Milepost 3,209 (Nashville)

We arrived in Nashville early this evening.  This was our fifth straight day with temperatures hovering around 100 and high humidity.  Sounds as though it'll be slightly cooler tomorrow.  We wish we could import some cool, dry air from back home.

Today marked the beginning of the Great Civil War Battlefield Tour of 2010 with the Shiloh battlefield in Tennessee.  Actually, the story includes Corinth, Mississippi, which was a critical rail transportation center.  We began our trip at the Civil War Interpretive Center in Corinth and then drove across the border into Tennessee to see the Shiloh National Military Park.  It was a very interesting place.  This photo is of an area of the battlefield called the "hornet's nest."  It's where union troops held off confederate troops for much of the first day of the battle before surrendering.  But they were able to buy enough time for union reinforcements to arrive and turn the battle around the next day.

We spent a good part of the afternoon on about a 75-mile stretch of the Natchez Trace Parkway.  It's a very beautiful drive with minimal traffic and a 50 mph speed limit.  No truck traffic is permitted.

It's hard to believe that we've now traveled more than 3,000 miles!