Visiting Nashville?

I've had a lot of people ask me for recommendations of things to do in Nashville, so as I move from Tennessee I wanted to compile a list of my favorite places (and other recommendations) to share with y'all!

Food

There are a million and one AMAZING places to eat in Nash, so I've decided to organize them by meal.

Breakfast/Brunch

• Loveless Cafe: Loveless is not my favorite, but it is a Nashville staple.  Its an old motel turned restaurant.  There is usually a wait but there are plenty of shops to look at and outdoor seating to relax in as you wait.

• Marche Artisan Foods: definitely one of my favorites! (Located in East Nashville)

• Saint Anejo: another favorite! The brunch is amazing, but beware- the drinks are potent! Definitely plan to either have someone stay sober or take some escapades around The Gulch before you plan on driving anyway.

• Proper Bagel: If you're looking for a light breakfast, I recommend Proper Bagel.  These have a variety of bagel sandwiches and other breakfast items. It is located near Belmont University- I learned this the hard way when I tried to go for the first time on graduation day!

Lunch/Dinner

• Hot Chicken-Hattie B's is wonderful, so wonderful that there is ALWAYS a line! (The first time I went, I got there at least 15 minutes before in opened IN THE RAIN and there was a line). There are two locations in Nashville (and another in Birmingham, AL).  Prince's Hot Chicken is the original hot chicken spot in Nash, though I have yet to go there. When you order hot chicken in Nashville, make sure to get a "temperature" more mild than you would usually get, because it is HOT!

Hattie B's

• Tacos- Mas Tacos Por Favor, located in East Nashville, is my absolute favorite.  It looks like a sketchy little roadside taco shop but it is amazing! They only take cash, so its best to be prepared by bringing some, but they do have an ATM.  There is always a line here, but its worth waiting for, even in 90 degree weather. Bar Taco is also great.  They have a ton of options and are very food-allergy friendly.  It is located in 12 South so it is very trendy.  They have outdoor seating which I highly recommend taking advantage of. (That being said, the margaritas are costly and tiny, not worth it in my opinion).  Lastly, if you're in the downtown area and are craving tacos, Bajo Sexto is located in the same building as the Country Music Hall of Fame.  The tacos are good, but nothing compares to Mas Tacos.

Mas Tacos Por Favor

• BBQ- Martin's BBQ by far takes the cake. Martin's has two locations, one on the south side of Nashville and one just up the road from downtown Nash. The downtown location has amazing rooftop seating!

• Burgers- Pharmacy Burger, right across the street from Mas Tacos in East Nashville, is by far my favorite burger choice.  The burgers are huge and the drinks are tasty! They have an extensive beer menu but also have a large variety of non-alchoholic beverages. Burger Up! is another good burger joint.  It is located in 12 south, near Bar Taco, and also very trendy.  Its very much a hipster burger joint, even has tofu and black bean burgers. They do have another location elsewhere in Nashville, though I've never been.

Burger Up!

• Bluebird Cafe- I haven't been here yet, but I know it is an iconic Nashville place to visit (also on the show Nashville, I am told).  Reservation are necessary and their hours are limited!

Treats

•  Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams is located in 12 South and at the Nashville Farmers Market.  The ice cream is good, but I wouldn't say great.  Definitely worth a try at least once. Fun Fact: you can order Jeni's to be delivered to your door!

• Sprinkles Cupcakes is also located in 12 South.  I didn't think the cupcakes were the great when I had them, but they have a cupcake ATM located out side the building, and that's something you can't pass up! P.S. While you're here, make sure to take a photo with the "I Believe in Nashville" mural right across from Draper Janes!

• The Soda Parlor is a little ice cream shop arcade.  They host a variety of events but its great at any time!

• Five Daughters Bakery has great 100 layer donuts! There is also a crazy variety of random flavors, I've never had the same one twice! There are two locations- one is down in Franklin, and the other is located in 12 South, near Jeni's Spendid Ice Creams and Burger Up! 

Music

• Country Music Hall of Fame- there is always programming going on that is free with your museum admission!
• Johnny Cash Museum
• Patsy Cline Museum
•  The Ryman - tour the original location of the Opry and see a concert!

