Elvis' Stuff and Truck Troubles

Sunday, June 9th

Today, we got up and headed over to the Graceland visitor center. We purchased our tickets online, and saved $4.00 each!

I went to the will-call desk and realized I had picked the wrong date! Luckily, they moved it with no problem, and soon we were waiting for the shuttle. They have mini-busses to take you across the street to the Graceland property, and you receive a headset that plays the audio tour as you walk around the house and grounds.

Graceland Farms was originally owned by S.C. Toof, founder of S.C. Toof & Co., a commercial printing firm in Memphis, who was previously the pressroom foreman of the Memphis newspaper, the Memphis Daily Appeal. The grounds were named after Toof's daughter, Grace, who inherited the farm. Soon after, the portion of the land designated as Graceland today was given to her nephews and niece. It was Grace Toof's niece, Ruth Moore, who, in 1939 together with her husband Dr. Thomas Moore, built the present mansion in the Colonial Revival style.

The house if very kitschy, garish and 70s style, but it's interesting to hear how generous and entertaining Elvis was.

Here's some pics:


The living area off the main entrance and the piano room. Note the stained glass peacock windows.


The dining room


The jungle room, green shag carpet floor, and ceiling!


The basement TV room


The game room, walls and ceiling are covered with fabric

The tour takes you through the house and out to a few other buildings, plus Elvis' racquetball court, which now houses Awards and some of his famous jumpsuits.

All these are Elvis' gold and platinum records

More Elvis' gold and platinum records

Some of the jumpsuits

Outside pics of the house

Looking at the back, toward the carport

Us at the front of Graceland


Tour busses let you out here at the front steps to begin your tour
At the end of the tour, you end up at the Meditation Garden, which is where Elvis, his parents and grandmother are buried.

Large memorial


The actual grave sites


Elvis Presley's resting place
It was a solemn sight for me, I didn't really think about viewing his actual resting place!

After the tour, the busses took us back to the visitor center, where we could see the other Elvis exhibits, including his cars and planes and various memorabilia from his career.


One of his pink cadillacs

Elvis' contract for Live shows in Las Vegas, written on a table cloth!

Another jumpsuit


His large plane, the Lisa Marie
After viewing each area, we were directed through souvenir shops to exit. It inevitably makes you buy something!

I headed back while Tony went to the last two exhibits that were a little farther away. He said I didn't miss much. ;)

After resting a bit we decided to test-drive the truck again. When we were coming into the RV park, it was making an unusual noise, and we wanted to see if it was still doing it and see if we could determine where it was coming from. We drove down the Elvis Presley Blvd., also looking for a repair shop I found online. The sound was still there, but the shop was not. We decided we will need to get someone to look at it before we go anywhere else, so we found a location for a transmission repair place that gives free estimates. We'll try to get there early Monday am. We went over to the park office and explained our issue. They are going to hold our site until we know if we'll need to stay longer or not, on Monday.

We ate leftover hotdogs, watched a little tv, and hit the hay.

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