Sunday, July 8, 2018

Home Sweet Home.  After 47 days on the road we are back home.  We enjoyed our vagabond lifestyle with a new adventure every day.  Unloading the car and putting everything away, sorting through piles of mail, cleaning up after our two cats, getting our yard back in order, are what we are concentrating on now.  Not so much fun.  But all good things must come to an end, and so did our Great American Adventure.  We live in an incredible country and are grateful we’ve been able to take such a fantastic journey.

Thank you for coming along with us.

–We drove 8,960 miles

–We were in 19 states:  Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, Kentucky

–We stayed at 21 different hotels, motels, B&B’s for a total of 37 nights

–We stayed at the homes of friends or family for 10 nights

—We visited the following National Parks, state parks, monuments, etc.

Badlands National Park, Carlsbad National Park, Grand Canyon National Park (both North and South Rims), Mt. Rushmore National Memorial, Crazy Horse Monument, Wind Cave National Park, Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, Pecos National Historic Park, Bandelier National Monument, Mammoth Cave National Park, Central High School Historic Site, Palo Duro Canyon State Park, Minuteman Missile National Historic Site, Custer State Park, Little Bighorn National Monument, Mormon Tabernacle (choir), and the Minuteman Missile Launch Silo Delta 09 Launch Site

—We visited the following museums:

Akla Lakota Museum & Cultural Center, Buffalo Bill Center of the West, Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, New Mexico Historical Museum, International UFO Museum and Research Center Museum-Roswell (NM), Historical Museum, Oklahoma Route 66 Museum, Route 66 Museum (Kingman, AZ), National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis Rock n’ Soul Museum, Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center, National Corvette Museum, Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum, National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum, Clinton Presidential Library and Archives, and The Mammoth Site

—We saw the following oddities, many of which were on Route 66:

Porter Sculpture Park, The Corn Palace, Wall Drug, Al’s Oasis, Homestake Mining Company, Devil’s Tower, Roswell-NM, London Bridge (in Lake Havasu City), Delgadillo’s Snow Cap Drive In, Alien Fresh Jerky, Oatman -AZ (burros on the street), Clines Corners, Conoco Gas Station, West of the Pecos Rodeo, Giant Hare, Ozymandias, Cadillac Ranch, Beale Street, and a giant pyramid-Bass Pro shop.

Note:  There are probably a fair number of places we didn’t list because we went to so many sites our memory banks are on overload. We’ll probably remember them tomorrow.

BY THE WAY, WOULD WE DO THIS AGAIN – YES!!!

New adventures are in the offing…stay tuned.

Side comments/random thoughts:

• Dan enjoyed the 80 mph speed limits in South Dakota, Montana and Wyoming. Getting from point A to point B is much faster than what we had been used to. As for me, the fast speeds made me very nervous, especially on 2 lane roads.
• South Dakota would be a wonderful place to take children on vacation because there is so much to do.
• The United States is beautiful and very large. No matter what we saw out of our window it was lovely with the exception of the Texas Panhandle. Where some might find it boring, we really liked seeing the green plains stretching out to the horizon.  It just made the clouds in the sky amazingly gorgeous.
• Everyone was friendly from the teenagers behind many of the retail counters to the bikers traveling Route 66.
• It was quite unexpected to listen to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for 1-1/2 hours; truly an amazing sound. The acoustics were so great that the sound seemed to enter your body from all directions. Worth attending on a Sunday, which we discovered by accident.
• There were many other surprises on this adventure ranging from Friday night services by the Pacific Ocean; to bats flying out of their cave in the evening at Carlsbad; to going to a rodeo, to finding t-shirts with unusual sayings along the way. Going with the flow is to experience – expect the unexpected.
• Dan was a fantastic organizer and it made our trip so much easier. We had moving in and out of countless hotels down to a science. One-night stays were simple– just toss stuff into a bag and bring in the cosmetics suitcase.
• Leave more time to do nothing. We didn’t do that and it would have made the trip a little less hectic and even more enjoyable.
• Wear comfortable shoes.
• Pack Less!!!! We took way too much stuff with us and that made organizing things in the car more difficult and limited what we could bring back with us.  On second thought, that might have been a good thing.
• Enjoy the moment, even when it means sitting in the car doing nothing for hours. There is always something around the corner to make life interesting.
• Technology is wonderful. With cell phones, internet, etc. we never felt out of touch. However, it can also be annoying when it fails – i.e. our Subaru audio system, or internet that you can’t log on to.
• Nowadays it is probably better to book hotels in advance. If you wait to the last minute you might have problems finding places to stay. Many of our hotels were sold out after we arrived.
• If you want to stay in the national parks you need to book the lodges and hotels well in advance, i.e. 12 to 18 months ahead of time. Even your choices in locations outside the parks, i.e. West Yellowstone will be limited if you wait too long.
• We both liked taking a break from politics and the craziness of the world. Some information would sneak through to us like Justice Kennedy’s retirement, or the separation of young children of illegal aliens from their parents, but we were able to tune out most of it. We could pretend that all was well with the world for a few weeks.  We never watched television but spent the time writing our blogs.
• Blogs take time a lot of time to write (Wendy did most of the writing, Dan edited and selected the photos). It took approximately 1-1/2 to 2 hours per blog.  It was worth doing because we now have a great record of our adventure.
• We found that using GPS (Garmin) was good in most cases but often gave incorrect directions. Without maps from AAA, towns themselves, and the parks we would have made lots of mistakes along the way. Maps helped make this adventure possible. GPS alone just doesn’t cut it for this type of trip.
• We booked many of our stays through Best Western, which had locations in most places where we wanted to stop. Eventually, we racked up points for free nights.
• We found the Subaru very comfortable and all of the safety electronics were really great. However, as stated earlier we did have problems with the audio system.
• All good things must come to an end, but we will have the memories and the blog for the rest of our lives. We hope that you enjoyed this adventure with us.

