On the Road

Nothing exciting to report today.  Just lots of driving.  I'm reduced once again to pictures of state signs as I cross over. 




And the occasional interesting thing (only in Texas...this guy had these giant guns in his front yard with the cows).  At least the weather isn't very hot.  In the high 60's so it has been comfortable.  And I have a good audio book to help pass the time.

What I've seen of the Texas panhandle is what I thought the whole state looked like before I saw the southern part.  Flat, full of farms and ranches, mostly brown, and boring.  And windy again.

Once I got into New Mexico, the landscape started to get more interesting anyway.  Tomorrow I will head to the petrified forest, after lots more driving.  This is not the fun part of the trip.  But, I'm getting excited to get home again now that it is getting closer.  Should be back in a couple days!!  Feels like I've been gone a long time. 

Heading Home

The rest of the buses are to the right

4/28  Interesting couple of days.  I got up after the storm to clear, sunny skies.  I tried to go to Graceland in Memphis.  To make a long story short, I never got inside the mansion.  The regular parking lot was empty when I went in so I thought it would be a good tour.  Only, as I got to the entrance, they were unloading 7, count 'em 7, buses full of kids.  It would have taken me 1 1/2 hours to get the shuttle that takes you to the mansion, so I took a pass on the whole thing instead.  I then headed to downtown Memphis to check out Beale street and take the tour of the Gibson guitar factory.  The factory was closed, and most of downtown was blocked off for a music festival they were having over the weekend.  I finally found a place to park a ways a way thinking we could at least walk down and see how flooded the Mississippi was, but we were stopped.  Seems you couldn't even walk down there.  I found a park farther away by the river, but got stuck with a local who wouldn't shut up and insisted he walk with us, but he walked very slowly.  So we finally gave up and headed down the road to Little Rock.  The wind damage  and flooding was fairly extensive.  Every creek, river and lake was to the top of it's banks and over.  Several roofs and signs had been blown down. The farmer's fields were all flooded.  I tried to take some pictures, but it didn't do justice to how bad the damage was.

Me in front of the "Little Rock"

Later, in Little Rock, I met up with a snow bird friend who was heading home from Seal Beach.  We caught a ride on her free hotel shuttle to the River Market area, and had the funniest (unintentionally) southern gentleman as a driver.  He ended up giving us an impromptu tour of town.  We laughed and enjoyed him on the way to a wonderful dinner, after which he picked us up and continued the tour on the way back to the hotel.  Besides him being entertaining, we got a good look around town.  And learned a lot about Clinton.  I ended up staying over at the dog friendly hotel with my friend. 

4/29  We got an early start this morning, but it was soon delayed.  I had unplugged the trailer connection and forgotten to reconnect it when I drove off.  The cable dragged along the ground for several miles before I noticed it.  The connectors in the plug were completely worn away which meant I had no lights on the trailer; brakes, or turning, as well as no connection to operate the brakes or charge up the trailer.  So I had to find a place to fix it.  That wasn't too hard to do, and as usual, I met and chatted with some very interesting locals in the process.  And it turned out to be a cheap fix.

As we had started the day, there was a large caravan of electic company trucks.  There had to be 40 of them.  As they got off the freeway, I followed them and took a picture.  I believe they were from different areas rendevoing in town to try to get the power back for the people that had lost it.  The rest of the day was spent driving.  Not too boring, but boring.  Lots of green, gentle hills, farms, more farms.  And wind....really strong wind.  I saw two 18 wheelers blown over.  As I write this, I am in the  Wal Mart parking lot being rocked by the wind.  Yes...I ended up at Wal Mart tonight.  At least the price is right.

The Storm

Off the TV last night

What an interesting day.  The storm hit overnight as predicted.  From the safety of the hotel room, I only heard some loud thunder in the early hours of the morning, even though it was raining very hard when we woke up....early.  The rain stopped fairly early as well.  I reorganized the truck, and we headed off.  I only had time to do one thing before trying to beat the storm to Memphis, so I did the tour at the Grand Ole Opry.  So glad I did.  Quite a treat seeing the backstage and standing on the circle where so many famous country singers have stood.  The guide even had us sing a song so we could say "I was asked to sing at the Grand Ole Opry".  Very cool.  While in there, the rain started again for round two, with lots of thunder.

