6-28-19 Montgomery, AL

There sure are a lot of bugs here.  There are more bugs than Baptist Churches and that’s sayin’ something.  Some are tiny fliers, too, and get right through the screens.  We bought bug killer at the hardware store, yesterday, “good for 50 different species of bugs.”  Huh?  So what was God thinking THAT day?!  In the evening, there are lightning bugs, though, which is cool.  We sat outside tonight and watched the river flow along and all the bugs were screeching their songs and those loud birds sing, “turbo, turbo, turbo,” “weezoo, weezoo,” “ready, ready, ready.”

Do you think our campsite is big enough?

We are camped in Gunter Hill Park, a really beautiful, spacious place on Catoma Creek.  It’s a state park but we have a full hook-up and are tucked in among a lot of tall trees and green grass on a great big site.  Spanish moss hangs from the branches of the trees and lichens grow all over the trunks so it is pretty wet here a lot of the time, it seems.  But we’ve been lucky with the weather, so far.  Green, green parks and blue skies, mostly.

Originally, two small towns, New Philadelphia and East Alabama existed side by side locally.  In 1819, the year Alabama became a state, the two towns were merged into Montgomery, named for a hero of the Revolutionary War, Gen. Richard Montgomery.  The first capitol was built in 1849 but it burned down.  The current capitol building was completed on the same site in 1851.  It is blindingly white and stands out from viewpoints around the city. 

AL capitol in Montgomery

Unlike many capitols we have visited, this building is not used anymore.  The Senate and House chambers are really small, relatively speaking.  The House is furnished with simple chairs and the Senate with small desks and chairs.  We were really surprised.  The capitol building is pretty much a museum and historic landmark, now.  On the walk outside the building is a brass star. 

Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as
President of the CSA on this spot

It marks the spot where Jefferson Davis was sworn in as the President of the Confederate States of America in 1861.  There is an elegant cantilever staircase in the building designed and built by

Horace King's spiral staircase

Horace King.  King was a slave owned by an architect, John Godwin, who worked side-by-side with him on many projects.  In 1846, an act of the Legislature emancipated him, an effort driven by Godwin, and King continued to work with Godwin and became a renowned engineer and architect in his own right.

House chamber

Senate chamber

The "White House" of the CSA

The first capitol building of the Confederate States of America was moved to a corner near the state capitol building.  The CSA capitol was the home of Jefferson Davis before the capital was moved to Richmond, VA.  Almost all of the furnishings in the house were owned by the Davis family and the rooms include his “oval office” where Davis worked and met with dignitaries.  There was no kitchen in this building, like many others.  With the heat in this area, an indoor kitchen would have turned the entire house into an unbearable oven.  Many houses had outdoor kitchens, just as this one.  There are a lot of artifacts here, including uniforms and hats worn by Davis and the confederate flag which draped his coffin.

This is the flag that draped the coffin
of Jefferson Davis 

After our explorations, Rob found Wintzell’s Oyster House.  There were bar stools available framed by colorful Christmas lights and, my goodness, happy hour $1 oysters done any way you like them!  Eighteen raw oysters later, dinner was served, Cajun seafood pasta!  A great day!

6-23-19 Meridian and Jackson, MS

We are camped in Toomsuba, MS but we spent today poking around nearby Meridian.  The city’s history dates back to the 1830s but it really became solidly established in 1855 when the railroads intersected here.  It was even the state capital for a short time.  Meridian had become a significant Confederate outpost but during the Civil War, William Tecumseh Sherman (I love to say, “Tecumseh.”  My next cat will be named Tecumseh.  “Here, Tecumseh! ”) came through and obliterated the city.  His famous words were, “Meridian no longer exists.” 

Sherman's bowties

Because the railroads played such an important part in the war effort, providing supplies and armaments, Sherman’s army embarked on the task of destroying this important conduit.  They tore up the rails, then used the ties for firewood to heat the rails and wrap them around trees.  They were called, “Sherman’s bowties.”  The Union Army destroyed 100 miles of the tracks around the city of Meridian.  Undaunted, the Rebs rebuilt the tracks in 26 days.  Don’t mess with us, General W. Tecumseh!