 

 

Monday, June 4, 2018

By The Way this is our “back-note” on day two of our visit to Yellowstone National Park.

We were all packed up and ready to move from the Adler’s to the Madison Hotel in West Yellowstone.  Once again, we had breakfast and picked up our lunch at The Hungry Moose and for the last time drove along the Gallatin River to Yellowstone.

Today we followed the Madison River and took Firehole Canyon Drive.  It was a lovely drive without too many other tourists for a change and took us to Firehole Falls.  After that detour we headed to Fountain Paint Pots.  The area was full of dead trees and hot pools of water in various colors putting off the usual luscious Sulphur odor.  The walkway took us to Spasm Geyser, which we saw spasming in all its glory. The Great Fountain Geyser wasn’t too active when we were there and was just giving off steam.  White Dome Geyser, on the other hand was interesting because steam and water came out of a cone that shot high into the air.  For hundreds of years thermal water has been building a cone by depositing silica.

After all of that geyser watching we were ready for lunch and for some fresh air.  There are plenty of picnic areas in the Park and we picked one with unexpected guests.  There were two happily grazing buffalo about 30 feet from our table.  Fortunately, they paid absolutely no attention to us or we would have had to leave.  We were more bothered by the tourists who came by to take buffalo pictures, thus disturbing our tranquil lunch.   Buffalo are massive creatures and you really would not want to get in their way.

Not far from our picnic area was the Midway Geyser Basin.  It was interesting in that streams of hot boiling water poured directly into a running stream.  The Excelsior Geyser Crater looked like a blue pond that was steaming inside a crater.  Many of these hot pools of water were an attractive aqua color.  The water was very clear so you could easily see down into them.  The Grand Prismatic Spring is the largest and one of the Park’s most colorful hot springs.

Finally, we are headed to the most well-known feature of Yellowstone National Park – Old Faithful Geyser.  It isn’t the tallest or the most predictable geyser, but it erupts the most frequently, about every 90 minutes –give or take 10 minutes.  Thus, making it one of the premier sites in the Park.  It was late afternoon when we saw it and the crowd was manageable.  Old Faithful didn’t let us down and gave us an impressive show.

Next we visited Old Faithful Inn which is a place I would love to stay at one day.  Built out of logs back in 1904 its seven-story lobby rises an impressive 80 feet.  The central fireplace and chimney is immense and made from 500 tons of rhyolite rock. It is a very impressive place and offers tours which unfortunately had already ended for the day.

On the way back to our hotel we stopped at a few more pools and geysers. Our hotel, The Madison Hotel was built in 1912 out of simple log construction.  It reminded me of the Old Faithful Inn on a miniature scale.   In the lobby, the log support columns, beams, light fixtures and stone fireplace are the original. The room we got, however, was your standard motel room at an inflated price because of location, location, location.

Tomorrow we return to see the Yellowstone Lake area, but look for it on By The Way With Wendy & Dan (Blog) dated June 5^th issued last month.

Sunday, June 3, 2018

By the Way; A prior “Back-Note” on day 1 at Yellowstone National Park…did you think that we missed a day?  No we missed two days… just a lack of Wi-Fi with no time to catch up.

We spent a very comfortable evening in the Adler home.  The core of the home is its family room that features a wonderful fireplace, comfy furniture and built in book cases.  The Adler’s were very good friends of my parents and I could easily picture the four of them enjoying each other’s company in that room.  It was nice imagining them together.  The rest of the house consists primarily of a nice sized kitchen, 2 bathrooms, 2 bedrooms and a laundry area.  It sits beside a creek that happened to be flowing very forcefully because of snow melt.

