The Gulch is a pretty new and upcoming section of Nashville. If you want to visit it while you’re in Music City, this 24 hours in The Gulch – Nashville post will help you plan your trip.
For more help planning your trip to Music City, check out all of our posts about Nashville.
Nashville is known for Broadway, the main drag in downtown that’s filled with bars playing loud music continuously from breakfast time until the middle of the night when most people have already gone to bed.
But, there’s so much more to Nashville than just Honky Tonk bars.
Like The Gulch.
It’s an up-and-coming area, sandwiched between Music Row and downtown, filled with brand new apartment buildings, new restaurants, and lots of shopping.
If you’re planning on a trip to Nashville, of course you wanna go downtown, but you should also spend a day in the Gulch.
To find out what to do there, we’ve got you. This post is filled with ideas.
If you’re heading to The Gulch, it’s probably because you want to see more than just the celebrity bars on Broadway.
If you do, our list of 10+ Must-Try Nashville Bars And Restaurants (That aren’t owned by celebrities) will give you some great suggestions.
24 Hours In Nashville (The Gulch)
Affiliate links are included in this post and Drugstore Divas may make a small commission if you use them.
Morning
Breakfast
We’re going to start you off at Milk & Honey (214 11th Ave S), which is one of the most popular breakfast spots in Nashville.
I’m not going to say it’s the most popular because that is, for sure, Pancake Pantry, which Taylor Swift has mentioned before as one of her favorite spots, but Milk & Honey is pretty popular as well.
Everything on the menu is good, but you definitely want to order coffee. It’s a great cup, brewed with Stumptown Coffee, and will definitely give you the caffeine you need to get through the rest of the day.
If you like hot sauce, Milk & Honey makes its own, and that’s definitely something you want to use to add a little bit of flavor and flare to your eggs.
You can purchase bottles of it to take home, too, although you might not wanna carry it around with you all day.
Late Morning
Milk & Honey is a couple feet away from the most famous mural in Music City: the Nashville WhatLiftsYou Wings Mural (302 11th Ave S).
It’s a pair of white angel wings painted onto a black brick wall, painted by Kelsey Montague, who did a similar one in New York City before Taylor Swift asked her to paint a butterfly in The Gulch in Nashville before the release of her single, ME!
That one isn’t this one. The butterfly was up for two weeks in 2019. The wings one was painted nearby in 2017 and is there now, usually still with a line around it.
Everyone who has scrolled Nashville on social media will be stopping at this mural to snap their photo for the ‘gram. So, definitely get your photo. But just know you’re going have to wait a few minutes.
A little further down the block is Van Leeuwen (335 11th Ave S). That is a very iconic ice cream shop, known for it’s unique ice cream offerings, like it’s macaroni and cheese collab with Kraft.
If you don’t live in a major city, there’s a very slim chance you’ve ever been to one, so definitely pop into the Van Leeuwen in The Gulch for the experience — even though you did just eat breakfast and probably aren’t in the mood for sweets just yet.
Van Leeuwen is situated amongst a ton of new shops.
Most of the shopping you’re probably going to do in Nashville is for souvenirs, but this is actually a great spot for locals and college students. There are actually three colleges surrounding The Gulch: Vanderbilt University, Belmont University, and Fisk University.
So you might want a window shop in this area, but it will be filled with residents.
While you’re walking around, keep your eyes out for more murals. This area is super concentrated with them.
In fact, there are photography businesses in Nashville where a photographer will follow you around for 30 to 60 minutes, taking your picture in front of all the murals.
If you’re here with a friend, or even if you’re by yourself, this is a really fun experience.
Afternoon
Lunch
Barbecue is different wherever you go. Where we are in North Carolina, barbecue is pulled pork with a vinegar based sauce. In Texas, barbecue is synonymous with smoked meats. In New York, barbecue means you’re having hamburgers and hotdogs on the grill.
And in Nashville, you’re getting a Memphis-style barbecue, which is dry rub based.
Peg Leg Porker (903 Gleaves St) has perfected this.
Every protein the restaurant serves is incredible. We especially loved the ribs and the smoked chicken.
But if you order nothing else, you absolutely have to order the Memphis Sushi.
Now before you tell me you don’t like sushi, this has absolutely nothing to do with Japanese sushi. I honestly can’t tell you why it’s called sushi, but it is.
Memphis Sushi is a sausage cut into slices, then smoked and served with squares of cheddar cheese, saltine crackers, and some spicy pepperoncini peppers for a good measure.
It sounds diabolical, but I promise you it’s delicious and one of the best combinations of food you’ll eat in Nashville.
When you’re done eating, right next door is the Hear This Nashville Mural (901 Gleaves St on the side of the now closed Stock & Barrel building). You stand at a painted microphone and pretend to scream into it, which results in these beautiful colors that are scattered across the wall.
It’s my favorite mural in the city.
Near the mural is a BCycle station, so if you like bike riding (we rode all over Nashville), grab a bike and take it to your next destination.
Late afternoon
When you’re on vacation, you need to go souvenir shopping. But, that’s a little bit boring for everybody else you’re with unless they too need some type of tchotchke to bring home.
However, Marathon Village (1305 Clinton St) will please everyone. Marathon Village is a really short bike ride away and there’s a BCycle station right near it, so it’s perfect.