98 Degrees + O-Town + DREAM at the Ryman

• The Grand Ole Opry- tour the new location and get tickets to see the radio show live!

• Music City Walk of Fame - located right across the street from the Country Music Hall of Fame!

History

• The Hermitage- home of Andrew Jackson
• The Parthenon- miniature replica of The Parthenon of ancient Greece, including a 42-foot statue of Athena inside!
• The Carter House and Carnton Plantation- The Battle of Franklin
• Bicentennial Capitol Mall - located right next to the Nashville Farmer's Market!

• Stones River Battlefield- located just east of Nashville in Murfreesboro

Other

• Cheekwood Botanical Gardens

• Natchez Trace Parkway Bridge

• Nashville Farmer's Market
• Nashville Zoo

• Antique Archeology American Pickers
• Frist Center Visual Art Museum
• Opry Mills Mall
• Cooters- Dukes of Hazzard!
• Broadway- my favorite places on Broadway are Honky Tonk Central, The Stage, Tin Roof, and Tequila Cowboy.
• Nashville Predators!

• Gaylord Opryland Hotel- especially beautiful around Christmas time!
  
  
  

If you're ever looking for any other specific recommendations, let me know!

You can find all travel posts from Hey Dreamer Blog here.

NOLA

My first trip to New Orleans!

Carl and I had talked about heading down to Louisiana for Mardi Gras this year, but then it came and went and we completely forgot about it, so we decided to plan a trip down there Easter weekend as we both had Good Friday off.

We left AL around 8AM Friday morning for the six hour drive to New Orleans.  On the way down, we stopped at a couple interesting places.  Our first actual stop was in Bessemer, Alabama, which is just outside Tuscaloosa.  In Bessemer, we stopped at the Bessemer Hall of History Museum.  Our original purpose for stopping was to see the one-millionth Pullman Standard Freight Car.  The museum was kind of cool though, it had a bunch of random old stuff from the area, but it also had a type writer that was from the Eagle's Nest.

We traveled a little further to Hog Heaven BBQ in Laurel, Mississippi for lunch.  It was this little itty bitty BBQ joint stuffed inside a restaurant but it smelled delicious- and it was!  We got a pound of pulled pork and a sausage link with fries and fried corn on the cob.  The fries and corn were mediocre at best but the meat was magnificent.

We got to NOLA around 3 in the afternoon and went straight to Carl's cousins house where we were staying.  They were having a craw fish boil that night which I was excited about (even though I DO NOT like seafood!) I know its a southern thing to do, so it was on my list.  They had coolers filled with LIVE craw fish. I reminded me of back in college when Carl and I went to an Asian market and got a live lobster for him to make for dinner.  It was crawling around the in back of the car (okay thats an exaggeration, it was in a bag) the whole way back to his apartment, then when we got there, it fell off the counter and then onto the floor! Anyway, I digress.  Lucky for me, they threw things like sausage and corn on the cob, mushrooms and potatoes, in the water after the craw fish had been boiled as well.  It was all spicy and delicious!  It took some time, but eventually I tried the craw fish.  It wasn't bad, but I still just can't get comfortable with the whole process of eating things like craw fish.

Before

After

The next morning we got up and drove into town to go to the World War II Museum. For some reason I thought it would be more holocaust centered, but it wasn't at all.  Most WWII-type museums have been, so this was a different piece of history I haven't gotten to actually SEE much of.  The museum started off with an exhibit on the propaganda of WWII, definitely a side of the war I didn't know much about.  I paid the extra 10 bucks for us to see the Beyond All Boundaries film produced by Tom Hanks, as I had read that it was worth going to.  Carl and I agreed that it definitely was.  It showed the journey through WWII in a 4D film with loud sound and fake snow!

After the museum we headed down to the French Quarter.  We didn't spend a lot of time down there, just enough so I could see what it was all about.  We walked past Cafe Du Monde but the line was far longer than I cared to wait in.

We found a place called The Spud Spot.  A whole restaurant with just potatoes!!! HEAVEN ON EARTH.  The potatoes were GIANT and you could choose from a variety of different "stuffings."  I had taco and Carl had chicken fajita, the Italian meatball one sounds good too!  I wish I had one closer to AL, I would love to try them all! From there we headed back to the house to take a nap.