Back 40 years ago when they built their home, Jesse Adler said that the Big Sky area was rustic. It is a beautiful place surrounded by mountains and is becoming more popular with the ski crowd.  In fact, it was rather quiet this time of year.  Now million-dollar homes are being built across the street and on either side of Jesse’s house.  I’ll have to ask her what she thinks about all of this new development.

The town of Big Sky is also “new.”   Imagine a shopping area like Legacy being Big Sky’s business area.  It certainly wasn’t how I imagined it to be.  We became fans of a little grocery store, /sandwich shop called The Hungry Moose.  We stopped there for breakfast, picked up sandwiches for lunch and headed to Yellowstone National Park about a 1-hour drive away.

The ride to West Yellowstone and the West entrance to Yellowstone National Park followed the raging Gallatin River.  The river flowed through a canyon that was worth seeing on its own.  The town of West Yellowstone is a 100% tourist area, and we will be switching to a hotel there tomorrow to cut back on our driving time.

Entering the Park did not take that long, however, there is a about a 19-mile drive to Madison, the point at which you can select which direction you want to go that day. The road followed the Madison River with lovely open green areas with buffalo grazing.  We were traveling at a decent clip until the buffalo turned up on the side of the road. Then we were crawling along, since people were stopping in the road to take pictures.

We finally made it to our first stop which was Gibbon Falls, one of the Park’s prettiest falls according to our Lonely Planet tour book. The water falls 84 feet into the Yellowstone Caldera.  Beryl Spring was next.   Here is where the buffalo got even more annoying.  On our way to Beryl Spring they decided to walk down the middle of the road bringing the traffic to a standstill.  Oy Vey Iz Mir!  The Spring is blue green in appearance due to the escaping gases.  It runs between 189 – 192 degrees F and is one of the hottest springs in Yellowstone.

Artists Paint Pots was a large area that first introduced us to the boardwalks that you had to stay on in order to view the thermal activity throughout the Park.  It is a hydrothermal area and included Blood Geyser.  The high concentration of iron oxide in the water stains the surrounding rocks a red color.  The area also included lots of mud pots.  The acidity in the water essentially dissolves the rock into mud and escaping steam and gas makes the mud appear to be boiling.

As we approached the Norris Geyser Basin, one of the main attractions at Yellowstone, the entry was blocked supposedly because the area was full.  Not to be deterred from entering a place we had traveled days to see, Dan ignored the signs, went around the barrier, and had no problem finding parking. It is North America’s most volatile and oldest continually active geothermal areas.  It was a large area that smelled strongly of Sulphur and where steam was escaping all over the place.  It looked like Hell on Earth.  In fact, instruments recorded as temperatures as high as 459 degrees.  It included Steamboat Geyser the world’s tallest active geyser with eruptions up to 300 feet.  We saw it steaming but didn’t get to see it fully erupt.  This is where we first saw people known as geyser watchers  (many of whom were geezers) who set up chairs and simply wait for geysers to erupt. We also saw Emerald Spring which was a pool of water that was a “striking” blue-green color because it reflects blue light with yellow sulfur deposits.

One random observation was that since it was often very windy people kept losing their hats.  Throughout the Park we saw hats of all kinds sitting in the middle of non-approachable areas.  I was tempted to create a photo album entitled, “Hats of Yellowstone”.

The Roaring Mountain is a large bleached hillside pockmarked with hissing/roaring fumaroles.  Those are steam vents that give off carbon dioxide and some hydrogen sulfide (for that nice rotten egg smell) along with a hissing sound.  Billions upon billions of rock eating bacteria called thermophiles are slowly eroding the mountain.  Close to Roaring Mountain we passed a cliff made from Obsidian, a black stone used for tools and arrowheads.  This stone was traded by various Indian tribes and was found in the Indian mounds located in Marietta, Ohio.

Sheepeaters Cliff is where we found a picnic area for our lunch.  The cliffs are made from hexagonal basalt columns similar but smaller in scale to Devil’s Tower.  The area was named for the Shoshone Indians who relied on the use of bighorn sheep.

The last stop for the day was Mammoth Hot Springs.  This area is known for its geothermal terraces and the Gallatin Mountain Range to the NW.  Supposedly it is a popular wintering area for wildlife, but we didn’t see any animals of interest.  There was both an upper and lower terrace that involved at least an hour’s worth of boardwalk and stair walking.  Large areas were moon-like and barren with oddly colored rock and unusually colored pools of water.  You could see where the bacteria were eating away at the stone.

On our way back to West Yellowstone we drove through the snow-covered mountains that were part of North Yellowstone.  We didn’t stop because we planned to visit this area more thoroughly in the next few days.  It took about 2 hours to get back to town. Before driving an hour back to Big Sky, we stopped at a West Yellowstone restaurant called Canyon Street Grill.  Not very good, but to be fair they didn’t charge me for my dinner.