Merrehope mansion

The Merrehope House, a Greek Revival “cottage” built in 1858 up on a hill, eventually grew into a beautiful mansion.  During the Civil War, it was occupied by the Confederates, specifically Gens. Johnston and Polk and later by Union officers.  W. Tecumseh S. arrived in Meridian with 10,000 troops and ran Polk out of town.  In the Battle of Meridian, it was one of 6 houses that he chose not to destroy, probably because he was living there.  Despite his boast of destroying Meridian, the city was rebuilt and is now a thriving metropolis.  I repeat, don’t mess with us, General W. Tecumseh.

Gustav Dentzel immigrated (legally) to the US from Germany and was part and parcel of a family of artisans and carousel builders.  In 1896, he launched on a project to create a carousel for the 1904 St. Louis Exposition.  The carousel was sold in 1909 to the city of Meridian for $2,000 (now worth more than $1M) and has been housed in the Carousel House here ever since.  Projects to restore the animals, hand-carved from basswood and poplar, have revealed that over the decades, 6-10 coats of paint had been applied.  It is now one of 11 carousels nationwide that is an historic landmark and the only one in the South.  As a tribute to this landmark, there are carousel horses located around the city, each artistically painted and named.  It is a really pleasant drive with the pretty horses on the corners here and there.

Horse Power, located at 210 22nd St.
in Meridian

It was undecided if we should drive the two legs of the triangle, down through Jackson, MS and then east, or if we should take the hippopotamus down the trace from Memphis to Toomsuba.  Our goal was to see the capitol bldg. in Jackson but we opted to drive the trace.  (Good thing, as it turns out.  We could never have parked the beast near the capitol.)  This was Friday afternoon and as it turns out, the capitol bldg. is closed on the week end which called for a 3-night stay.  On Monday, we backtracked 90 miles to Jackson.  First, lunch at Saltine Oyster Bar which features you-know-what.  I had a wonderful feast of oysters on the half shell and alligator stew.  I begrudgingly shared with Spouse to prove my eternal love.  After lunch, off to the capitol building.  Centuries ago, MS lay under a shallow sea and so most of the land here is unstable sea floor.  The original capitol was built on poor sea floor foundations and soon began to falter.  About the same time, MS won a $1M lawsuit against the IL Central Railroad for back taxes and used the winnings to build a new capitol which was begun in 1901 and finished in 28 months.Much of the interior is Italian white and black marble and faux man-made marble.  The architect’s idea was to allow in as much natural light as possible and the floors on the fourth floor are embedded with glass cylinders to allow light to pass through and illuminate the stained glass ceiling on the third floor. The two legislative chambers are crowned with stained glass domes which allow them to be brightly lit with natural light.  The capitol sits on a square of 19 acres, pristinely manicured and populated with trees and flowers indigenous to MS, among them, the magnolia, the pretty MS state flower.

Capitol Jackson, MS

Dome over the House of Representatives

Tile floor on the third level outside the
Senate chambers.  The ancient swastika (before Hitler)
was meant to convey good fortune and
well-being.

The pretty Magnolia, the MS state flower.
We see thousands everywhere.

Old Glory and the MS state flag

 

My first leg of the journey plans are now behind us.  It’s Rob’s turn.  Next stop:  Montgomery, AL, a nice short drive and a nice long 5-night stay.  Hurray!  Rob’s got this!

6-21-19 Memphis, TN

“Oh the river is deep and the river is wide, alleluia!”  It is wider by far than I have ever seen the Mighty Mississippi and moving along rapidly with white caps in places.  There is a bridge that crosses over the river from the Arkansas side to Memphis which usually can be seen from our fave rv park.  We did not see Tom Sawyer’s so we suppose, as the park attendant told us, that it is woefully underwater.  The locals do not seem ruffled by any of this, traffic and commerce are in a business-as-usual mode, the river overflowing its banks or not. 

The Memphis Street Trolley

Conductor Terry and Lindy

Lindy and the band at BB King's

A trolley runs about in Memphis so we took a quick ride on it and got a lot of pointers from the conductor on good eats in Memphis.  A wonderful blues band was wailing at BB King’s Club, a perfect venue for a lunch of gumbo and catfish nuggets.  Stopping in occasionally at the shops and clubs was a relief from the muggy, heavy humidity.  It is so muggy that the air is actually hazy.  This will be the norm for quite a while on this trip.  So to assist in our adjustment  effort, Rob suggested a Big Ass Beer at an umbrella table on the sidewalk where we could watch all the activity and hear the live music.  Who am I to say, “No?”  Others joined in on the fun at the next table and we got into a lively discussion because of our clothes!  I was wearing a Green Bay Packers shirt and my Trump 2020 hat while Rob had on a University of WA cap.  The lady, originally from Prairie du Chien, WI, took our picture for her husband.  The poor bastard was still at work.

