Memphis Vacations

When planning vacations to Memphis, spring and autumn are excellent seasons to look for flights when the weather is pleasant for outdoor activities. Winter is comfortable in Memphis without an overabundance of snow. This makes it a convenient time to plan for Memphis travel for cheaper accommodations. You also get to enjoy Beale Street’s annual New Year’s Eve celebration as part of your Memphis travel at this time of year.

Stop for a tasty treat or lunch at Jerry’s Snow Cones, where you can sit and chat with the locals.

Enjoy the sounds of local musicians at Handy Park with open-air jazz, blues, and R&B concerts under the stars until the early hours of morning.

Browse the local produce from the Memphis Farmers Market downtown where you can taste everything from fresh fruit to home-baked goods.

Enjoy an afternoon bike ride on the seven-mile Greenline Trail, which links Shelby Farms to Midtown.

Enjoy kayaking in Wolf Man Harbor, one of the Mississippi River’s tributary, and see Memphis from the water.

Memphis is a city known for its music and you will find plenty of attractions and events designed around its musicians. However, you can find plenty of other activities in the city to entertain you, as well. Enjoy the dazzling scene of downtown at night on the antique trolleys as you stop for the famous Memphis barbeque at one of their many restaurants. Visitors can spend an entire afternoon of their Memphis vacations at the museums learning about the history and culture of the area. Enjoy a day out in nature hiking on the trails or biking through the parks.

Memphis Walk of Fame, located in the Beale Street district, is similar to the Hollywood Walk of Fame but focused on Memphis musicians.

Graceland, the best-known attraction in Memphis, was the home of Elvis Presley and now contains a brilliant display of his history and memorabilia.

Victorian Village features a series of old Victorian homes, many of which are open to the public.

National Civil Rights Museum, located where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, provides a stirring history of the fight for Civil Rights.

Memphis Zoo, located in midtown Memphis, has one of the only Giant Panda exhibits in the country and one of the only zoos to have a live rhinoceros birth.

The Pink Palace Museum, one of the biggest science and historical museums in the mid-south, is worth visiting on Memphis vacations.

Cruise along the Mississippi River on the American Queen steamboat provide guests a special overnight experience along the river.

Levitt Shell, a beautiful park in Midtown Memphis, is the site of Elvis Presley’s first show and continues to provide entertainment for the city.

The Orpheum Theater, located on Main Street, has featured many Broadway shows and had celebrities grace its stage.

Cooper-Young is a set of cross streets where you can hear a variety of local music and see what Memphis is truly all about.

Sometimes Memphis music and Memphis food coincide in a few annual events that bring a massive influx of visitors, locals and international media groups.

For one month a year, downtown's Tom Lee Park is transformed from a tranquil, riverfront greenway into a sea of music, pork and people for the annual Memphis in May festival. This month-long celebration draws tens of thousands of visitors every spring, and features the world-famous Beale Street Music Festival, World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest and several International Events honoring a selected foreign nation (Spain, 2007). Sponsored by Downtown's Center for Southern Folklore, the annual Labor Day Memphis Music and Heritage Festival showcases live music, spoken word and dance on multiple indoor and outdoor stages. The multi-day festival features a parade, as well as tons of Southern cooking, children's activities, works by Southern artists and craftspeople and much more.

Perched high on a bluff, the city of Memphis overlooks the mighty Mississippi River as it flows south from the nation’s heartland toward the Gulf of Mexico. Like the ancient Egyptian city for which it’s named, Memphis grew and prospered due to its proximity to the river, which has been a major commercial artery throughout the city’s history. With a population of 635,000, Memphis is the largest city in the state of Tennessee, and the principal transportation and commercial hub for western Tennessee, eastern Arkansas and northern Mississippi. But Memphis is much more than a transportation hub. In fact, most Americans know the city best for its barbecue and musical heritage. For most of his professional life, Elvis Presley made Memphis his home, and his Memphis estate at Graceland remains one of the most-visited homes in America decades after the King’s death. The histories of Memphis and the blues, a uniquely American musical genre, are closely intertwined, and multiple blues clubs line world-famous Beale Street, which sits at the heart of the city’s nightlife scene. For barbecue fans – particularly those who love baby back ribs and pulled pork – Memphis is a mecca. Its unique combination of dry rubs and spicy sauces produces barbecued pork that is truly unforgettable. Although many of the city’s 10 million annual visitors come for the food and music, others consider a visit to Memphis a sacred pilgrimage of sorts. For it was in Memphis that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made his last plea for equal rights for African Americans in 1968. The Lorraine Motel, site of Dr. King’s assassination, was transformed into the National Civil Rights Museum, one of Memphis’s most popular attractions.

AOL Travel’s Memphis Guide

AOL Travel's Best Memphis Hotels