 

These guys from the parking lot like the weathe

As we headed down the 40 toward Memphis, we ran through the second, and then the third storm.  The radio had several tornado warnings, even one of those with the loud noise that interrupts programming.  The trouble was, it kept referring to counties, and I had no idea which county I was in.  Tons of rain and lightning on the road which made it hard to see.  The only time I got really nervous was when it got really dark, and was raining really hard with lots of wind.  Pretty scary after all those warnings.  But pretty exciting.  It's so cool to see that kind of weather since we have nothing like it at home.  The sky was changing constantly and I  kept busy watching for that infamous funnel cloud.  As fun as it was, in a weird way, I sure wouldn't want to live here and have to deal with this all the time.  There has been a lot of flooding too.  All the creeks and rivers have overflowed their banks.  The Mississippi was amazingly wide.  Too wide from the flooding.  There were lots of trees down and other signs of wind damage.  I'm at a KOA tonight.  There was a sign on the door about where to go if the sirens went off which meant a tornado was coming.  As I write this, the wind has gotten very strong and the rain is pounding again even though last I heard the serious threat was gone.  This sure isn't the boredom I was expecting on the 40.

The Great Smokey Mountains

4/25  This morning the fog was heavy over the mountains, so we took our time getting started.  Did a bit of cleaning up.  That will be one good thing about getting home.  Getting cleaned up.  The truck and trailer and us are getting a bit the worse for wear.  Everything needs a good cleaning.

The weather was nice (warm, not hot) again, but with threatening clouds and occasional sprinkles.  I finished the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Kind of sad to see it end.  I dragged it out as long as possible by stopping in every pullout.  There were a lot.  Ran into some nice people at a couple of them.  Tonight we are in the beginning of the Great Smokey Mountains in a campground. 

A lot of people ask me how it is to travel alone.  I don't feel alone, I have Cash.  He is more company than you can imagine.  I have long conversations with him and we discuss what we are going to do for the day.  He never disagrees with me, or argues, or gets grumpy.  The ideal, of course, would be to have a soul mate to travel with who loves to do everything you do.  But that isn't always possible.  So it's better to go alone than not go at all.  But I wouldn't want to do it all alone...without Cash.  He is also the main reason I get into conversations with so many people.  He breaks the ice.  There are some things I haven't done, like eating in restaurants rather than tv dinners in the trailer, that are better done with someone.  It can be harder to get yourself to do some things alone.  It's easier if there is someone there to give you a push.  On the other hand, I've been able to pull over and stop at will, do exactly what I want, when I want, and best of all, I've met and talked with a lot more people than I ever would have if I had been traveling with someone.  I have to admit, before I left I wasn't sure how it would work out and I was nervous about the whole thing, but It's turned out to be a good trip.   I wish there was a way to stay on the road, and at the same time, be at home too.  I enjoy both.  I want it all.

4/26    There was a pretty good rainstorm overnight, but it had stopped by the time we got up.  As we started up the road into the Great Smokey Mountains, the fog rolled in.  Got one picture before visibility tuned to zero.  Following the road down again, it cleared up and we took one last hike on a dog friendly trail near the end of the park.  The road was beautiful and the wild flowers were out in force.  But the wind was also forceful.  There is a big storm coming and this was the beginning of it.

The Great Smokey Mountains

I was loving the whole drive, when all of a sudden, I got tired of it.  I was ready to head home.  So we did.