Rob at the Peabody Hotel fountain with the ducks

The Peabody Ducks Palace

The fountain in the ducks' condo

It was worth it to visit the Peabody again to watch the March of the Ducks, truly a one-of-a-kind event.  The elevator takes people to the top floor of the hotel to see the ducks’ “palace.”  They are on Easy Street there, with a fountain, a house and a pool, quite luxurious for 5 ducks! 

Rob on top of the Peabody Hotel in
front of the Duck Palace

We decided to have dinner at the Flying Catfish nearby and were walking there when a woman encountered us and exclaimed, “Oh My God!  You’re those people!”  We had no idea who she was or what in the world she was talking about.  She pulled out her phone saying, “Wait, wait, wait!”  She pulled up something called “Snapchat,” and there was the picture of us that the lady from Prairie du Chien had taken earlier today.  It was titled, “The perfect couple.”  (I do not know “Snapchat” from a bucket of paint.)  We laughed.  We’re famous!  (Send money.)

Maybe it’s good karma or something, but the red cell storms seem to be passing us by the skin of our teeth.  We got a serious splash last night and lost power for a little while but then, it cleared up and calmed down.  Phew!  No hail, which is a blessing because we have no way to go up on the roof to fix a broken skylight.  This rig was not built with a ladder (too many lawyers).  This morning, we head south along the “Natchez Trace.”  “Trace” is a word that is used, sometimes, in place of the word, “trail,” and the Natchez Trace is one of the more commonly-known uses of the word.  It means a more rugged path, if you will.  If you lay out a trace and a lot of people use it, it becomes a trail.  The Natchez Trace runs 440 miles from Nashville, TN to Natchez, MS and was originally used as a trail for travelers and traders.  When transportation on the Mississippi River became common the trace fell out of use but today it is an historic landmark.  (Like Route 66, yes?)  We have arrived and we rest tonight in Toomsuba, MS.

6-20-19 Sallisaw, OK to Memphis, TN

Yes, we have been to Memphis a few times.  But we love it and I couldn’t resist.  We did run into a snag:  one of our favorite rv parks, Tom Sawyer’s in Memphis, is closed due to flooding.  Disconcerting on several levels!  We found another place to stay but it won’t be the same.  Rob keeps asking me:  “What is this park like?  Is there a restaurant?  Did you pay ahead?”  My standard reply, “Rob, I don’t know… that was a planning effort from 28 parks ago!” (I did make a note or two on the maps when I found nearby restaurants that serve walleye, but otherwise, honestly, I have not memorized our itinerary!)

As of Weds., we’ve been on the road for 4 nights.  It has rained on us twice.  Last night was particularly exciting and it got Rob out of bed to pull up the weather reports.  Seems we were on the edge of a passing storm but we had just escaped regions further west where “enhanced tornado watch” was in force.  I am not sure of the difference between a “tornado watch” and an “enhanced tornado watch.”  I guess the first means, “Watch out for a tornado,” and the other means, “No, we’re not kidding, seriously, you should really watch out for a tornado!”  So we survived all of that and today, it is sunny. 

Sallisaw has a few claims to fame.  When we drove down the main street, I spotted Ruger’s Bar and Grill (built in 1891) so we stopped in for a catfish lunch and a history lesson. 

Ruger's Grill.  Many of the original buildings
were built using the quarry rock you see
behind the current plaster wall.

Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd, an Okie, hung out at this establishment which was a saloon in a previous life.  His occupation is listed as “American bank robber.”  He had tried his hand at farming but when drought made that nearly impossible, he decided to try robbing banks.  An interesting career shift.  He became notorious after a shoot-out in Kansas City in which 4 law officers were killed and the FBI finally caught up with him and shot him dead in a corn field in 1934.  With his dying breath, he claimed innocence in the deaths of the officers.  He was 30 years old.  He reminded me a bit of Butch Cassidy, in looks and demise.  Locals brag about Pretty Boy Floyd’s bank robbery here in Sallisaw.

