Grand Preeee and then Hersheeee and then Dudleeeee!!

 

Sunday, August 1- We had a bit of a Nashville Sunday Fun Day today.  Our first stop was a good one.  Ashlee had preordered some amazingly good pastries from the Brightside Bakeshop in East Nashville.  We decided to just enjoy them outside on site since it was a nice cloudy day with low humidity.   They were all great, but this key lime one shown above was the best.  So good!  We also had some great iced lattes from the pop-up Gold Bar for Hanna Bee Coffee also there on site.  Ashlee had the cotton-candy infused one, of course.  

Our next quick stop also in East Nashville was at this fun mural on W. Eastland.  Up, up and away!  We also took a look around the swanky, new Virgin Hotel over around Music Row.  They've got a great rooftop pool and bar (and it will cost you a small fortune to swim and drink in it!).   We headed back after that and enjoyed the rest of the afternoon in our own free pool! 

Tuesday, August  3 - We went to see the new Disney Jungle Cruise movie at the Roxy Theaters here in town ($5 discount night and recliners!) tonight.  It was a ton of fun and very well done.  This was our first movie here in a long while.  It was nice to be back! 

Thursday, August 5 - We headed to downtown Nashville tonight to see Sean McConnell at City Winery.  It was his new album release show and our first time seeing him live. We congratulate City Winery on enforcing a vaccinated-only crowd and a mask mandate when not seated in the venue.  It's a bold stand, but necessary and appreciated by us.  Sean was excellent live.  He's also a producer and brought out a young man named, Nick Connor, who he is helping with his debut album.  That dude can sing!  This may be one of those "I saw him when" moments!   Sean also had a great opener named, Tristan Bushman, who we enjoyed as well.  Great music, great food, great venue! 

August 6, 7, 8 - We won tix to the Music City Grand Prix this weekend - our city's first grand prix race!

Friday night  - We headed downtown after work not knowing what to expect, but just like the NFL Draft, NHL All-Star and other big events, Nashville seemed to handle this giant affair just fine.  We got easily into our free parking at Bridgestone Arena (thanks to our pal, Wayne, and his Predators season ticket).  Ticket access and entry was easy and smooth.  We had some tasty chicken sausage dogs for dinner from a food truck for dinner.  The race course and its surroundings encompass 45 total acres of space.  And we walked most of it! 

We got to see a little of the SRO GT America cars practicing before dark.  I snuck out afterwards and got this cool pic along the track heading west over the Korean Veterans Bridge part of the course.  This is the first-ever Grand Prix that goes over water.

Hey, it wouldn't be a Music City event without some...well...music!  We hung around into the night and caught a few songs by a decent line-up of artists including Tyler Farr, Vince Neil of Motley Crue, Jamey Johnson, Chase Rice, and the legendary duo, Brooks and Dunn, who we've never seen play together.  It was a lovely night and a beautiful walk back across the Cumberland River on the pedestrian bridge after the show.  

Saturday afternoon - Man, it was hot!  But we had a pretty good time back at the Grand Prix today.  We got there in time to see the end of the actual first race of the event, the Trans Am Series.  Next up was some SRO GT America qualifying.  We had some more terrific grub from food trucks on site.  Afterwards we wondered over toward the paddock area and were surprised how close we could get to watching the teams work on some of the cars.  

NTT IndyCar Series qualifying was next.  These are the big boys and the main event racers.  While the general admission tickets don't give you the best views of the track, there are some decent access places.  We found this cool view of tight Turn 10 which is their first turn after a long straightaway.  We headed back to our cooler pool since today's and tonight's concerts were of no interest to us. 

Sunday afternoon - Since the heat was so oppressive yesterday and projected to be even hotter today, we held off getting downtown until just before the Grand Prix race itself today.  There were a few earlier things we would have liked to have seen, but not at the cost of the heat index.  We did get to see the end of the SRO GT America Race # 2, the pre-big race parade of drivers, and the start of the Grand Prix itself in the shade near Turn 3.  Then we went to check out the view with some elevation from the east-side ramps of Nissan Stadium where we had a good view of the S- (or is that a Z) curve in Turns 1 and 2 .  We even saw this wreck happen right in front of us.  We had more good food from the bountiful amount of food trucks available...we chose The Loveless Cafe truck today.  

We were able to grab a glance at the inaugural winner of the Music City Grand Prix, Marcus Ericsson, as he emerged from his Indy car after the race.  The most amazing thing about Ericsson's win is that very early in Lap 5 he was in a hair-(and car) raising collision with another car in front of him that lifted his car off the ground and almost airborne and flipped over.  He and his crew were able to recover from that crash and take the whole thing!  Wow!  The race was exciting throughout with crashes and speeds of over 180 mph over the Korean Veterans Bridge, and right up to the finish with a bold young driver named Colton Herta pushing his way up the field with crafty passing in the tight turns and into second place as the race got close to the end only to crash with only 5 laps to go.  Ericsson and crews other great move was winning the race on basically fumes as well.   