I  feel like the best part of the trip is over.  There will be long stretches of driving from here to home.  I made it to Nashville after a prettier drive than I expected.  By all reports, the impending storm is a big one.  Lightening, flood watches and tornado warnings.  The worst of the storm is coming in the middle of the night and the local radio station I was listening to, recommeded sleeping in the storm cellar, or bathtub but at least be sure and be in a sturdy building.  I decided it was probably smarter for me to get a hotel room than stay in the little, flimsy trailer.  So I did.  Now I'm wondering if I would have been safer in the trailer.  There are some strange types hanging around here.  Wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Easter Sunday

Happy Easter.  As an example of some of the cute, funny things you see on the road, we went by this farm with this cute trailer set up on the hill for all to see.  Someone gets into the spirit of the season. 

Wild Turkey, bad picture. 

The road was almost empty in the morning.  I guess everyone was in church.  We had about an hour of driving with no one around, then there was a detour because of roadwork.  Well, me being me, I got lost.  Ended up going way too far east and it took over an hour to work our way back.  Interesting stuff on the way though.  I usually find things when I'm lost that make it a lot less painful. By the time we got back on the parkway, around 1:00, there were lots of people around.  It was a beautiful day and the locals came out to picnic and enjoy the day.  Lots of bicycles and motorcycles on the road too.

I found a nice, what I thought was short, hike.  Turned out I misread the sign and it was longer than I thought, but we found our way back thanks to help from some other people on the trail.  It wound through woods, along a stream then into a meadow before ending at a pond. 

When we got to the meadow, Cash found something to roll in.

 

This is the result. 

You can't tell too much from the picture, but it is very green.  Most likely....cow poop.  Thank heavens my olfactory sense sucks.  I ended up trying to wash him off in the pond, then at the stream and finally shampooed him on the side of the road with the little shower on the outside of the trailer.  I still had to wash the inside of his ears when we got to camp.  Fun stuff.


I ended up driving a bit farther than I planned.  It was such a pretty day and I wanted to see the sights in the nice afternoon sun.  The scenery was spectacular.  I wish I could do it justice. With all the stuff that went wrong, it still turned into a very nice day.

Still on the Parkway

These are just starting to bloom

It rained off and on all night, but had stopped by the time I got up around 6:30.  Since I was at the Dixie Caverns and a tour was only $7, I had to do it.  Turned out, I was the only one on the tour.  And guess what...the tour guide was on Spring Break.  His had just started (high school).  The tour was kind of fun, then we headed back to the Parkway at the same place we had gotten off the night before and took a short hike not too far down the road.

Today's section was different than the last couple days.  It runs along a community of farms.   There were nice ones, and not so nice ones.  Looked to be mostly hay and cows.  Very picturesque.  Also several houses tucked up into the woods.   It was a pretty drive still.  As long as there aren't any stores or signs, just lots of scenery, it's pretty.  The weather had cleared up and it turned into a nice day.....for awhile.

Then the fog came in.  Heavy.  By the time we got to what should have been the most picturesque view, according to the guide book,  the visibility was about 10 feet.  It was around 3:30 anyway, so we got off the parkway and within minutes found a wonderful KOA where we are spending the night.  And had another TV dinner for dinner.  That will be another nice thing about getting home,  real food. 

Blue Ridge Day 3

4/22    We woke up to rain this morning.  It was kind enough to stop by the time I closed up the camper and we started on down the road.  But...we started a hike to the top of Sharp Top Mountain and the rain started again when we were half way up.  Fortunately, it was more like a drizzle and I had brought my raincoat. 

Part of the view from the top

The view at  the top was not what it could have been with all the clouds.  We started from those little buildings in the middle, by the lake .  All in all still a nice hike.



 It rained off and on all day.  Not enough to really mess things up.  But not too many pictures today.  We got off the parkway at Roanoke and found a campground for the night at the Dixie Caverns.  Ran into some examples of  "blue ridge mountain men" at the grocery.  Several were shopping there.  I chatted with a guy in line for a couple minutes who had the long beard, long hair, overalls, and heavy accent.  He was complaining that his kids wouldn't listen to him.  Reminded me again, we really are all alike and have the same problems.

Rain over the Blue Ridge Mountains