Butch Cassidy (You have to admit,
these guys look alike!)

Pretty Boy Floyd

Pretty Boy Floyd's plaque on the sidewalk
near the bank

A Cherokee Indian named Sequoyah lived in this territory.  He was born in 1765 and is considered a genius and scholar.  He is responsible for putting the language of the Cherokee on paper, that is, he created an alphabet and syllabary for them and is considered the master of teaching the Cherokees how to read and write.  In Arkansas, Sequoyah owned acreage on a “saline,” a natural salt spring.  It was valuable because they could harvest the water and boil it down for the salt, which was used for seasoning, preserving, tanning hides and even trade.  He was offered a spread in Oklahoma on a saline and accepted it.  At this historic landmark, his original one-room cabin still stands in an enclosed building on his land by the saline.  He was a patriotic American and served twice in the war of 1812 and was awarded the Peace Medal but because the Indians were not really recognized as citizens then, he never received a military pension.  His widow finally received a pension much later.  Now, the Cherokee nation is 350,000 strong and 100,000 live in Oklahoma where Sequoyah is highly-revered.  It is common for the Cherokee to adopt an English name (Right, Elizabeth?) and Sequoyah’s was George Guess.  Sequoyah/George was a self-made professor and honored American Cherokee figure.

Sequoyah's original cabin

Sequoyah, American Cherokee scholar

Rob at Sequoyah's bronze statue on his
Oklahoma land

Next stop:  Memphis where you can walk down Beale Street with a “Big Ass Beer,” eat the best pulled pork or beef bbq in the world while listening to BB King-style blues.  Take me there, Noobee!

Shamrock, TX to Sallisaw, OK

There is not much going on in the Texas panhandle.  Three times to Amarillo in the past was enough.  There, you will find the Big Texan Restaurant where, if you eat a 72 oz. steak with the trimmings in one hour, your dinner is free.  That’s right, a 4 ½ pound steak (what my Mom used to feed a family of 12), plus a potato the size of a football, a ten-gallon hat-sized salad and a shrimp cocktail appetizer.  I know people have done it because there is a blackboard near the entrance with their comments, like, “Ugh, I think I’m going to die.”  If you don’t eat it all in one hour, you have to pay for it:  $72.  A logical way to shop for meat, hey?

So, we had a choice:  Amarillo or continue on through just about nothing to the next stop, Shamrock, TX.  Too short a drive or too long.  We chose Shamrock.  We will each drive twice so as to break up the day and make each lock-up in the pilot seat more tolerable.  One night in Shamrock and then:  TWO nights in Sallisaw, OK, God willing and the creeks don’t rise.  Creeks meaning the water kind not the Indian tribe.  From what we hear from others in the parks who have just come from the east, there is a very good possibility that the creeks have risen.  Fortunately, Noobee has oarlocks and a rudder.  We’ll see what we are in for.  (Uh oh, ended the sentence with a preposition.  HELP!)

View from the Mesquite Canyon Restaurant window

Rob in Texas, y'all!

Historic Route 66 on the right

As you know, I love driving across our beautiful country.  Our scenic treats so far have included cactus and sagebrush, wide expanses of range dotted with cattle, tall bright red rugged mesas and now, more prairie-like flatland, John Deeres, oil rigs, thousands of cylinders of hay in the fields, pinon pines, scrub oak and miles and miles of old Route 66 to accompany us.  Now, we are parked at Lone Star RV Park where there are 18 rustic sites. 

The instructions are:  pull in to any space and pay for it in the restaurant.  $20 US.  The restaurant features catfish and fries and looking out the big picture window, you see green rolling hills that go on to forever.  Tricia wanted to know what she could serve y’all.

This morning, we press on to Sallisaw, OK pursuant of the quest to traverse this portion of the trip efficiently so as to spend as much time as possible in the places we haven’t seen yet in the southeast.  The land is green and lush, small rivers travel aimlessly it seems, the crop dusters are busy and the cattle are doing what they know how to do:  graze.  There are hundreds, if not thousands, of windmills and just to pass the time, we did the math.  The molecules at the tip of the windmill blades were traveling at a speedy 31mph.  Not the AJ Foyts of molecules, for sure.  This was a low wind day.  Top speed of the molecules is 180mph.  Still… no AJ Foyts!  Just thought you would want to know that.  Traffic has not been too awful and the I-40 has smoothed out some. The sky is blue.  No rain threatens, yet!  It’s a pretty drive through our heartland today.