Giant stuffed potato!

That night, Carl's cousin and her husband took us to Blue Oak BBQ for dinner.  (We really like BBQ!) We shared a platter with chicken and pulled pork, mac n cheese and beans.  The four of us also split a plate of wings and cracklins (essentially bacon pieces).  It began to rain as we were finishing out meal outside,  so we dash in before it started to downpour!

Prior to heading back to AL we headed south to Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve to participate in "Spring in the Swamp" which was just program to advertise walking through the park which is set in a swamp.  I was most excited about being below sea level (dorky, I know, but I don't know if I've ever technically been below sea level before).  Carl spotted two alligators in teh swamp, there were a couple snakes, a frog, and a bajillion lizards in a variety of colors.  After the swamp, stinky and sweaty, we hopped back into the car and began the drive back home from Louisiana.

Below sea level!

Can you spot the lizard?

NOLA was fun, but I'm glad we did it over the weekend instead of making a full vacation out of it. I'm not sure what our next road trip will be, but I can't wait for it!!

You can find all travel posts from Hey Dreamer Blog here.

Spring Break 2017

Even though I didn't leave the Tennessee area, spring break was definitely an adventure.

My grandma was suppose to fly in with my cousin to Nashville on Friday night, but just as they were about to depart for the airport, she got a phone call saying that their flight was cancelled. The next couple days were spent in uncertainty, until grandma found a flight down on Sunday night with a return flight on Thursday.

On Monday we went to iHop for breakfast (per grandma's request) before heading to Nashville.  Our first stop in Nash was the Opry Mills mall.  We meandered through there for awhile before going to the theater in the mall to see Beauty and the Beast.  We watched the movie in the iMax theater. It was expensive, but it was worth it! SO GOOD! We left the mall just in time for the storms to start.  It rained pretty heavily the first part of the trip home, I nearly had to pull off the road the visibility was so bad.  Once we got home we relaxed for a bit before going to Liberty Park Grill for dinner.  I ordered the fish and chips on a limb (I have NEVER ordered sea food before. EVER.)  IT WAS SO DELICIOUSLY AMAZING.  I can't think of the proper adjectives to describe my fish and the asparagus but I would highly highly highly recommend it.

On Tuesday the weather was still rainy so we decided to hang around C-ville.  I took grandma to the mall and to Old Chicago for lunch (she had never been there before and was very satisfied with her pizza).  We did a little more shopping before heading home to relax.

We headed back to Nash on Wednesday to check out Cheekwood Botanical Gardens.  I'd only been there once before, but it was in June, so the gardens looked different than they do in the Spring.  The trees weren't really in bloom but there were tulips everywhere.  We even took a little hike through the sculpture garden (during which my brand new flip flop broke...grrrr...).

After the gardens we headed back to Opry Mills to grab lunch at the Aquarium Restaurant that we had been admiring earlier in the week.  I had a chicken wrap which I personally did not think was worth the money, but I think grandma enjoyed hers.  With full tummy's we headed to Antique Archeology, the American Picker's shop in Nashville, which we followed up with desert at the newly located Soda Parlor before returning home.

Aquarium Restaurant

Antique Archeology

The Soda Parlor

Thursday morning we enjoyed a meal at our beloved Cracker Barrel before I took grandma to the airport and headed back down to Alabama before the storms returned.

Thursday afternoon and Friday were days of relaxation and grad school work before another adventure on Saturday.  Carl and I got up early Saturday morning to gear up and head to Chattanooga on the motorcycle.

After a chilly 2 hour trip, we met Hannahlea and John at the Tennessee Aquarium.  We bought our tickets and after realizing that none of us had eaten breakfast, we went to The Hair of the Dog Pub before actually visiting the aquarium.  Food was good and prices were affordable.  I had chicken strips and fries with gravy (get the chicken, DO NOT get the gravy!)

