Memphis Add-ons to Your Winter Tunica Vacation

By Travel Tunica on Thursday October 27, 2011

getaway, memphis, tourism, tunica

As a Memphian who frequents Tunica, I know a thing or two about great places to visit in Memphis while on your way to Tunica. Check out my list of top 5 stops on your way to Tunica.

1. Go Ice Skating Rink at the Memphis Zoo – November 19 til January 31, visitors will be able to take to the ice at a seasonal, tented ice skating rink located in the picnic area between the Northwest Passage and Teton Trek at the zoo. Zoo visitors will have the options of when they skate and can even skate while celebrating the magic of the holidays during Zoo Lights, the annual Christmas light exhibit held at the zoo. The rink will be open daily from 10:00am to 4:30pm, and on Zoo Lights nights the rink will be open from 5:30pm to 10:00pm. Skating fees are $6 including skate rental and $5 if guests bring their own skates. Zoo admission fees will also apply. Visit memphiszoo.org.

2. Go See an Imax Movie at the Pink Palace Museum – Check out the giant screen of the Crew Training IMAX Theatre International! The images on the 40-foot-tall screen immerse you in an experience bigger than your imagination. Every seat takes you on a voyage under the sea or above the sky and beyond the stars! – Now through November Legends of Flight is playing. This IMAX documentary covers the history of aviation and today’s challenges (both mechanical and financial) of getting an airplane into the air. Price: $8 adults/$7.25 seniors/$6.25 children

3. Stop for Some World Famous Rendezvous Bar-b-Que –  Everyone should stop and have some Rendezvouse Bar-b-Que when they come to Memphis. Each week, several thousand people on an average Saturday night pour into our basement and sink their teeth into a slab of what makes Memphis, well, Memphis. Presidents and potentates, the King and the Killer, Rolling Stones, *NSYNC, and everybody who’s anybody have all been down for a bite. Rendezvous is all about ribs, but the menu is as varied and interesting as the wide array of incredible stuff that adorns the walls and ceilings.

4. Take a Stroll Through Tom Lee Park – This city park located to the immediate west of downtown Memphis, overlooking the Mississippi River. Encompassing about 30 acres parallel to the Mississippi River for about one mile, it offers panoramic views of the river and the shores of Arkansas on the opposite side. The park is named after Tom Lee, an African-American riverworker, who saved the lives of 32 passengers of the sinking steamboat in 1925.

5. See Graceland’s Holiday Lighting Ceremony – Elvis Presley’s Graceland in Memphis will officially kick off the holiday season by “flipping the switch” for the annual lighting celebration on Friday, November 18, 2011. The extensive display will include hundreds of blue lights along the driveway, a life-size Nativity scene, Santa and his sleigh and much more originally displayed at Graceland by Elvis and the Presley family.