Blue Suede Highway.

There are a number of key sites to take in on the driving tour, places that played an important role in Elvis’ life—schools, church, library—but there’s one stop in particular that is not so much a show-stopper as show starter. The Tupelo Hardware Store, with its wide plank floors and high ceilings and penny nails for sale, is very much as it was the day Elvis and Gladys came in to buy Elvis’ birthday present. He wanted a shotgun, but Gladys convinced him to get a guitar instead. Today, the store still has the glass case that once held guitars. At the Tupelo Courthouse, you can see where Elvis made his debut with that guitar, and at former site of the Fairgrounds (now the Fairpark District), you can see where Elvis gave his triumphant performance to throngs of screaming fans at the 1956 Mississippi-Alabama State Fair.

After you’ve stopped at Johnnie’s Drive-in, where Elvis and friend James Ausborne used to while away time drinking RC Colas and eating cheeseburgers, you may be ready for the 100-mile journey takes you to a destination light years away: Memphis, where Graceland, Beale Street and more await you.

In Memphis, Elvis became a man and a superstar. It’s a different world to encounter in Memphis. But don’t worry. Now that you’ve experienced Pure Elvis here in Tupelo, you’re ready for anything.