South on our radar
From Louisiana to Tennessee, new attractions provide group travel planners with fresh itinerary ideas
These are just a few of the developments creating a buzz in the South: and into an attic and onto a roof where they can view the flooded city surrounding them. They’ll hear a firsthand account of a St. Bernard Parish family’s rescue. Artifacts range from music legend Fats Domino’s baby grand piano found in his flooded Ninth Ward house to a Coast Guard rescue basket to seats from the Louisiana Superdome. The forensics of Katrina unfold in Gallery Three, where visitors discover how the levees failed in a display with digital animation. The
New Orleans Metropolitan CVB
LOUISIANA The Louisiana State Museum in New Orleans will remember the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina and showcase the renewal with a new exhibit that opens Oct. 26. Living with Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond, a $7.5-million installation on the ground floor of the historic Presbytere in the French Quarter’s Jackson Square, will tell the stories of people caught in the hurricane’s wrath. Combining eyewitness accounts, historical context,
Guests on Mississippi River cruises will have time to enjoy New Orleans.
immersive environments and in-depth scientific exploration, Katrina and Beyond enables visitors to understand the 2005 storms’ impact on Louisiana, the Gulf Coast and the nation. In one gallery visitors will move through the “Evacuation Corridor,” overhearing residents’ voices as they weigh their options as Katrina approaches. A state-of-the-art “Storm Theater” shows Katrina’s full fury with moving and dramatic footage of the hurricane’s onslaught. Another gallery takes visitors past a leaking floodwall LeisureGroupTravel.com
fourth gallery will celebrate recovery and showcase the ingenuity of Louisianans in rebuilding their lives and communities. (800-568-6968, katrinaandbeyond.com). LOUISIANA/TENNESSEE Cruise West, a leading small-ship cruise line, has announced two new itineraries sailing on the Mississippi, Ohio, Tennessee and Cumberland rivers in spring of 2011. The overnight voyages, with eight departures from March 19-May 7, will take place aboard the
Spirit of America, formerly the Spirit of Glacier Bay. Highlights on the sevennight Mississippi River itinerary between New Orleans and Memphis will include Oak Alley Plantation, Vacherie, La.; the antebellum and Victorian architecture of Natchez, Miss.; Vicksburg National Military Park, scene of the Civil War battle that gave the North control of the Mississippi; and historic Helena, Ark. The second new river voyage, a sevennight excursion between Memphis and Nashville, follows the Mississippi north to Cairo, Ill. at the confluence of the Ohio River, then cruises upriver to the Tennessee and Cumberland. Stops will include New Madrid, Mo.; Paducah, Ky.; Fort Smith, Ark; Clarksville, Tenn.; and Fort Donelson National Battlefield in Dover, Tenn., site of the first major Union victory. (800-296-8307, cruisewest.com) NORTH CAROLINA Harrah’s Cherokee Casino & Hotel, 50 miles west of Asheville, has opened a new Motorcoach Lounge, enabling it to accommodate greater numbers of group visitors. It includes a comfortable waiting area for motorcoach guests, state-of-the-art digital arrival and departure screens, and a large Driver’s Lounge with TV monitors and a desk for computers. The lounge connects to the first floor of the casino’s new eightlevel parking garage containing five motorcoach bays for pick-up and dropoff of customers. Other elements in the casino’s $633-million expansion, set for completion in 2012, is a 21-story guest room tower that was topped out in April and an events center for concerts that opens Labor Day weekend. New restaurants for 2011 include a 150-seat food court, 600-seat buffet and Ruth’s Chris August 2010 37
on our radar: south Steak House. Paula Deen’s Kitchen opens at the end of this year, and BRIO Tuscan Grille debuts in early 2012. (828-497-7777, harrahscherokee.com) TENNESSEE Ole Smoky Moonshine, Tennessee’s first legal moonshine distillery, just opened smack in the heart of Gatlinburg’s Parkway. Ole Smoky offers a variety of products, including original unaged corn whiskey moonshine, apple pie moonshine, sweet tea moonshine and peach moonshine. The recipes are from local families who have made moonshine in the mountains for more than a century. Dave Pickerell, formerly the master distiller for Maker’s Mark, assisted with the refinement of the recipes. A highlight of the facility is the authentic working moonshine still where visitors learn the science of the distilling process as well as the history
and lore of moonshining in East Tennessee. (olesmokymoonshine.com) Also in the Smokies, Bush’s Beans Cafe & Visitor Center just opened in the company town of Chestnut Hill, the home of Bush’s Beans factory. A Sevierville-area fixture since its founding by A.J. Bush and his sons, Bush’s Beans gained new-found popularity in recent years with a spate of television commercials featuring A.J.’s greatgrandson, Jay, and his trusty recipeblabbing dog, Duke. The center consists of an extensive gift shop, a detailed replica of the general store that operated on the site from 1897 until its closing in the mid-1990s and a restaurant that serves an array of down-home specialties, including dishes containing beans. One of the most intriguing of these is Pinto Bean Pie, which tastes like a cross between chess and pecan pie. A hightech museum has a theater featuring Jay Bush and his dog in a History of Grilling movie, a walk through a giant replica can of Bush’s Baked Beans showing a bean’s journey from beginning to end, interactive exhibits that allow visitors to learn their weight in beans and photo kiosks that let them create a picture with Duke and tools from Bush’s original canning process in 1908. (bushbeans.com) VIRGINIA The Newport News Tourist Development Office offers groups the “Paranormal Tour” for the upcoming Halloween season. The twonight tour begins with a
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Newport News’ “Paranormal Tour” visits several plantation homes.
ranger-led “Owl Prowl” through Newport News Park. Start the next day with a ghost tour of Ferry Plantation in Virginia Beach, which holds stories of a native Indian tribe and Grace Sherwood, Virginia’s only convicted witch. Groups venture back up the Peninsula to hear stories and battle cries of sailors past at the USS Monitor Center at The Mariners’ Museum in Newport News. After lunch, groups travel to Endview Plantation to see video and listen to actual electronic voice phenomenon (EVP) recordings from investigations conducted by RTL Paranormal, a local investigation group. The adventure continues with a visit to Lee Hall Mansion and a candle-lit, Civil War-themed evening at The Boxwood Inn, a gracious 1896 Southern mansion. Tour members feast on a traditional plantation dinner, followed by an actual paranormal investigation with team members from RTL Paranormal. They will teach the group about the tools and methods used to capture evidence of ghosts. (Contact Trista Attoh, 757-926-1442 or 888-493-7386; tattoh@nngov.com; newport-news.org) LeisureGroupTravel.com