Another hot day led to a beautiful night and another gorgeous walk across the Cumberland River back to our car.  The Korean Veterans Bridge shone is all its brilliance somehow knowing it was also a star of this weekend's historic event.  We were a bit disappointed that Alan Jackson, who was scheduled to close out the event on the concert stage, was a no show.  The ageless Oak Ridge Boys were a great fill in at least.  We also saw performances by rising country-music stars Justin Moore, Riley Green, Danielle Bradbery and Callista Clark as the Grand Ole Opry was broadcast tonight from the Grand Ole Prix!! (not my joke, but I like it). 
Overall, an outstanding weekend an event.  It looks as if it was a big success with all parking nearby sold out, all grandstand seats sold out, and lots of smiles on lots of the 110,000 faces despite the heat.   We can't wat to go again next year...and, hell, we might even pay for tickets this time!! 

August 12, 13, 14 - Our (damn Covid) rescheduled trip and show to see Green Day in Hershey, PA, is finally this weekend! 

Thursday - We flew up to Philly this morning, rented a car and headed west toward Hershey.  Our first stop were the beautiful Longwood Gardens where we were hoping to see some of the dozen or so cats that "guard" the huge conservatory there. 

 It was blazing hot and the cats were nowhere to be found, and even the beer garden was closed!  Kind of a bust, but still a beautiful place with flowers everywhere in the giant conservatory, and this huge aeolian organ (over 10,000 pipes) that was amazing to walk around behind. We may try and return someday (especially at Christmas we hear).   

We continued west through Amish country with heavy traffic through Lancaster County. 

Our funniest stop was at  a red light in Intercourse, Pennsylvania. Make your own jokes here, but don't forget it sits between the small towns of Blue Ball and Paradise...

After checking into our hotel in Lebanon (sounds familiar) just east of Hershey, we headed on in to Chocolate Town and meet a new co-worker of Ashlee's who lives nearby  at Troeg's Independent Brewing (her idea, so I like her already!).  We had some great beer and some very good food (the street corn fries were amazing!).

Friday - We spent most of today at Hershey's Chocolate World with some fun activities including a trolley tour around town and the Hershey factory.  It's a great place where even the street lights are shaped like Hershey's kisses!! 

The BIG pay off at the end of the day at Hershey's Chocolate World was designing and making our very own personalized half-pound chocolate bars!  We ate mine almost immediately, but Ashlee's made it back home...for about a day!  Yummmmm!! 

We Ubered up to check out the historic and beautiful Hotel Hershey.  Again, the really cool bar in the hotel was closed (what's with no day-drinking in PA?).  So we just looked around and then our friends, Joe and L.A. picked us up and we headed back over to Troeg's Brewing for more beer and tasty food.  

We got lucky and dodged some rain while at Troeg's Brewing.  Then it was off to the SOLD OUT Weezer, Fall Out Boy,  and Green Day Hella Mega Tour concert at Hershey Park with our friends Joe, L.A., Danny, Brenda, and Wil.    

It's the Galapagos Fearsome Four-some back together again! 

Green Day, Purple Night.  We've seen Weezer a couple time before and as usual they fun and solid.  Fall Out Boy was pretty good and sounded great, but we honestly just don't know a lot of their music.  Green Day was the main reason we were here, and they were electric!  Excellent show! Great energy!  It's hard to believe these guys are pushing or past 50 years old!  

Saturday - We got up pretty early today to head back to Philly for a little fun before flying home.  A spur-of-the-moment stop that turned out to be pretty cool was Valley Forge Historical National Park.  They have a great driving loop of interesting sights that again worked out best since it was still blazing hot.  This would be another place to definitely visit more in depth with cooler temps.   

When we got to Philly it was cheesesteak time and the big Pat's vs.Geno's debate (and chow down) began!  We think Pat's is a little better, but Geno's is solid.  

We met up with Ashlee's co-worker and our good friend, Eileen, and her husband, Mike, and their daughter, Megan at the Old City Beer Garden for a few hours before our flight home tonight.   One of my choices from their impressive beer list was this hilarious, but tasty, IPA.  

Added note: Our Southwest flight home which connected through Orlando (yuck) kept getting delayed due to bad weather in Florida, so we decided to cancel that flight and jump on a decent-priced American Airlines direct flight home (why didn't we do this from the start?).  We got home safe and sound with another fun little trip under our belts.  

Holy cat!  Dudley's in the Tennessee State Fair! 

Sunday, August 15 - We flew back early from Philly for this, dude!  You better win this cat show!!  I mean, no pressure.  It's just now the STATE Cat Show since the Wilson County Fair and the Tennessee State Fair are one in the same now as of this year.   

He's our winner for sure!!   He seems relaxed and ready...of course, he has no idea what's about to happen to him either.  Thanks to our cat-sitter, Anjie, for this great pic of the Dud-miester over the weekend while we were gone. 

Dudley chilling before his competition (or chilled in fear).  It's hard to tell with him.

Dudley eyeing his competition. His category of short-haired adults was the largest of the night.  He didn't win unfortunately, but we are still proud of him.  And very excited about some of the Mighty Miracles kittens winning their categories (and runner-up Best in Show) and getting a lot of positive publicity and an invitation to come back next year and bring even more participants.