Apr 13-19, 2025 - Alabama and Mississippi
Apr 13-19, 2025
Sunday, Apr 13
☀ Weather: 60s -70s
🛪 Travel Day
Flew Delta nonstop arriving in Huntsville around 1:00.
Huntsville Botanical Gardens
The gardens were really well done. We spent the afternoon walking all the trails of the gardens, took lots of pictures and especially enjoyed the Troll garden (all the vines creating a maze is the troll's hair!).
Dinner at BJ's Brew House and staying at the Hilton Gardens near the Space Center Museum.
Monday, Apr 14
☀ Weather: Sunny 70s.
US Space and Rocket Center
One of the highlights of our trip was visiting the NASA US Rocket Center and Space Museum. We spent several hours at the museum marveling the engineering, sheer power and scale of NASA's quest to explore the heavens and the bravery of the pioneering men and women who sat on top of these rockets! It was awe inspiring. The Saturn V rocket dominates the Huntsville skyline!
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After the museum we explored the small downtown area of Huntsville walking and relaxing in Big Spring Park and later having a beer at the Melt restaurant. For dinner we went to the Cajun Steamer. Stayed a 2nd night at the Huntsville Hilton Garden.
Tuesday, Apr 15
☀ Weather: Sunny 80s. Nice!
🏞 🥾 Monte Sano State Park
Just outside of Huntsville is Monte Sano State Park. The trails are up on the plateau of the small mountain. Trails are well groomed and marked. An easy ~4 mile hike, mostly flat with light traffic. After our hike we had a picnic lunch at the park.
After our hike we headed to Birmingham, AL about 100 miles Southwest from Huntsville and checked into the downtown Hilton Gardens. In the evening we walked to El Barrio for dinner.
Wednesday, Apr 16
☀ Weather: Sunny 80s. Nice!
Slept in and late morning we walked to the Birmingham Art Museum. A pretty impressive free museum in downtown Birmingham. After the museum we explored more of Birmingham, got take out from The Fennec restaurant and had a picnic lunch in Railroad park. Later in the afternoon we relaxed near the pool at the hotel and just had an appetizer for dinner at the attached restaurant, The Lab. Stayed a 2nd night at the downtown Hilton.
Downtown Birmingham, Art Museum, Railroad Park, The Lab
Thursday, Apr 17
☀ Weather: Sunny 80s.
Another hightlight of our trip was a walking / riding 3 hour Civil Rights Tour. Our tour guide lived tour guide. We were lucky to be the only two on the tour and our tour guide had lived his whole life in Birmingham and was excellent. He warned us at the beginning the tour would start out sad and get sadder. We started in downtown and then drove into some of the neighborhoods of historical significance to the civil rights struggle in Birmingham. It was shocking to see the contrast to the relatively modern active downtown of Birmingham to the abandoned neighborhoods just outside the downtown area. Boarded up homes, vacant lots, porches with no house behind it. The tour guide not only told us about the civil rights history of the city but, the dying of the city. He described the downtown area of "putting lipstick on a dead pig". The story was sad, the neighborhoods sadder. But, a very good tour and tour guide.
Civil Rights Tour
After the tour we said goodbye to Alabama and drove 265 miles (5 hours) to the Mississippi town of Vicksburg along the banks of the Mississippi River. After checking into our Airbnb (nice) we had our nicest dinner of the trip at Anchuca. A 200 year old Mansion converted to an Inn and restaurant with various dining rooms. We ate in the "Library" room. Very Nice.
Friday, Apr 18
☀ Weather: Sunny upper 80s.
🏞 Vicksburg National Military Park
Another highlight of our trip was our visit to Vicksburg National Military Park . Vicksburg was heavily fortified by the Confederates and was in a very strategic location on the Mississippi River. If the Union forces, commanded by Major General Ulysses S Grant, could take control of Vicksburg they would have full control of the Mississippi River cutting the Conferderate forces in half. After countless failed attempts at frontal assaults Grant made the daring move to encircle Vicksburg and lay siege to the encampment for over a month in 1963. Starved and wounded the Confederates, led by Lt. General Pemberton eventually surrendered to the Union forces on July 4th, 1863 (the day after the three day battle of Gettysburg) and marked a turning point in the war.
We watched a good 20 minute video at the visitor center and then did the driving tour through the park with 15 stops. The NPS app had a brief description of each of the stops which was great. As a bonus, one of the stops featured the U.S.S. Cairo, an iron side river boat ship.
Downtown Vicksburg
After the Military Park when went downtown for a late dinner.
In the evening we just picked up some appetizers at the grocery store, relaxed at the airbnb and watched a movie.
Saturday, Apr 19
☀ Weather: Mid 80s
🛪 Travel Day
Easy one hour drive to the Jackson airport, 12:15 Delta flight with a stop in Atlanta, arrived at O'hare 4:42.
Home Sweet Home
Summary
- ✅Alabama-A pretty state with lots of green, big trees, rolling hills and low mountains.
- ✅Huntsville- A small northern city (population 256K) dominated by NASA.
- ✅Nasa Space Museum- Amazing! Lots of rockets to see and tons of history of our space explorations. The Saturn V rocket dominates the skyline!
- ✅Monte Sano State park- Just outside huntsville. Nice well maintained and marked trails.
- ✅Birmingham- A contrast. Downtown is modern and active with the university and hospital (eighth largest in the country). But, once you get out of downtown it is a dying city with abandoned neighborhoods and high crime rates.
- ✅Birmingham Art Museum-Free, nice.
- ✅Civil Rights Tour-Excellent guide, informative, sad.
- ✅Mississippi-Same as Alabama, pretty with lots of green, big trees, rolling hills and the river.
- ✅Vicksburgs-A small town dominated by the Civil War history. A quaint downtown and older neighborhoods that look to be shrinking.
- ✅Vicksburg National Military Park- Excellent. Well done scenic tour that gives you a real feel for the siege of the city. The U.S.S Cairo was a nice bonus.
- ✅Overall-This was a bucket list item for me to visit all 50 states (#s 48 & 49) but, we had a nice time. The Space center, civil rights tour and the Vicksburg National Military Park made this a worthwhile and interesting trip.