SUM-RRR FUN!!!
(i'm trying to get pictures on here, but it doesn't seem to be working...sorry!)


I'm a teacher, so I am fortunate to get the summers off. I was hoping to make a big trip this summer to somewhere like the Grand Canyon, or go back to Yellowstone. I love to go to places like that. But this summer I didn't necessarily have the funds to make such a trip. So I planned a couple of small trips instead...

First, I took a trip down to a place called Quincy, Florida. My Grandaddy lives there, and I wanted to go visit him and his wife. They are a lot of fun because they like to get out and do stuff. My aunt (Diane) has recently moved back in with him too, and my uncle (Chris, who is only 2 years older than me) lives in a pool house on my Grandaddy's property with his girlfriend, Erin. When I got there we had a little cookout (and it was hot as a mo-fo!). That was fun. Then the next day I went canoeing with Diane, Chris and Erin. That was fun (except that I accidently left my sunscreen at home, oops). The place where we canoed is called the Wakula River, which flows out of a cold spring. So its really a gorgeous place. The water is so cool and clear, and there is a lot of wildlife out there to see. Normally we would've seen manatee, turtles, aligators, and lots of other stuff. But the water was low so we didn't see any manatee, and only saw one aligator (he was kind of a small guy too). But it was still a nice ride. That is, until three hours upstream we got to the place where we would turn around, and we realized that a storm would try to beat us back to the place where we let in. We felt alright about it because the whole way back would be downstream, until the wind started blowing with some force (enough force that would cause us to float backward if we didn't paddle. So we paddled vigorously to try and beat this storm, but our attempts were futile and the storm caught up with us before we reached our spot. I wasn't so concerned about the rain, I was just scared of the lightning. ;0) Anyway, we loaded the canoes back up and headed out. Before we got out of Wakula, Erin's car needed to gas up. So we stopped at a station, and I left my aunt in the car with the car running so she could listen to music and have a little a/c. Well, while I was insided getting a bite to eat she decided to get out and roam around...and somehow locked my keys inside of my running truck!!! An hour and $85 later we were back on the road...what an adventure. The rest of the trip I got to hang out with my Grandaddy and his wife. He beat me at chess and she showed me the sights around town, half of which were closed that day (I guess things are often closed on mondays?). All in all it was a good trip. I like a good scenic ride alone sometimes. Its kind of refreshing...

Well the very next weekend I was on to adventure #2...NASHVILLE!!! I've been wanting to go to Nashville for quite some time now. The guys I play bluegrass with raved about it, so my friend Leigh and I planned a trip. It was so much fun! The first afternoon we spent just looking around the town and trying to find some good music (which was hard because most of the bars on Broadway Street have wanna-be country stars in them, so all we were hearing at first was bad country music). But we stopped by a place called The Bluegrass Inn, which is a bar. We were intruiged when we heard from outside the door, one man and his guitar singing a really mellow song. He was good, so we went inside. We were shocked to see a young guy with long blonde hair, worn out sneakers, and old jeans and a T-shirt playing a super old Martin guitar. There were three other girls on the stage putting on make up, oddly dressed and already coated with several layers of previous make up. They looked kind of scary, with real dark eye make up. It turns out they were the rest of the band--two of them on fiddle and the other on mandolin. And they were SO good. They played a lot of older bluegrass and country tunes, and some tunes that friends of theirs had written. It also turns out that they were all brothers and sisters! Anyway, that was our first taste of good music. Their band's name is "Gypsy" (formerly "Silk 'n Saddle"). The first night we were there we went to a place called BB King's and heard some good oldies music and ate some good food. Afterward we walked (10 blocks!) to a place called The Station Inn for what would later become the highlight of our trip. We heard a band called "The Stringdusters", and they were incredible! They played bluegrass, and they were easily right up there with Union Station and Nickelcreek. They played for three hours, and the venue was great. We only payed $10 to get in there, and we sat right in the front. You should check them out on The Infamous Stringdusters website. They have a cd coming out soon that I will be getting asap. Anywho, the next day we made our way to The Bluebird Cafe, which we had been hearing a lot about. We didn't thing that place was all that great, so we left early (which is a good thing because we got lost on our way to the Opry). When we got to Opryland, we spent some time inside the Gibson Showcase. It was a guitar player's heaven! They have endless amounts of top quality guitars that you can just pick up and play. A guy that works there took out a $25,000 mandolin and let Leigh play it! We were having so much fun in there that we didn't want to leave to go to the Grand Ole Opry, which turned out to be a let down anyway. Most of the people I hadn't really heard of, and were REALLY old...like Jean Sheaperd (sp?). She was like 75 years old. I've never seen a bunch of richer rednecks in my life. She got up there and told a joke, and in the middle of it someone in the back dropped something that made a loud "bang" noise...so she stopped her joke and yelled out, "hit it again, it's still crawlin'!". Anyway, the Opry wasn't that great. But we decided to come back to the Gibson place the next day and fool around some more in there. Leigh and I jammed to a Dixie Chicks tune. We also went to the Country Music Hall of Fame that day, which was pretty cool. Anyway, I'm ready for another trip down there already. Don't be surprised if I just pick up my things and move out there sometime soon...

Well there ya have it. That's my summer fun! Now its back to school!!!