Located in Italy's culturally rich Emilia-Romagna region, Ravenna offers a fascinating blend of art, churches and historical landmarks.
27.02.2024 - 19:29 / lonelyplanet.com / Elvis Presley / Martin Luther King-Junior / Johnny Cash
Laid-back, eccentric Memphis is a city built by music, where the streets can often feel like a throwback to another era.
Whether you’re strolling the brick-lined byways of downtown or sliding into a booth at a Midtown dive bar, there’s often a whiff of the past lingering in the alleyways and between the stage curtains here. In Memphis, it’s still easy to imagine a young BB King carrying his guitar along Beale St, or a teenage Elvis Presley deploying the lessons he learned there to thrill a crowd at the Overton Park Shell. Little imagination is needed to envision Otis Redding and Isaac Hayes strolling beneath the studio signs at Stax Records, or to walk in the footsteps of Johnny Cash at Sun Studio.
Memphis has kept its music history alive. And while the city’s most popular tourist attraction, Graceland, can be seen as a kitschy shrine to the late King of Rock ’n’ Roll, other corners of this soulful, Southern city invite travelers to cut a rug and help its sounds continue to thrive.
Here are the best ways to get to know Memphis.
Anchoring downtown Memphis, the National Civil Rights Museum is a solemn reminder of the price paid for progress. The institution encompasses the former Lorraine Motel, whose balconies became known globally as the site where civil rights hero Martin Luther King Jr was gunned down by an assassin in 1968.
A wreath marks the location of the tragedy outside; inside, an immersive story of America’s civil rights movement unfolds – a difficult but critical starting point that no visitor to Memphis should miss. The history here is grim, defiant and powerful. And it’s impossible to truly appreciate the city’s connection to the nation without exploring that past in depth.
The electric glow of neon signs arching over Beale St in downtown Memphis is impossible to miss. This famous street rose to fame as a magnet for the city’s Black-owned businesses – from a newspaper edited by Ida B Wells to department stores owned by Robert Church, the South’s first Black millionaire. In the early 20th century, musicians ranging from jazz maestros WC Handy and Louis Armstrong to blues legends like Muddy Waters and BB King cut their teeth on Beale. Their music, and the music of early rock ’n’ roll and soul pioneers can still be heard live on Beale St, seven days a week.
Though tunes are on deck year-round, blues hounds from across the globe make the pilgrimage to Beale St sidewalks each January for the International Blues Challenge, during which hundreds of artists square off in an epic, four-day battle of the bands.
Planning tip: The best plan for Beale St? To have no plan on Beale St. The thoroughfare is home to dozens of bars, restaurants and juke joints all featuring some of the most talented musicians in
Located in Italy's culturally rich Emilia-Romagna region, Ravenna offers a fascinating blend of art, churches and historical landmarks.
Something of a mini-continent, the island of Sicily in Italy ticks most boxes. Adventurer, art lover, beach bum, ruin explorer: this rugged chunk of sun-spun land at the crossroads of the Tyrrhenian, Ionian and Mediterranean seas has enticed ancient and modern peoples with its charms since time immemorial. The result: one of Europe's richest and most extraordinary histories, with an unmatched booty of artistic and drop-dead-gorgeous natural treasures. The food and drink's not bad either.
Oofos shoes challenge everything I thought I believed about comfort. Like most travelers who love spending hours traipsing around new cities—I have many times chosen to climb the steep, cobblestoned streets of Bairro Alto in Lisbon instead of taking a taxi, and consider walking the entire length of Central Park an ideal afternoon activity—I have to think about what's practical, and not going to hurt my feet 10 minutes into a 4-hour jaunt. But you won't see me Googling “comfortable walking shoes” and clicking the first option that appears. I still want to look good during all this exploring, you see. (What else am I doing in a fabulous city besides trying to feel entirely fabulous?)
I've been on two African safari trips. Both involved glamping but on completely different budgets.
With films like Under The Tuscan Sun and Call Me By Your Name romanticizing Italy in the summer, it’s no wonder the season is the country’s busiest. But with the country seeing unprecedented numbers of visitors—last year they received an estimated 68 million visitors, three million more than before the pandemic in 2019—it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find the magic of Italy amidst the crowds. Since the early days of Tuscany’s tourism economy in the 1980s, the region has remained a summer destination that largely shuts down to visitors during the winter months. But with the growing number of visitors in the summer, hotels in the region have gradually been expanding their seasons to open earlier and close later, providing visitors an opportunity to see Tuscany when it’s not flooded with tourists.
Panama's capital is a cosmopolitan cityscape with a skyline dominated by gleaming skyscrapers and streets full of culture, incredible food and enticing attractions.
The people of Memphis know how to have a good time and there is rarely a period when the city isn't enormous fun to visit.
Let's assume you're planning a trip to Europe and want to include a visit to the United Kingdom. Should you plan to visit London at the start, in the middle or at the end of your trip? Does it even matter?
Budapest’s elegant boulevards and world-famous thermal baths welcome travelers from all over the globe – yet some aspects of navigating the city aren’t the most visitor-friendly.
Get out your bucket list; it’s time to cross off a major line item: Greece.
Memphis has rightfully earned its place in history for its impact on American music and the Civil Rights Movement.
Looking for a fun-filled city break that won’t break the bank? Then Memphis has you covered. With a non-stop schedule of free festivals – 200 of which are located in the highly walkable downtown area – there’s never a dull moment in the Bluff City.