We then headed over to the famous Corky’s BBQ which was jam packed. Much of the jam was due to Knight fans as we had to be approaching a good 50% of the people in that place at one point earlier on, at least it felt like that.

The wait at Corky’s was long but we ended up sitting next to one of our coach’s and his family while waiting at the bar area. Had a nice conversation with them before finally getting called to our table. One of the guys in our group put Kevin Smith down as our name, so they called Kevin Smith Table for 7…got some cheers from that! We had heard a bad review from the clerk at our hotel, but we all really enjoyed our meals. Most of us got the pulled pork and loved it. The cole slaw was also great and the service was humorous and friendly. It was a fun experience, glad we went!

DAY 2: Friday Dec 28th

AFTERNOON

We got up and mapped out our drive from the hotel to the Liberty Bowl and in doing so we drove by the sweet billboard that C-USA put up congratulating UCF on our championship! We then went to Brother Junipers for breakfast and it was just awesome. It’s a little mom & pop type shop near the campus of Memphis University that’s gotten some fame from Rachel Ray. After breakfast we went next door to a Memphis Tiger bookstore and it was loaded with super cool merchandise. Stuff that I would die for UCF to have…they absolutely had EVERYTHING you can imagine in Tiger Blue. We then went to Sun Studios and did the tour and it was fabulous. The history in that place is remarkable, so good that I actually went there again on Sunday with the wife who didn’t arrive until Friday night.

BOWL PARADE & BB KINGS

After Sun Studios we dropped the car off and took the trolley into Beale St. The Liberty Bowl parade was out of this world, just in the sense that I’ve never seen that many UCF fans anywhere outside of being at a home football game. Lots of energy from both sides of the crowd, this was actually the first time I really saw MSU fans since arriving in Memphis. After the parade there was a Coach’s Show with George O’Leary in BB Kings. It was again insane and overflowing with UCF fans, in fact I would say that 100% of the people in there were UCF fans. Just amazing, you had to be there to feel it. This is where I met up with my friend Gena and her crew.

UCONN VIEWING & BEALE ST

Watched the UCF vs UCONN game at Jillians on some big screens, and again the place was full of UCF fans. Fun way to watch the game, unfortunately we came up 3 points short. Felt bad for not being there for Kirk and the boys, but must admit to having a great time taking in the festivities. My wife Shannon finally arrived during the game as did my sister. We then partied on Beale Street with family and friends for the rest of the night, spending most of our time in Silky O’Sullivans which is a dueling piano bar. It was fun once we got into a spot in the corner and could actually move around. I think that overall UCF owned Beale although there were lots of MSU fans out. Had a great time and props to Gena who somehow managed to sit on the floor of the backseat of the rental so all seven of us could drive home in the wife’s rental car. A site to be seen…

Day 3: Saturday Dec 29th

TAILGATE

First stop is Schnucks grocery store, which was the planned meeting spot for our entire tailgate group so that we could pick up all the food we need and to setup a caravan to the Liberty Bowl to ensure we would all be together. I wasn’t at the top of my game in the grocery store which lead to some inefficiency in getting the items and a bit of a delay, but it worked out as it gave my uncle (& all of TWF) some extra time to arrive as they drove in straight through the night from watching the UConn basketball game. That’s dedication, crazy, but dedication.

Arrived at the Liberty Bowl just after 10am, and headed to our preplanned spot. Unfortunately things don’t always work out as planned so we had to do a 15 car u-turn and find a “plan B” spot. Found a nice patch of grass at the back of a lot on the northwest side of the complex. We made it work…

Tailgating when most people fly can be difficult, but we had just enough to get by for our group of 60. We had 2 tables, 1 large grill, 1 travel stove, 2 coolers, 2 cornhole sets, 1 washer set, 1 bocche ball set, and a dozen or so chairs. The trip to Schnucks took care of the rest, keeping it simple with burgers & brats. Big thanks to Anthony & Felichia (Leger’s parents) who brought the grill and large cooler and really cooked for the entire tailgate. It wouldn’t be a roadtrip without tailgating with them. Also had the privilege to meet and tailgate with the Rashad family. It’s easy to see why we have such good character kids on this team, they get it from their parents.

GAME

Time to head into the game and time to get our first large dosage of cowbell. All the MSU fans were ringing them in our ears on the way in. Thank goodness I’m not a MSU fan, because I’d hate to have to always hear that. Got inside the stadium and who is sitting next to us by pure chance? None other than Anthony (aka Biggie) and his wife Kristen. What are the chances of that? Overall I felt the 10,000 UCF fans in attendance never really got in sync with our cheers. Maybe we needed a TD to get us together, or maybe it was we all were just too dang cold. Man that stadium was COLD!