The aquarium is split into two buildings, fresh water and salt water.  The fresh water building was HUGE and took us nearly two hours to go through.  It was really neat to see all the creatures that roam the rivers.  The salt water building was kind of disappointing.  It only took about 30 minutes to get through, and didn't have as many colorful fish as I had hoped for.  I did enjoy the large assortment of jellyfish however.

After the aquarium we headed back to HL's house to hang out before dinner.  Of course we had to have tacos for dinner, so we dined at Amigos Mexican Restaurant.  I had the chicken tacos and they were very yummy!

Blurry pic, but still good food!

After stopping at Krispy Kreme's on Sunday morning, Carl and I headed home to get some yardwork done before I had to head back to TN.

Family Fun

My family (well, half of them) came down for a visit mid-March during baby brother's spring break.  They arrived on a Saturday night, just in time for tacos and margaritas prepared by Carl and myself.

Sunday
On Sunday we ventured into Nashville to take in some history.  We began at my favorite church, Crosspoint.  I've written about it before, but Crosspoint is a non-denominational church with six different campuses- I go to the one in Nashville.  I used to go pretty religiously (ha!) but now that I've been going to Huntsville every weekend that hasn't been happening.  Anyway, I took my family there, it was Carl and Luke's first time, but it wasn't quite the service I was excited to show them.  The thing I love about Crosspoint is that even if you aren't super religious, it is still very relatable and you can get a lot out of it. This particular Sunday's service however was essentially about how they are in a rough patch and are losing attendance as time passes without a new head pastor.  I talked to a friend after who said she really like the service, but to me it felt like I was sitting in a room with a friend as they were getting scolded by their parents.  Perspective, I suppose.

After church we headed to Fort Negley in Nashville.  Luke is a first year history major so he wanted to see all the historical sites in the area.  Unfortunately, Fort Negley has not been kept up very well over the years.  While it was semi-restored, it still kind of looks like it is falling apart. Plus it was chilly and windy and being that Fort Negley was on a hill made is that much worse!

After the Fort we headed down to Broadway in downtown Nashville.  It was definitely NOT prime time for visiting as there was a big basketball game taking place at Bridgestone Arena.  Driving was a pain and parking was even worse.  I have become accustomed to city life so it didn't both me too much, but I'm sure it was driving my dad crazy!  We took Luke down Broadway and down to the river from which you can see the Titans stadium across the way.  We ate lunch at Rock Bottom, one of the few "restaurant-y" places on Broadway (as opposed to bar-y).

Carl left us to head home after lunch, and we traversed over to Murfreesboro to check out Stones River National Battlefield.  It was kept up much better than the Fort and had a nice visitor's center with a museum.  At the battlefield was a large cemetery with thousands of soldiers buried in it.

After the battlefield we headed home for the night. We thought we would try out Logan's Roadhouse for dinner, of which we all decided was not as good as Texas Roadhouse.  The service was slow, the portions were small, and my burger was cold.

Monday/Tuesday
The fam headed to Memphis on Monday/Tuesday and since I couldn't get off work, I didn't get to join them.

Wednesday
On Wednesday I was able to get off and we headed up to Bowling Green, Kentucky, stopping along the way at a couple Roadside Attractions! (Why did I capitalize that? Because its the name of the app I used to find them! You have to pay like 5 bucks to download the whole country, but totally worth it in my opinion.  The app gives you tons of random roadside attractions, everything from graves to the World's Largest Underpants).

Our purpose for heading to Bowling Green was to go to the Corvette Museum and Factory.  We had been there once when my brothers and I were kids but (as I was told, I don't actually remember) I couldn't go on the tour because I didn't have closed-toed shoes with, and my youngest brothers couldn't go for some other reason I cannot remember.

I'll be the first to say I don't know anything about cars, but it was still pretty interesting.  Some fun facts I learned:

• Corvette's are always made custom to order- they do not make a Corvette unless it has been pre-ordered
• You can literally go to the plant and watch your car being made, or you can go and help design the engine!
• It takes a day and a half to fully make a Corvette
• (I thought I learned more than this but apparently I've forgotten it all already)

After the Corvette museum and factory tour, we headed to Chainey's Dairy Barn for lunch and ice cream. Lunch was mediocre, but the ice cream was delish! We visited Ollie's Bargain Hunt (Dad's favorite store in the south) to look at junk cheap stuff we don't need.

