Music City: Nashville, Tennessee - Tuesday, April 9, 2019

Today, we are touring Nashville on a 12k (7.44 miles) Volksmarch that includes the capital of Tennessee. Our walk started at the Comfort Inn Music Row on Demonbreun Street. The motel does not want us to park there, so we found free street parking behind the motel. 

We walked up to a traffic circle, then back down Demonbreun Street to check in for the walk. At the traffic circle is a beautiful sculpture called "Musica." The artist, Alan LeQuire, graduated from Vanderbilt University in Nashville. He then apprenticed for a year with Milton Hebald, an American sculptor living in Italy. He earned his Master of Fine Arts at the University of North Carolina in Greensboro where he studied figurative sculpture.

"Musica," by Alan LeQuire.

Once our feet hit the sidewalk on our 12k walk, it wasn't long before we arrived at the historic Union Station which is now the luxurious Union Station Hotel Nashville -- The Autograph Collection, by Marriott. The design details are stunning, inside and out. If you do this walk, be sure to go in and look around.
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Union Station Nashville Hotel --
The Autograph Collection (by Marriott).

Bob at the front entrance to the hotel.

3-D decorated guitar in the lobby.

A grand lobby.

Ceiling and chandeliers.

Detail above the fireplace in the lobby.

Detail above the other fireplace.

Stained glass in one of the meeting rooms.

Stairwell in the hotel.

From the hotel, we headed down Broadway to the honky tonk area, also known as Lower Broadway. Restaurants, most with live bands, had beautiful neon signs in front. 

Great old lamp somewhere along Broadway.

We stopped in the gift shop at Bridgestone Arena so I could visit my pal, Jack Daniels.

Nashville's neon.

Our walk was supposed to take us along the Cumberland riverfront, however, workers were busily setting up the stages for the NFL Draft (which is to take place April 25 [today is April 9 and this is well underway!]).

The main stage is built in position.

Part of lower Broadway is closed to stage
all the materials needed to build their massive
structure.

More of the platforms being built for the NFL Draft.

Our walk instructions routed us on First Avenue, but that's where all this construction was happening. We were able to get around it by going in front of the Hard Rock Cafe to First Ave.

The "Batman Building" from Lower Broadway.

Nissan Stadium, Home of the Tennessee Titans.

Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge
across the Cumberland River.

Next, we passed a replica of Fort Nashborough, the headquarters of the original frontier settlement. Then it was on to historic Market Street where goods were received in the back of the buildings from the riverboats and sold out the front.

Fort Nashborough historical marker.

Printer's Alley was next. It was home to Nashville's printing trade around 1915. Newspaper offices, printers, and publishers were located there. It became a speakeasy district during prohibition.

We continued on through downtown and saw Tennessee Historical Commission markers for the Nashville Sit-ins, the Slave Trade, and Seeing-Eye Dogs. Enlarge to read these.

We finally made it to the Capitol building which is Greek Revival style in design. It sits on the highest hill in the central city overlooking Bicentennial Mall State Park. We headed up the hill and into the capital for the tour.

Supreme Court Chamber.

Such a shiny floor.

"The Pride of Tennessee," by Michael Sloan.

House of Representatives.

Andrew Jackson (Old Hickory).

Looking back up at the capital.

These must be cherry blossoms!

The highlight of this walk, in my opinion, is the Bicentennial Mall State Park, a 19-acre outdoor history museum. It is down a long set of stairs below the capital. When you get to the park, look for the 200-foot-long granite map of the state (it will be on the ground in front of the railroad trestle), 31 fountains designating Tennessee's major rivers, Wall of History, World War II Memorial, Court of Three Stars with carillon, Walk of Counties, history of the Tennessee Centennial Exposition, a Visitor Center, and great views.

Fountains designating the major
rivers of Tennessee.

Wall of history goes about 3/4 mile.

This particular snippet of history shows a broken
wall when the Civil War broke out.

Division of North vs. South.

World War II Memorial (3 tons of onyx
floating on 1/8" of water).

Bob standing in the middle of 50 carillon bells.

View from the park to the capital.

See those stairs? We came down them, now
we've got to go back up them!

Bob went up the grass slope. I took the stairs.
He's waiting for me at the top. Show off.

More sites we visited included the Legislative/War Memorial Plaza, The Hermitage Hotel (be sure to look in the men's restroom downstairs where there was a secret passage from the capital), and the Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge.

Korean War Memorial.

Hermitage Hotel men's room restored to its former
glory. The secret passage came out where the
large black panel is.

Hermitage Hotel men's room.

Hermitage Hotel grand entry.

Hermitage Hotel lobby.

NFL Draft ad on the
Bridgestone building.

Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge.

Downtown Nashville from the pedestrian bridge.

The workers building the stage for the draft.
It must be break time!

From here we went to Demonbreun Street and walked back to our starting point. In today's title, I mentioned that one of Nashville's nicknames is Music City, pretty self-explanatory. How about these other nicknames?

1. Athens of the South (due primarily to the city's focus on higher education, but more recently a full-size replica of The Parthenon which was built in 1897 for the city's Centennial Exposition).
2. The Protestant Vatican.
3. Smashville.
4. Buckle of the Bible Belt.
5. Nashvegas.
6. Cashville.

We headed back to the 5th wheel while it was still daylight. Tomorrow, we will do the 11k Music Row & Universities Volksmarch.