>Be me and GF>Live in Iowa>Finally saved enough to escape the flatlands for a couple of weeks>Planning a road trip to the SouthWe're looking for a mix of great food (real BBQ, not the chain restaurant garbage), interesting history/geography, and maybe some unique nature that isn't just endless miles of basedbeans.Current rough idea: driving down through Missouri/Arkansas, hitting Memphis or New Orleans, and maybe looping back through the Appalachians or Kentucky.What are the absolute MUST-DOs that tourists usually miss?What areas/cities should we avoid entirely because they are total shitholes or tourist traps?Any specific routes or scenic drives we should take?
Arkansas Ozarks has a lot of great hiking, caves, waterfalls and canoe/kayak rivers. New Orleans is great but have your street smarts tuned up, lots of crime but you can avoid it. Cajun country west and north of New Orleans is more chill with great food and music. The “Redneck Riviera” east of New Orleans through the Florida panhandle has a lot of cool beaches and seafood. East Tennessee/western North Carolina has some obvious tourist traps but a lot of nature, music and interesting small towns.
What are your interests? Outdoors, music, history like old buildings or Civil War battlefields, highbrow art or crazy folk art environments, which the South has a lot of, food, beaches, drinking, etc.?
>>2884888>Planning a road trip to the South>We're looking for a mix of great food (real BBQIs that a typo? Surely you meant BBC
>>2884912Thanks for your reply.We'd love to see the Civil War battlefields and maybe even a few museums/old buildings.
>>2884906>Arkansas Ozarks has a lot of great hiking, caves, waterfalls and canoe/kayak rivers.>East Tennessee/western North Carolina has some obvious tourist traps but a lot of nature, music and interesting small towns.That's what we were looking for. We don't want to waste money.And what are the people like there? Friendly or will they shoot you?
>>2884888>hitting Memphis or New OrleansSkip Memphis. Complete shithole. Maybe do Graceland if you want to see that. Otherwise don't bother.>Any specific routes or scenic drives we should take?Natchez Trace Parkway or the Blue Ridge Parkway are pretty good. The Natchez Trace Parkway is pretty long, it goes from near Nashville southwest almost into Louisiana.>>2884906>The “Redneck Riviera” east of New Orleans through the Florida panhandleThat's really just from Gulf Shores, Alabama east into the panhandle. The beaches west of there are noticeably worse.>>2884921>We'd love to see the Civil War battlefieldsIf you swing through Chattanooga, there are two battlefields (same park) nearby, one in Chickamauga and the other on top of and around Lookout Mountain, where you can ride the Incline Railway up to the top and walk to it. That's really worth doing even if you don't care about the battle. Lots of other things to do in and around Chattanooga as well. If you want to go whitewater rafting, the Ocoee River is ~30 min outside of town with lots of outfitters right around it to choose from.>>2884922>And what are the people like there? Friendly or will they shoot you?Are you planning on breaking and entering homes or robbing people? If you're not, your chance of being shot is 0%.
>>2884888I have a soft spot for St. Louis if you are passing through there. The Hill is their Little Italy. Lots of good Italian restaurants. Kinda fun vibes there. Obviously Eastern STL and Downtown are kind of not ideal outside of a Cardinals gameday.Kimmswick on the way out of the city was a fun little kitschy Midwestern town if it happens to be on your route. Otherwise skip it.Memphis BBQ is pretty good. I recommend kind of an old faithful "The Rendezvous" downtown. The wet ribs are probably the best thing on the menu, but you can't really go wrong. Corky's is another obvious one. Tops BBQ and Central BBQ are a little more fast food-y and YMMV there. I know The Bar-B-Q Shop went viral recently, so that's probably a good one. In terms of tourism, the Pyramid, Beale St, and Graceland are kind of the big ones tourists hit. The Memphis Zoo is actually pretty decent if you like that. If you travel into Arkansas, the Ozarks have lots of great nature. Walmart's founder's had a kid into mountain biking so there's lots of trails near Bentonville. Lots of hiking all over the Northwest really. If you want to go down further, Hot Springs is an interesting town, kind of Prohibition vibes. Used to be a resort that Pro baseball players and Al Capone used to visit to convalesce and train.