6-16-19 Flagstaff & Albuquerque

Seems a shame not to spend a bucket-load of time in Flagstaff and Albuquerque, we love these two towns and there is so much to do.  But since we have passed this way many times before and likely will often in the future, we reasoned that we should beat feet and move along so that we can spend more time in places we have never been before in the Southeast.  Thus, one night in Flagstaff and one in Albuquerque.  Aggressive but doable. 

The first park of choice in Flagstaff was Black Bart’s RV Park, Steak House, Saloon and Musical Review.  We just love this place and stay here every chance we get!  The fare is average American, steaks, ribs and chops but all the wait staff perform songs and skits.  The crowded hall is filled with applause and laughter.  What a jolly way to spend our first night traveling.

It never rains in Flagstaff.  Except every day when it does.  Yesterday, it rained on us three times coming into town.  Today, on the way out of town, guess what.  It rained.  The I-40 is a mess.  Avoid the hundreds of miles of potholes if at all possible.  The drive itself is so pretty, through the flatlands and then the tall, red mesas, fighting the prairie winds and passing thousands of cattle, black, brown and white with spots.  But the highways?  They rattled our fillings and spilled dishes from the cupboards and refrigerator shelves.  Holy buckets, we are here to tell you that the states must work on their infrastructure.

Rob asked, “Is the new campsite paid?  Is it a pull-through?”  My answer:  “Rob, I have no idea.  That was 28 campgrounds ago.  Jeez.”  So here we are.  The Albuquerque KOA is very accommodating to overnighters.  We have a pull-through sight so we did not need to disconnect the Jeep and tomorrow will be a fast get-away.  (Well, we can hope.)

Tomorrow will be a long day, indeed.  371 miles to Shamrock, Texas.  These first few days are a bit grueling but they will get us to where we want to be, to spend some long, lazy days exploring the never-before-seen.  Stick with us, t-loggers!

INTRODUCTION 2019 SUMMER TRIP

Friday night 6-14-2019:

We depart in the morning on a brand new adventure.  We are more or less prepared, everything mostly packed up except for this contraption on which I am clicking, clicking, clicking and so forth.  The home fridge is emptied except for Rob’s breakfast.  The home lighting computers and the trees’ watering system computer are checked and double-checked.  The mail and papers are stopped, the pest control folks, Sheriff and ADT have their notifications.  There is something amiss, of course, but we won’t know what it is until we are long gone.

We had one last good-bye cocktail with our good friends and neighbors, George and Kathy, whom we shall not see again until the end of September.  That’s the way it is here in the desert:  we all say, “adios,” for the Summer months.  It is already 107F here in the Pahrump valley, midday, and that or more will be the norm.  So we desert rats, crazed from the heat apparently, all decide we will go from where it is hot to wherever it is hot and also humid.  Why we do this remains a mystery.  That’s always the itinerary, it seems.

Importantly, we old folks have remembered to pack up the big essentials, prescriptions and underwear.  These, along with shorts, t-shirts, raincoats, mud shoes, mosquito repellent, hats, mittens, sunblock, umbrellas and heavy coats should get us through most anything.

Having sold our beloved Bee, our one and only carriage is Noobee, our Winnebago that just celebrated her first birthday.  We are cautiously optimistic that Noobee is functioning without a glitch.  But of course these beasts never malfunction when they are sitting in the driveway, now, do they?  The headaches, if there are any, will arise en transit.  We’ll burn those bridges when we get to them.  We even packed suitcases for the unexpected hotel stay, God forbid.   But you know how it goes, if you can’t handle the occasional trouble, stay on the porch.  So we’re braced and as prepared as we know how to be.  Hey, bring it!

We are ready.  Whatever we’ve forgotten will stay at 1640.  We’re off like a dirty shirt.  First stop, Flagstaff.

All hooked up, checked and re-checked

PRIORITIES!

On our way with our guardian angels!