So quick backstory. Marathon was a car company and as far as we know, the only one in the United States that made the entire car in one facility. Marathon made the parts and assembled them in a large three block building that’s now known as Marathon Village.
If you’ve never heard of Marathon cars, don’t be surprised because I didn’t either. The brand thought that it was going to be the next big thing, but, unfortunately, that didn’t happen.
So the facility has been turned into part shopping area/part museum.
There are tons of small rooms lining both sides of the building which house shops like The Ville Merch, which is where you will probably buy your souvenirs (it’s where I did), distilleries, a winery, a comedy club, and more.
Outside of the stores and all down the center of the building are machines and the car parts that they used to create.
They’re mostly just on display to give the building some character and remind you of what it was. There’s a lot to look at, but it’s not really that informative. There aren’t signs all over the place telling you how the machines worked, so you really have to do your own homework if you want to figure that out.
Across the street is a smaller building that’s known as Marathon Motor Works. Inside are five of the eight surviving Marathon cars.
There’s a lot of information about these cars, including about how one of them was won for a $1 raffle ticket and how another was probably stolen and for that reason the Marathon emblem was pulled off the car.
It’s really interesting to look at the cars and the terrible springs under the seat and think about how bumpy the ride must’ve been and how lucky we are for modern cars.
Marathon Village is technically outside The Gulch, but it’s so close and not really in another district in Nashville, so we’re including it here (although, locals might argue with me about that).
Evening
Dinner
One of my other favorite bites from Nashville has absolutely nothing to do with southern food.
At The Mockingbird (121 12th Ave N), a restaurant part-owned by celebrity chef Maneet Chauhan’s restaurant group, we had mini brie grilled cheese.
I love brie cheese, so I was super excited about this. But in all the times that I’ve eaten brie, I’ve never thought to make it into a grilled cheese with chimichurri on top. Which is kind of shocking because I also love chimichurri.
Thank goodness it existed here because the combination was incredible and as soon as we got back from Nashville, but we had to re-create it.
The sandwiches are so popular that they’re on the full time menu now, despite just existing originally on the brunch menu.
So order those along with anything else on the menu.
Late night
Mockingbird is catty cornered from Pins Mechanical Co. (1102 Grundy St), which if you are a child of the 80s, you will absolutely want to spend your entire evening at.
It’s part of a complex with 16 Bit Bar+Arcade, and the entertainment center can really entertain you all night.
The 16 Bit Bar+Arcade side has a ton of old-school video games, like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Super Mario, that you can play for free.
In the back of that room, there are television screens that are hooked up to console emulators with two screens above that where you can watch TV. We actually watched the Monday Night Football game there when we were in town.
Between the two sides are rows of pinball machines that cost $1 per play.
On the Pins side, there are ping pong tables that cost a quarter of (that’s the price for the ball), foosball that’s $.50 a game, then bocce, cornhole, and patio pong, which are all free.
On the second level, there is a little tiny area with skee ball, which is free too.
Can you tell why this is on our list of free things to do in Nashville?
But the best part about that section is there is a large slide that goes from the second floor to the outdoor courtyard.
Definitely take the slide. It’s so much fun. You feel like a kid and the joy and happiness that you will get, not just from the slide, but from Pins Mechanical Co. overall is absolutely worth it.
All along the back wall downstairs are lanes for duckpin bowling. If you’ve never done duckpin bowling, you need to.
It’s just like regular bowling except the pins are very tiny and attached to strings that bring them up and down. You also get to roll a ball, which is much smaller than an actual bowling ball, three times per frame instead of just twice.
A strike is a strike, a spare is if you knock all ten down in two shots, and if you knock all 10 pins in three shots, it’s just 10.
We played two games and neither of us got a strike.
It’s $8 a game Monday through Thursday and $9 a game on the weekend, but if you go on Monday (which we happened to do), duckpin bowling is free after 8 pm. So, go get your drink on, play your video games, then head back there at 8 and have a good time.
Bedtime
So we actually stayed in downtown Nashville near Broadway, not The Gulch, so I can’t recommend a hotel based on our actual experience.
But, Union Station Nashville Yards (1001 Broadway), which is located inside the old train station, is supposed to be haunted by a spirit named Abigail who died on the railroad tracks nearby and now haunts room 711.
So if you like the paranormal and you want to visit all the haunted places in Nashville, definitely stay there.
Plus, it’s in walking distance from everything that we mentioned, so it’s a really good location.
The Next Morning
That’s it. That’s your 24 hours in The Gulch. Time to move on.
But, on your way out of the area, be sure to stop by Five Daughters Bakery (602 12th Ave S). There are a few locations around Nashville, including this one in The Gulch (and including the one in Assembly Food Hall where the photo above is from).
Grab one of the famous layered doughnuts (or two, if you get the mini ones like I did) and a cup of coffee. It’ll give you the bit of caffeine and sugar you need to get to wherever you’re going next.
And fine, fine, if you have a couple minutes to spare, head to The Gibson Garage (209 10th Ave S #209). It’s a guitar store, but it’s more.
There’s an acoustic room, a custom shop, a conveyor belt of guitars that go across the ceiling, listening stations where you can learn the history of the guitars, and a stage — where yes, bands come and play.
If you’re in Nashville, you probably like music. And if you’re in The Gulch, stop by The Gibson Garage.
Then get outta town because now you’re outta time.
What other things would you recommend to do in the Gulch in Nashville? Let us know in the comments.