>>2884930>What are the absolute MUST-DOs that tourists usually miss?most tourists only go to the smokies in east tn and totally miss the beautiful area between east tn/nc border and nashvillewelch point https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/tennessee/welchs-pointeasy short walk to a beautiful view, this harder walks to other views and waterfalls if you are interestedalso savage gulf state park nearby, easy walk to beautiful viewshttps://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/tennessee/stone-door-trail>>2884912there's a folk art museum in morehead kentucky with a really nice gift shop with wooden bowls and pottery and other artkentucky and tennessee have a lot of nice stuffdon't skip WV though - highland scenic highway - most people miss it, its beautiful
https://paradisegardenfoundation.org/This folk art environment in north Georgia is not far from Chattanooga and is one of the greatest outsider art works around. There’s other things like this in Georgia like the Land of Pasaquam and a search on the site Roadside America will show you more.
>>2885046uhhhh i dunno about folk art but there's some great hiking in northern georgia and near chattanooga as well chattanooga is also relatively nice for a mountain-adjacent city in the easthip and affluent in parts
>>2884912Shiloh Battlefield is pretty nice. Early battle with Grant and Sherman. Pretty bloody and back and forth.It's about 2 hours from Memphis. About 30 minutes from Corinth MS. Russell's Beef House has good steak there.
You're going the wrong way. If you're in Iowa, go west to Colorado. The southern US is flat, ghetto and has terrible weather. Car trips are expensive too. Gas is going to run you $600. You'll need 10 days worth of hotels and food. For that price, you could buy two roundtrip ticket to Cancun and go stay at Playa Del Carmen. Flights would be less than $600 roundtrip and you can get a really nice hotel for $70/night. If you're dead set on doing a trip to the south, do New Orleans and cut across on a coastal route. Just drive along the beaches the whole way to Panama City. It's the best stretch of beach in the US. Make sure to do the Emerald Coast in Florida.
^^^^ Ignore that retard
>>2885055Vicksburg is another cool battlefield park with a lot of the siegeworks still intact, the salvaged ironclad USS Cairo, a sleepy old city rather than suburbia that’s gobbled up other battle sites, and the river itself, the reason this was the “Gibraltar of America”.
>>2885174uh yeah but like the battle is long over and its just a list of names and places nowif you go that far south you miss the best hillsozarks east through nashville or cincinnati east to appalachia is gonna be much nicer scenery
>>2884926Wow, so many tips. Thank you so much.>Are you planning on breaking and entering homes or robbing people? If you're not, your chance of being shot is 0%.Okay lol, so they are friendly
>>2884930You seem like an expert, I'll check it out. My girlfriend loves Italian food.>>2885009This! We want to avoid the usual tourist spots and have the equipment for a few hikes.Nothing too strenuous. Thanks.
>>2885055>>2885174>>2885175We hope to be able to see as many of them as possible (it will be very difficult to see all of them)>>2885046Paradise Garden looks fun to see.We like these alternative attractions. Thank you
>>2884888That's a lot of shitty unappealing country to cover, full of fat mutts, bad drivers and countless miles of commerical boulevards lined with goyslop drivethrus. You could go across a much shorter stretch of Midwest emptiness to the Black Hills of South Dakota. But I bet that part of America has some awful restaurants.
>>2884921You obviously need to go to Vicksburg.
>>2884888Skip Memphis. Absolute shithole, very dangerous. If you want the bbq, stop in Germantown or something.You're also going to be driving through a lot of pine trees and rural poverty.
>>2884913This Americans cant help themselves but want their wives to be bvlled. So glad to be canadian and we have nothing but good memes and stereotypes if you can even think of one
>>2885128Yea, I'm sure you know what you're talking about. Have fun in Shiloh.
>>2885340>>2885357Thank you both.I'm used to traveling through corn and wheat fields.A few pine trees don't scare me.>>2885360>>2885376Kek
A literal shack in a parking lot serving high-end brisket and steelhead trout tacos; a local favorite that tourists often drive past.
>>2884888New Orleans is a must. Go there eat great food and enjoy the most unique city of the region. Memphis is a trash pit just ignore that spot. Go down the gulf coast to Tampa towards the everglades. Don't bring your girl to Miami. Go to miami alone or with the homies. Go up to Savannah, GA. After that go back up to the smoky mountains in TN/NC. Hit Nashville maybe on your way back to Iowa
>>2885411Where is located?>>2885419Thanks, I hope to see Nashville then too.Oh, I was in Miami during spring break a few years ago.Good memories ;)
>>2885411>>2885452Over romanticizing it. It's been a restaurant for years. It was a pizza place before this.
