In this post I’m sharing how our family spent 4 days in Franklin and Nashville, Tennessee.
We spent most of our time in Franklin visiting family. I feel like I need to warn that you won’t be able to plan your entire trip based on our itinerary but I share what we did, where we stayed and some honest opinions about breakfast places.
From my research before our trip, it seems like most people visit Nashville for a few days and maybe take a day trip to Franklin. We did the opposite. Most of our time was spent in Franklin with our last day in downtown Nashville.
Franklin has a lot of the recommended Nashville restaurants but without the long waits and lines. Biscuit Love, Frothy Monkey, Puckett’s Grocer, Hattie B’s Hot Chicken can all be found in Franklin. Depending on day/time you might have a little wait but its nothing compared to the lines at the same places in Nashville.
We flew into the Nashville airport, picked up our rental car and drove the 25 minutes to our hotel. We stayed at the Aloft hotel in Franklin, TN.
Once we settled in we joined our family for shabbat dinner. Spending time with family and seeing Aaron with his cousin was the highlight of our trip to Tennessee.
The next morning we decided to start exploring. We started with Biscuit Love. This breakfast spot was high on my list because I had seen it recommended so many times. I can see why people like, but it wasn’t our cup of tea. We don’t eat pork products so our options were limited. I tried the ‘princess’ and liked it but didn’t love it.
Nashville Zoo
After breakfast we met up with our family and spent the day at the Nashville Zoo. I absolutely recommend visiting with kids, we had a great time! You can read all about our visit to the Nashville Zoo here.
Sunday morning we tried another highly recommended breakfast place, Frothy Monkey. And again we weren’t super impressed.
After breakfast we explored downtown Franklin. We did some window shopping and walked by some adorable (and very expensive) houses.
Arrington Vineyards
After a little nap and quick visit to a playground, my sister in law packed up a picnic and we visited Arrington Vineyards. You can read more about our visit here.
Our last breakfast in Franklin was finally a winner. We had a delicious but casual meal at Puckett’s Grocery.
Downtown Nashville
We spent our last day being tourists in downtown Nashville. We walked along Broadway and listened to some country music from outside. (A little too loud to take a one year old into any of the bars).
We also visited the Johnny Cash museum in our matching Johnny Cash shirts. Yup – we were those tourists.
We walked from Broadway to 12 South. It was close enough to walk but probably would’ve been easier to drive. I didn’t want to have to deal with finding parking again and uber isn’t an easy option with a toddler who needs a carseat. So.. we walked.
We did a little shopping (mostly to get some air conditioning) and of course took some pictures in front of the ‘what lifts you’ wings.
Aaron napped through our family photo but woke up and stole the show right before we left.
We made it back to our car right before it started pouring. We drove over to 12 South to find the I believe in Nashville mural. We waited in the car for the rain to mostly stop but that never happened. I would love to explore this neighborhood on our next visit.
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