Clarksdale, MS: We came to the crossroads…

And discovered a Delta mystery

Clarksdale, Miss., has been in the news a great deal lately because of the movie Sinners, which, for the record, I haven't seen. Still, I'm glad the people of Clarksdale did get to see it despite there being no movie theaters in the area.

Even before this movie, though, Clarksdale had been on my radar as a bucket list place to visit mainly because of a Mississippi Public Broadcast radio show I listened to growing up called "Highway 61," hosted by Dr. Bill Ferris, who, among many other things, founded the Southern Culture Studies program at Ole Miss. That's where I first heard authentic Mississippi Delta blues music and where I fell in love with it.

That's why when I saw we could stop over in Clarksdale for a few nights on our way back home from Hot Springs, Ark., I just couldn't drive on by.

I immediately booked us lodging in a grain silo at Clarksdale's Shack Up Inn – another bucket list place just a mile or so outside Clarksdale proper. There are other hotels in Clarksdale, but who wants a generic room at a Quality Inn when you can have an experience? And that's what staying at the Shack Up Inn is – an experience. There are several converted sharecropper cabins available, as well as a number of grain silos. However, I chose the grain silo because we were three travelers, and it had two bedrooms and a bath and a half. All the other rentals available when I made my reservation only had one bathroom.

The Shack Up Inn is like a Mississippi Delta Disneyland – it looks a bit…rustic, shall we say, but you get the feeling that every rusty tool and faded sign has been carefully placed for effect. Our accommodations were certainly comfortable enough, and we had everything we needed. The shower was a bit fiddly (either freezing cold or scalding hot), but on the second day, we figured out how to hold our mouths just right to not get a nasty, wet surprise.

Home Sweet Silo

And where else but Clarksdale would you get an air show from a crop duster first thing in the morning? Just a reminder that you are, in fact, deep in the Delta. You are in the country whatever was the country.

You can't talk about Clarksdale without talking about the infamous crossroads – the intersection of Highways 61 and 49 where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for fame as a blues guitarist. In my mind, it was going to look like it did in the 1986 movie Crossroads starring the Karate Kid his ownself, Ralph Macchio. I, too, was going to stand in the middle of the dirt roads and look about, waiting for something mystical, although I hoped not devilish, to happen. Also, it would have been a good shot for the 'Gram. But alas, it was not to be.

The first time we drove into town, there, at a red light among a couple of gas stations, a barbeque joint, and a U-haul, was a sign that told us this was the place – not just A crossroads, but THE crossroads. At this moment, as I stared out the car window at the metal guitars silhouetted against the sky, I understood why the raw emotions of blues have given way to the sonic sadness that is shoegaze. There's nowhere to be when the dark times take you down to your knees. Where you are alone, in abject despair, way out under a blanket of stars that illuminate the dark spots where your tears scar the red dirt road. Where nobody can hear you scream in anguish like a wounded panther at a real and metaphorical crossroads. Now we just go to Starbucks and doom scroll while we drink a mocha-frappe-matcha-chino.

The crossroads at twilight. There was too much traffic to even get a decent picture.

But despite that disappointment, there was blues fun to be had at the Ground Zero Blues Club, which is owned by Morgan Freeman, whom everyone said was a really nice guy, the Delta Blues Museum, and at the Bad Apple Blues Club, where you'll not only get to hear some music while you sit on the bench seat from an old truck but you'll get an in-depth history lesson about the genre with a bit of comedy thrown in. The next time I go, I want to get by Red's too, which we missed because there's only so much you can pack into two nights.

(Here's a pro tip for Clarksdale: have some cash on hand because not everyone accepts cards.)