We headed back to C-ville and made it back by late afternoon with enough time to relax before heading to Logan's Roadhouse for dinner.  We were not impressed with the joint, the service was slow, my burger was cold, and the steaks were tiny. That being said, we all agreed we wouldn't say "no" to going to the place again, its highly possible it was just an off night.

Thursday morning my family left to head back north and I returned to reality.

Satur-date in Nashville!

Our day started off at home when we were debating what to make for breakfast.  After much dilemma, and nothing in my apartment sounding all that enjoyable, we decided to head to Nashville early.  Excited to check a restaurant off my Nashville bucket list, Carl navigated us to The Perch Downtown where we arrived right as it opened.  The Perch has a vast menu of both sweet and savory crepes, as well as some other dishes like Belgian waffles and omelets.  Carl had only had sweet crepes before, so we scanned the savory list, unsure of which to choose.  I had my eye on a chicken and spinach crepe with balsamic vinegar and feta cheese, but Carl couldn't decide.  He asked the cashier what she recommended which led to his order of a crepe with chorizo sausage, salsa verde, cheese, and eggs.

My crepe was delicious! Carl's....wasn't that wonderful. If we were to go again, we decided we would order one savory crepe to share, followed by a sweet one.  The lady did offer Carl a free Americano, which he said was fantastic. I am not a coffee fan so my opinion was moot.

We then headed off to our intended destination of the day- the Adventure Science Center! It was definitely more kid-oriented than adult, but since we are both children at heart, we had fun anyway. It cost just under 20 bucks for Carl to get in (including the planetarium show), and was free for me since I am a teacher in Tennessee, though I still had to pay $6 to see the planetarium show.  If you're not going with kids, it's probably not worth the money for the ticket, but since I got in free it wasn't too bad of a deal. 

The top floor of the Adventure Science Center was basically just a little play tower that looked out over Nashville.  It was elementary school child-sized, but we squeezed up into it anyway.  If I were to go back I would wear sweats and leave my purse behind! Man was that hard to climb through in jeans and a sweater.  There was a shape game on the top floor as well, which Carl challenged me to.  The point of the game was to see how many shapes you could put through the correctly shaped holes in a certain amount of seconds (I told you-we are children).  We tied the first time and he cheated the second!

The second floor was much more fun.  While still kid-oriented, it was very interactive for both kids and adults alike.  We played a game with a dad and his son (us against them) in which we had to "shoot" the "germs" in the various bodily systems.  Carl and I won of course, I think I even shot more "germs" than him!  We also attempted the Dance, Dance, Revolution game, which kicked both our butts.  My feet do not move as quickly as they did in middle school.  The game that made me laugh the most was one that you had to relax to win.  It was a two player game in which we had to put headband type things on our heads.  It scanned your brain waves which made a ball move.  Whoever the ball moved to was the loser.  I won the first time (shockingly), but Carl beat me the second round.

Our last activity at the science center was the planetarium show.  The show was produced by the planetarium and was about the complete solar eclipse that is due to appear in Nashville on August 21, 2017.  The production was actually pretty good, and worth the $6 I think.  It was about 30 minutes and I was intrigued the whole time.  The bottom floor was more outer space oriented.  Space is my favorite aspect of science, so I wish they would have had more interactive things on that floor.  It was neat regardless.

It was nearly 1 by the time we left the science center, so we were hungry again.  We headed down to 12 South for some burgers at Burger UP!  I had the Woodstock burger and Carl had the Mr. Lewis Patty Melt.  Carl's was better than mine was, and while they were both good, my expectations had been let down.  The homemade fries however were wonderful! The perfect amount of potato and salt, I would go back and just get an order of fries.  Carl commented on the people around us and how the area seemed to be the hipster area of Nashville.  I responded by telling him that it was definitely the trendy part of town, and how I would never fit in there.  This was followed by the table next to us discussing how good the black bean burger with quinoa was.......#notmyburger!!

