Cletha's Adventures: Mississippi Blues Trail

We woke up to a bluebird day that promised to be perfect for today's scooter adventure. Our goal was to leave by 9 am and guess what? We launched at 9:05 so that was pretty darn good. The temperature was hovering around 52 degrees so I donned my heated jacket and plugged in along with cranking up the heated hand grips. After a quick splash of fuel we were on our way to the Natchez Trace heading south. Twenty miles later we were taking our exit and the long route to Kilmichael, MS. I so wanted to title this post "I Wanted to Kill Patrick But We Had to Kill Michael Instead".

As usual, Eric had planned a delightful route that kept us off any major highways. What a fun exploration we had today. I asked him if we had any goat trails or off pavement riding and he replied not today, just small, rural highways and roads. And then...this happened 😅

It was only a few miles and for the most part the surface was hard but of course there were those sections of chunky monkey rocks, several sections of washboard and a few areas of deeper, loose gravel. I survived 😏

Before long we reached the tiny burg of Kilmichael. Really, really tiny. As in there isn't anything there but for a beautiful park, a tiny City Hall, an even tinier public Library and a closed restaurant. We easily located our target, the Mississippi Blues Trail (MBT) marker. B.B. King's Roots

Wiki info on B.B. King. Lucille is the name American blues musician B.B. King gave to his guitars. They were usually black Gibson guitars similar to the ES-345-355, and Gibson introduced a B.B. King custom model in 1980. And one of his most known songs The Thrill is Gone. Dude, doesn't get much better than B.B. King!!!!!!

The Kilmichael town park was very festively decorated and we enjoyed taking a stroll around. Lots of creativity and imagination!

This was my favorite, hahahaha! Effin' Covid!

Since the only restaurant in Kilmichael had closed and was for sale we had to scooter on to Winona, MS for lunch and another MBT marker. A short 10 or so miles later we landed in Winona and the restaurant called "Tracks" because it's an old railroad station that is oddly enough right next to the train tracks 😄

Sorry, we forgot to take any food pictures. I was happy to see this place practicing Covid protocol. The food was good but not over the top fantastic. Just simple fare. I had a child's cheeseburger because their regular burgers were 1/3 or more and that's just way too much for me! Eric had a Philly Cheesesteak with onion rings. Now, I do have to say the onion rings were super, duper delicious! Homemade - no frozen bag of rings here!

They have a little free Library in front of the cafe.

Also, we found this very interesting tidbit of history in Winona.

Having sated our appetites we remounted the little Honda ADV150 scooters after stowing my heated jacket. (Warning to Fran K. to have a seat because this will knock your socks off!) I figured I wouldn't need any more heated gear because the day was warming up to a toasty 77 degrees!!!!

By the way, today was the first time using both the heated grips and jacket together on the scooter so I had been watching the volt meter to make sure I wasn't over taxing the little beast. Nope - no problemo - the draw on the electrical system was minimal. The volt meter bounced between 14.2 volts to 13.7 volts. Yippee! I can now be comfortable and secure the scooter can handle the draw!

Back to the adventure. Not far down the road from Tracks we found our MBT marker. Pops Staples

Wiki on Pops Staples and a bit of the Blues Down in Mississippi. LOL, Pops given name was Roebuck and guess what? His brother's name was Sears. OMG, when I found that tidbit I burst out laughing. How fun!! 😂😂😂

In the same place as Pops Staple's MBT marker we found a Blue Star Memorial!

From Winona we headed to Grenada where we hoped to score three more MBT markers. A rather uneventful ride on some lovely back roads with nothing but clear skies and warm temperatures. A perfect day for a scooter adventure!

Upon our arrival in Grenada we rode into a rather sketchy neighborhood to grab the Magic Slim MBT marker.

Wiki on Magic Slim and some Magic Slim Blues Going to Mississippi.

A shot of the hood. A row of tiny shotgun houses.

Next was the Grenada Town Square for another MBT marker. The Square was nicely decorated for Christmas.

Lots of monuments and plaques dotted the town square. We found this Confederate statue covered up. Maybe it needs repair? More likely a sign of the times.

We also found a clock tower with no clock!

The Square also had the MBT marker. Greneda Blues.

Wiki on Big George Brock and some Blues Walking Through The Park.

We found several interesting plaques and memorials at the Grenada Town Square.

A Time Capsule!!!! Wowza!

Our next and final MBT marker was about five miles down the road. Magic Sam.

Wiki on Magic Sam and some Blues Easy Baby.

This is the house just outside of Grenada where he lived.

Having captured all five MBT markers it was time to head home. Our route eventually put us on the Natchez Trace (surprise!!) where we took a quick bootie break at the Bynum Mounds.

And then we were home just before 4:30 after a 245 mile scooter adventure! We have now visited 28 MBT markers. We only have 180 to go unless they add more 😆😆

I was tickled we got out on the scooters today and that the weather was simply perfect. We scored 5 new MBT markers, had a decent lunch, learned a bit of Mississippi history and rode a bunch of new to us roads. I'm also delighted that my heated jacket and grips work just fine on the ADV150. Hopefully we will get another window of nice weather soon so we can continue the MBT adventure.

Thank you so very much for following along. I hope you enjoyed our little adventure.

Here's a map of today's scooter adventure ;-)