After quite a bit of time in Mississippi, a bit in Alabama and considerable time in Tennessee, today we finished the entire length of the Natchez Trace. We started in Natchez over on the Mississippi River on March 31 and finished up at the northern terminus to this historic road a little south of Nashville today. We were diverted a few times to places like Vicksburg but mostly enjoyed the scenery all along the way. It is a bit flat for our liking in MS and AL but the part here in central Tennessee is gorgeous and a bit less planar. Up toward the north end are the towns of Franklin and Leipers Fork, both with early 20th century storefront masonry buildings lining the main drag. Franklin is sort of like a upscale version of Old Town America except the folks living there appear to be quite affluent with black BMWs, Denalis and bitterly ugly Porsche Cayennes filling up the almost claustrophobic downtown streets. Quite a few of the buildings seem to have been recently built but with the same architectural style that keep them cozy on downtown avenues. Leipers Fork is right next to Franklin and offers a little less high fashion and a whole lot more reality in their old buildings. Some are such authentic old structures they have fallen down and now look like large piles of scrap lumber. The country surrounding these two towns is gorgeous.
Near the towns and all along the last 50 miles of Trace there is magnificent scenery; clear water creeks, turquoise rivers, colorful roadside flowers, a variety of stunning varieties of flowering trees and we also spotted some ground hogs and wild turkeys. The turkeys here have much lighter-colored feathers than those in the west. It must be good camouflage because they are hard to spot, even when they are near the road.
At some of the turnouts from the Trace we also found that jerks here use very similar graffiti to the jerks in the west. Some of it is quite familiar and written in English. Jerks must be irritating regardless of locale.
See the pix. Click here