Although I wanted to continue devouring the fries, we saved some space for one last stop before we headed home- Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream!  The weather was sunny and beautiful, so we walked down the street, dropped our leftovers off in the car, and strolled down to the ice cream shop.  Jeni's was another place on my Nashville bucket list I had been meaning to cross off for a while.  We both tested a couple of flavors before choosing- I had the Wildberry Lavender and Brown Butter Almond Brittle and Carl had the Wildberry Lavender and Ndali Estate Vanilla Bean.  It was soft and sweet and everything I ever needed in an ice cream dish.

The ice cream had done us in and we were in dire need of a nap.  It was definitely a successful day in Nashville!

Birmingham, Alabama

Carl surprised me this weekend with a mini weekend getaway! I knew we were going somewhere, but he wouldn't tell me where until we were on the road. If you couldn't figure it out from the title of this post, our destination was Birmingham, Alabama!

Our first stop Saturday morning was the Barber Motorsports Museum.  They have so many motorcycles, they don't even have enough space to display them all! There was an extension to the museum opening Fall 2016, but it hadn't opened yet which was disappointing.  Anywho, the museum was full of motorcycles from when motors were just attached to bicycles until now, from a variety of makers.  We definitely plan to go back once the exhibit expansion is complete.

There is a large racetrack outside the museum, but you have to be a member of a racing club to get into it.  We cheated the system however, and sat on the lawn outside the fence of the track and enjoyed a picnic of sour gummy worms as we watched the cars zoom by.  It was interesting to watch because of the variety of cars.  Motorists drove everything from race cars to Toyota street cars!

Our next stop was SAW's Juke Joint for lunch. It was in the ritzy part of town (a part that, we later found out, is one of the richest areas in the country).  We ordered fried pickles for an appetizer as I had never eaten them before and it seemed like a southern thing to do.  Carl had a smoked chicken sandwich with homemade chips and I had a loaded "stuffed tater."  And when I say loaded, I mean loaded!  It came with the normal "stuff"- green onions, cheese, sour cream, but also came TOPPED with bacon, pork, chicken, and BBQ sauce.  I don't even think I managed to eat 1/3  of it.  It was delicious though!

After lunch we headed to meet the host of our first Airbnb experience!  Thirty-four year old Antoine lived in a two bedroom apartment down the street a ways from our lunch restaurant.  Not going to lie, I was a little apprehensive about staying with some random person, but for the sake of adventure I went with it.

The experience turned out to be a great one! Antoine was so accommodating.  When we got there he chatted our ear off for a good hour or so about everything from good places to eat to his childhood.  His apartment was adorned with photos from his own travels and adventures which were pretty impressive!  His twin sister even stopped by for a short while and talked with us as well.

In the afternoon we headed down to Railroad Park for a walk.  It was 75 degrees out and apparently everyone else had the same idea as we did as the park was packed with people!  Kids were playing, teenagers were skateboarding, college kids were walking their dogs..heck, there was even ice skating! We had finished walking around the park but were enjoying the nice day so we headed down some side streets and walked towards the University to enjoy the fresh air a little longer.

It wasn't quite dinner time, but since we knew where we wanted to eat we headed that way anyway.  We found a little brewery (Trim Tab Brewing) where Carl got a beer and I had a Mello Yellow (I'll like beer someday, I swear!) It was the perfect weather for sitting outside and discussing future travel plans ;)

For dinner we went to a taco place called Babalu Tacos and Tapas.  It was pretty good.  Our waiter accidentally gave us extra tacos, not that we were complaining!  Carl and I are definitely taco fiends; we make a point to try a taco place whenever we go somewhere.

Of course you can't go out to dinner on a trip without having dessert, so we went to a local place called Mountain Brook Creamery.  I was so excited to see that they had Superman Ice Cream, but was let down when it turned out to be just colored vanilla ice cream. We walked around the area and admired the nice store fronts and window displays before we headed to the movies.

We went and saw the movie Live by Night, which was definitely better than the ratings that Rotten Tomatoes gave it!  By the time it was over, we were both exhausted and headed back to Antoine's.  Luckily, he wasn't home (or he probably would have talked our ears off), so we went right to bed.

Sunday morning we headed home right away.  The weather was so nice we wanted to get some yard work done.  However, we both agreed that we definitely want to go back and visit B-ham again, especially since it is less than an hour and a half drive away!

