Memphis is brilliant. One night is not enough but you can see a lot in 2 days. I can't recommend the hotel we stayed at but it may well have been refurbished since. However, pick somewhere close to Beale Street- which is where you'll want to be in the evenings! Have a look at my trip report here for some ideas of what to see.
By the way
Memphis is a bit of a nightmre costwise to get to. I think there is a monopoly on who flies there. I don't think you will find it any cheaper once you get to Florida( but of course I may be wrong!)

We looked into doing this a couple of years ago when in Florida but found the flight costs prohibitive, about £180ish return each. In comparison we are flying Norwich-Amsterdam-Memphis-Los Angeles-Amsterdam-Norwich in October this year for Approx £400 each.

regards

hi ..grandadgrud... we stayed at the hotel comfort inn memphis downtown.
phone no 1-800-228-5150 clean but basic hotel about 10 mins walk to beal st.
had a few problems with beggars during the day on our walk to beal st but not at all during our night visit there (had a really great steak meal on beal st.
there is a police station also on beal st which makes you feel very safe and you can look around it.
we flew with continental air lines from orlando to memphis.
the travel agent was jetsave europe p.l.c.
we did our tour of gracelands and booked it at the hotel.
make sure you have a wander around memphis fantasic places to see boat tours e.t.c.
any more i can help you with please ask(if you take me with you i can carry your suitcase i would love to go back).
many regards...............john-doe............

I don't think you can get a direct flight from Orlando (MCO) to Memphis (MEM) and the best route would be to connect in Atlanta. Delta has a price of $290 return which is a good deal. Memphis is about 800 miles from Orlando. Take a look at Kayak dot com and put in the airport codes and you will see all the airlines that fly there.
For hotels take a look at TripAdvisor. The Hampton Inn on Beale St is currently number one in their members ratings for Memphis hotels and it is in a very central location. I use Hampton Inns and have never been disappointed. They are a nationwide chain,reasonable prices and good value....You could book direct at HamptonInns dot com or go through Hotels dot com,a reputable site.
Be sure and go to the Peabody Hotel for the Parade of the ducks at 11am daily. It's an old ,really cute tradition,very popular with tourists.

Northwest Airlines fly direct from Orlando International (MCO) to Memphis (MEM) several times a day.

http://www.nwa.com

Be best to check several other websites for prices as well, for example http://www.expedia.co.uk has the Nortwest flights in July from about £130 return each.

Regards,

Nigel

But why pay Expedia a booking fee when you can book direct with NWA?

emdia43 , not sure what you mean by booking fee, most ticket consolidators, Expedia included charge less for flights than going direct to the airline. They do not normally have a booking fee as such. There are many websites that sell flight only's & prices can vary wildly. I was just giving expedia as an example.

ie Dep mco 2/7/07 NW957, Ret 5/7/07 NW956

Expedia £132.10

NWA direct £142

Opodo £154.70

Air Tran also do flights via Atlanta for about $230 return.

http://www.airtran.com

hi all just a note to thank you for the response..pls keep posting ideas etc
because we are still not sure..we definately(well,my other half) want two nights there in may..thanks in advance for any further info...cheers

At a push you can drive it in a day...its a very long days drive but do-able maybe 650 - 700 miles
Remember interstates are quiet..mostly 75mph..(or a bit more hehe)

I have done EL Paso Tx to Houston Tx in one day..and thats further

As for Memphis...I agree with previous post. Beggars can be bit intimidating. There are a lot of run down areas in memphis.

Beale st is fun...Graceland a must, as is the Sun Studios tour and the Lorraine hotel (Martin Luther King). Couple of days is all you need
And if you like Vegas style casino hotels try Tunica one night (about 30m SW of Memphis

nt639- maybe it's different for expedia UK users- but in US they charge $5 per person booking fee. For MCO to MEM shows as $274on Expedia while NWA website shows $264 by booking direct. Might as well spend the difference on your vacation......

hi all thanks again for all replys..we have now decided and booked
2 nights through expedia 9th to 11th may on nwa staying at peabody memphis..whilst there we hope to do graceland...trip down the mississipi
wander round beale street and anything else we can think of,time permitting.then back to the solana resort.well looking forward to it.....cheers......

The Civil Rights Museum is well worth a visit. It is built round the Lorraine Hotel where Martin Luther King was shot. We went on our last morning and wished we'd had longer than the couple of hours we had. Really well set out.
Also Sun Studios- where Elvis recorded- that can be done in under an hour and not far from Beale Street.
And of course you are in the Peabody where you can see the march of the ducks-bizarre Very posh hotel by the way- we couldn't afford it!

I've driven Memphis -Orlando. It really is not a 1 day drive, even if 2 are sharing. I reckon thats about 18hrs on the road with a few brief stops for snacks/fuel. We drove Memphis - Nashville - Chattanooga - Savannah - Orlando over aweek, plus a week in Orlando.
Chattanooga - Savannah was the biggest chunk taking about 6hrs, to give you an idea.

We booked the car through Premier Holidays. They did not charge extra for dropping the car off at a different location which made a big difference at the time.
An awesome trip though, probably the best we've ever had!

Did you like Memphis grandadgrud?

Hi - this is Mrs Grandadgrud. Memphis was brilliant - we did Beale Street, Sun Studios, Civil Rights Museum (a bit heavy going) and a Mississippi evening cruise in our 2 days. The evening dinner cruise wasn't the quiet romantic cruise we expected - it was taken over by a school party of about 20-30 11 year olds!!

Sun Studios was well worth the visit. The bus tours are a very expensive way of doing it, unless you really want to do all the other venues on the tours. We only wanted to see Sun Studios so we walked there from our hotel (the Peabody) - it only took about 15/20 minutes.

But the best bit was Graceland. I've wanted to go to Graceland for a very long time and it was everything, and more, than what I expected. It was well worth paying for the VIP tour - I took so many photographs the first time round the house that I missed lots, so we went round again, something you can't do with the other tickets. We spent a complete day there and even my husband - who is not an Elvis fan - was impressed.

Overall it was a brilliant few days that were the highlight of our holiday (for me anyway).

yes graceland is something special isn't it? And not as I had imagined. Glad you had a great time!