I’m not going to say much about the game except that the defense played an absolute monster game. Losing Leger and Keith is going to be HUGE losses to fill, but you gotta like our chances on having a top D next year with all those seniors. Had we made at least one of those field goals we may have had a difficult outcome. Hurts bad, but doesn’t take away from a great season.

Not impressed by all the Miss St fans ringing their cowbells non-stop as we walked out of the stadium. I could understand it if we were rivals or if they thrashed us, but considering the type game it was I didn’t see the need for the gloating, but of course I just can’t stand those stupid bells regardless.

RENDEVOUS & BEALE ST

Dejected from the loss we decided to still make a fun night of it. Dropped the car off at the hotel and took the trolley into Beale St for a night of fun. First stop was Rendevous BBQ. The place that everyone seemed to tell us, “you HAVE to go there!” So we went there and we waited, and waited, and waited some more. I’ve actually never seen anything like it, the waiting area is literally bigger than many restaurants. According to the locals the wait wasn’t just due to the Liberty Bowl, they say it’s always like that. Wow. After two hours, a table nap by Eric (as shown), and a couple pitchers of beer our name was finally called. Wohoo! The place is famous for their dry ribs, and although I didn’t think I’d like dry ribs I had to try them after that long of a wait. I gotta admit they were pretty darn good, not sure about 2 hour wait good, but they were tasty. It was an experience to say the least…

After dinner one person from our group called it a night and went back to the hotel, the other six of us were ready to have some fun on Beale St. After hanging out in the overcrowded Silky’s the night before we opted for a more relaxed place with some live blues. We went into Rum Boogie Cafe and it was the perfect spot. Live blues music, not too crowded but still nice and packed. We had a great time and ended up staying there the entire night enjoying the drinks and music. Found a new “go to” drink, thanks Marissa!

Took a van cab back to our hotel and found that we were locked out. It’s a small hotel with only one person on staff. Well come to find out she was on a bathroom break and locked the door. Of course we were banging on it pretty loud, and suddenly she came running out to open the door. She lectured us about how we were going to wake up the entire hotel and explained that she had just sat down on the toilet when we got there. She followed that by asking if we wanted a warm beverage. Or something to that effect, hey it may not sound like it now but it was sure funny as hell at the time!

Day 4: Sunday Dec 30th

MEMPHIS SIGHTSEEING

After sleeping in we joined up with Mike & crew, my uncle, aunt, and cousins for a late lunch on Beale St at Superior. Table for 16 please. Food was tasty, but not near the best we’ve had since arriving. After lunch most of my family departed Memphis for Atlanta and we connected back up with Gena & crew to visit the National Civil Rights Museum. The museum is located in the hotel where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr was tragically assassinated in 1968. It was an informative and large museum, I actually didn’t even realize that it was two separate buildings until the end. The second building was devoted to discussion on the assassination and the speculation on who was involved in the murder, very interesting but we lacked much time by then. It is here that I found out how Eric was quite the JFK conspiracy theorist. Dinner discussion material for sure. After the museum I made my second touring of the Sun Studios now that I was with a different group of friends. Although it was still good, unfortunately the tour guide this time was less enthusiastic and seemed to leave out many of the details compared to the bursting with energy little lady I had back on Friday.

DINNER & KARAOKE FUN

For our last night in Memphis we were going to go to some cafe, but made a last minute change to BB Kings as they had live music going and collared greens for Shannon. Once again enjoyed the live music which was blues / rock-n-roll’ish. We had fried pickles (see pic) as an appetizer which was very tasty if not addicting. I can’t speak for the others but I enjoyed my (wet) ribs & chicken platter. After enjoying the music and entertainment we left BBs, said goodbye to Gena & Elexus who had early flights, and then walked down the street to meet up with Mike & friends at Superior for karaoke. Seemed like a good way to wind down the trip. It was a fun time and just about everyone in the group went up at least once to sing. More than anything, I’m just happy we went just because we saw a Elvis impersonator sing at karaoke. I think it was Kari who said that the trip is now complete, and I agree completely. Once again we had more people than seats in the car, but by now we are old pros at this, childs play really. Said goodbyes to the group, everyone was flying back in morning while Shannon and I weren’t going out until afternoon.

Day 5: Monday Dec 31th

FINAL DAY

After sleeping in we made a last minute decision to try and take in Graceland. Unfortunately before getting there we realized we were hungry and decided to get a “quick” lunch that ended up being not so quick at all. By the time we got over to Graceland and saw the line queue we decided not to chance it. So we just drove by instead and took a picture of Knightro in front of the mansion. We then decided to just do a driving tour of Memphis, going by the FedEx Forum, the Pyramid, along the Mississippi River, and even into Arkansas just so we can say we’ve been there. Took some final pictures on the shore of the Mississippi before heading to the airport. Thank you Memphis for a wonderful time, hopefully we will see you again very soon!

Here are all 200 pictures from the trip

Here are a few quick videos from the trip