You can find all travel posts from Hey Dreamer Blog here.

Jack Daniel's Distillary

It's been awhile, but I've finally done a little adventuring worthy of a blog post!

Last Sunday was Carl's birthday, and since his parents were in town, we decided to do something fun. We drove up the back roads from northern AL through southern Tennessee to Lynchberg, TN, home of the infamous Jack Daniel's Distillery.

We did the Flight of Jack Daniel's Tour which entailed an hour and a half long guided tour of the facilities and a sampling at the end.

Our tour began on a shuttle bus, as it was "so cold" outside (and by so cold, I mean between 20 and 30 degrees).  The shuttle took us to the top of one of the hills and our guide showed us where they store the American White Oak wood used to make the barrels for aging the whiskey.  The JD Distillery is one of the only distilleries in the world that makes their own barrels. Quite a feat considering each barrel is only used once! They let the wood season outside for some time before making barrels with it.  The same area is used to handcraft the barrels and then char the insides.  They don't burn the barrels on Sundays however, so we didn't get to see that process. Fun fact: the wooden staves that the barrels are made of are not nailed together, they stay together simply by the pressure of the arrangement.  

Then we shuttled back down the hill where we were shown the cavern that extends throughout the property.  The water from the cave is iron free and is so clear and pure! They use the water for a lot of the distilling processes.  Near the opening of the cave was the little white office building where Jack once worked.  Inside that building was where he committed an act that would end up being fatal to him- he kicked a safe. (Okay, so that was a little dramatic).  When he had kicked the safe, he injured his foot. Unfortunately, he didn't get it examined until almost a year later, but by then it was too late.  He had an infection that had traveled into his blood steam and ending up killing him at the ripe old age of 60-something (I can't remember exactly!)  

The mouth of the cave with a statue of Jack in front of it. This statue is actually 7 inches taller than Jack's actual height of 5' 2".

Some more fun facts about Jack's life- the distillery was actually sold to him for like 20 bucks I believe from his pastor (minister?).  The pastor had been the one who taught Jack to make whiskey at the age of 7 or so, but when his parishioners found out about his secret hobby, they made him choose between the whiskey and the church.  He chose the church, and thus his sale to Jack.

Anyway, we then finally got to go into the distilling building where they presented to us the giant vats that held the mash. The mash is created by using a mix of grains combined with water from the cave.  From there it is fermented for about a week, and then distilled in a copper still where it becomes clear bourbon.

From there we went to the building where they do the charcoal mellowing.  The clear, 140-proof bourbon is dripped into the top of one of the 14-foot tall vats full of charcoal.  By the time it drips to the bottom of the charcoal pebbles, approximately 10 days later, the clear bourbon has become a whiskey.

The (almost) last stop of the tour was a barrel house.  Whiskey at the top of the storage area ages the best because of the temperature changes, and because heat rises.  Thus why good whiskey, especially single barrel whiskey, is called "top shelf." The JD process does not determine maturity based on age, but rather on professional tasters.  People taste the whiskey in order to determine if it is done, and if one barrel of a batch is determined "unready," the whole batch stays in the barrel house until it has matured. (I'm still trying to figure out how to become a qualified taster).

The actual last stop of our tour was the tasting!  We got to try five different Jack Daniel's products.  The first one we tasted was the Gentlemen Jack.  A fun fact about this whiskey is that it goes through the mellowing process TWICE.  Our second sample was the Jack Daniel's Old Number 7.  I've never had JD straight before and while it wasn't my favorite whiskey, it was better than I expected it to be.  The third sample was a single barrel whiskey, which again, was good, but not my favorite.  Fourth, we sampled the Jack Daniel's Honey Whiskey- now THAT was a JD whiskey I could get on board with! It’s technically more of a liquor, but regardless- delicious!  Lastly, we sampled the Jack Daniel's Fire, which was similar to Fireball, but better.

Our samplings

Now I've only toured 4 or 5 distilleries, but the JD tour was by far the best one I have been on.  (And the only one I could tell you the process of still 4 days later!) I'm still not a whiskey connoisseur but I like to think I'm on my way there!