We got to Ground Zero in the early part of late afternoon because we expected it to fill up pretty quickly, and we wanted to get a good seat. We were probably a bit too early, but we did get a good seat, and it was just as well because when it gets busy and the buses unload, service does get a little sketchy because the folks that work there are running crazy. And being early just gave us time to enjoy some fried pickles (crispy crispy crispy just like you want them to be and not dripping grease) and the Big T Nachos (pulled pork and barbecue sauce with nacho cheese, jalapenos, and sour cream on a massive pile of chips). After all that, we were too full for more food, but they have a great menu of typical bar foods – burgers, barbecue, catfish, etc.

Ground Zero, some awesome art on the side of the building, and some good food on the inside. Also, you can write on everything, so I did!

We were initially disappointed to see that the entertainment for the night didn't come from a state adjacent to Mississippi,or even from Memphis or Chicago, other notable blues epicenters. Christopher Dean came to us all the way from that famed blues hub of…wait for it…New Jersey! Wah wah wah…Frankie Valli does the blues, was my first thought. But Dean quickly proved me wrong and staged a fun show that had several people dancing along.

I'm not sure what I expected from Ground Zero, but it's definitely geared towards tourists. I suppose I was hoping for a more authentic Mississippi Delta blues experience, like the one Dr. Bill brought to life on his radio show, but perhaps those days are gone. Maybe it just wasn't happening on our days there. In fact, the very first person I spoke to in Clarksdale when I was trying to find the door to Ground Zero didn't speak English! He was from France. Fortunately, my brother is fluent in French, and we made a friend because not too many people in Clarksdale speak French.

The Delta Blues Museum is definitely worth the price of admission, however. It tells the stories of the blues, its origins, and its most beloved artists while also highlighting many obscure (to me) musicians. There's photography, costumes, paintings, folk art, folklore, instruments, and gobs of information to read. No photography is allowed in the museum, and I forgot to take a picture of the outside.

Two notable meals we had were at Chamoun's Rest Haven Restaurant and Abe's Bar-B-Q.

Rest Haven serves authentic Lebanese cuisine alongside Southern home cooking favorites like country-fried steak. We opted for the traditional plate – kibbe (ground meat mixed with bulgar wheat and, here, topped with toasted almonds), stuffed cabbage, and grape leaves. I have to say, this is probably some of the best Lebanese food I have ever tasted, due in large part, I'm sure, to the fact that there was a woman who appeared to be a Lebanese granny cooking in the kitchen. Maybe she was Louise Chamoun, or maybe her daughter? Either way, this is food cooked from scratch with love you can taste.

I love a place that still puts crackers on the table.

Abe's is the aforementioned barbecue restaurant located at the famed crossroads. It has been in business, as the sign states, since 1924 and has been located in its current spot since 1937, according to the Southern Foodways Alliance. This is the intersection where truth and legend collide. How did, as lore tells us, Johnson go to the crossroads way out in the empty, desolate dirt road country in 1936 or 1937 if Abe's has been in this place – the very same crossroads – since 1937? Did Abe's just spring up in a cotton field the next year? Perhaps that's a little more Delta mystery because some versions of the story claim Abe's has only been in this location since the 1950s.

We couldn't get too bogged down on this debate, however, because there were rib tips to eat, and they were fork tender and delicious. The slaw was good and creamy, the potato salad was like Mawmaw used to make, and the baked beans were saucy and savory. None of us thought to order the traditional Mississippi tamales this family, also Lebanese, has been making all these years, but that's just another reason to go back.

There’s always a happy pig on the sign. Little do they apparently know.

When you go to Clarksdale, like I know you will the minute you read this, take some time to just walk around the downtown and soak up the public art. I'm a big fan of murals, and I love that Clarksdale supports the creative class as much as it seems to. And as much as photos of the degraded South sometimes bother me because I hate that our small Southern towns have become so dilapidated, neglected, and abandoned, if that's your bag, you can get some good ones here. I did because I have a love-hate relationship with it as an art form.

Having said that, I have nothing but love for Clarksdale, Mississippi, its music, its food, and its people. That's why I'm definitely allowing more days for our next trip, and there will absolutely be a next trip.