We were exhausted just like the thousands of other seniors (geezers) we had seen at the Park today watching and seeking geysers.  Apparently, we weren’t the only ones that had Yellowstone on their bucket list.  Tomorrow is another day exploring Yellowstone.

 

Saturday, July 7, 2018

Today we visited Mammoth Cave National Park. It is the last planned activity on a trip that lasted 46 days as of today.  Dan and I agree that it is time to return home but neither of us are truly ready for it to be over. We are both surprised by that.

Mammoth Cave is about 25 miles from Bowling Green, but we left plenty of time to get there.  We did not want to turn up late for our “Historical” Tour starting that began at 10 AM. We had also booked a tour entitled Domes and Dripstones for 2:00 PM.  The bottom line is that Carlsbad Caverns, which is simply spectacular, really spoiled us. Comparing Carlsbad to Mammoth is like comparing Chanukah to Yom Kippur.  Mammoth Cave is the longest cave in the world with over 365 Miles of surveyed passageways and more being discovered every year, but it is exceedingly plain.

On the first tour we kept waiting to see the usual stalagmites and stalactites one sees in almost any cave open to the public, but there were none.  On the second tour, we did see one spectacular area called Frozen Niagara, but out of a 2-hour tour that part may have taken up 15 minutes.  What it lacked in beauty, however, it gained in the walking experience itself.  What I mean by that is that rather than smooth, perfectly manicured, easy to walk paths, we had to duck from hitting out heads, squeeze through narrow crevices, and walk on uneven surfaces in semi-darkness.  We felt like spelunkers – or spelunkers that traveled it in large groups that included crying babies. All in all, we spent about 4 hours today underground.

In between tours we had lunch at the Mammoth Hotel. It was nothing special just a pleasant sit-down restaurant.  After our second tour we also enjoyed some local ice cream, which seems to have been our usual after hiking activity.  No wonder we have not lost any weight on this trip.

Back in our hotel we settled down to finish our blog.  At about 7:00 PM we ran out and picked up pizza at a place around the corner from our hotel called Blaze Pizza.  It was perfect. You custom order your pizza and it is ready in minutes.

By the way, tomorrow we continue heading North towards Lake Erie and parts unknown.

Friday, July 6, 2018

We woke up at 7 AM so we could say our goodbyes to Susan and Skip. All of us had such an enjoyable time together it really couldn’t have been any nicer. After they left we packed ourselves up and headed for the last stop on our historic trip, Bowling Green, KY. It was a little frustrating driving through Nashville and not stopping, but we would have had to add another day or two to our trip and it was time we got home. So, we continued on to Bowling Green and planned to visit Mammoth Cave the next day.

Through most of our trip to Bowling Green we encountered the only rain that we’ve had on this whole adventure.  It was several hours of pouring rain. We arrived early enough in Bowling Green, which had dry weather, that we had time to visit the National Corvette Museum. The plant that manufactures the Corvette is in Bowling Green which explains why the museum is located there. The Museum featured more than 70 Corvettes including an original 1953 model and numerous concept cars.  They were beautiful to look at in all of their intense shiny colors.  The history, design and manufacturing process of the Corvette was covered in an understandable and interesting fashion.

Part of the museum includes a display area that is called The Skydome.  On February 12, 2014 a 30-foot sinkhole (and a cave) opened up inside the Skydome swallowing 8 rare cars.  Only three of them could be rebuilt into mint condition, the rest could not be salvaged.  All of the cars are back on display in the Skydome, including the cars destroyed that day.   There are caves and sinkholes all over this part of the country, so it isn’t too surprising to me that this kind of incident took place here.

One part of this trip is that we always are searching for places to eat that are local and definitely not fast-food.  We’ve been pretty lucky finding places on Yelp, Google Maps, or TripAdvisor.  Tonight was no different.  We drove into “historic” Bowling Green just to check it out and ended up really enjoying a crab cake and shrimp sandwich which had some delicious sauce on it at a restaurant called Micki’s.  We also sampled a beer made by a local brewery called White Squirrel.

Tomorrow we visit Mammoth Cave National Park.

July 4, 2018 and July 5, 2018

 

Wednesday, July 4, 2018

We have the entire upstairs to ourselves and are very comfortable.  Susan and Skip (now to be referred to as S&S) have some excellent habits that Dan and I should adopt.  One is to take a walk first thing in the morning on days they don’t work.  So, we got up early and took a 3 mile walk in a lovely park located a short drive from their home.  All I can say is that we all needed showers after that.  The humidity is something we aren’t accustomed to, not to mention that it is already hot outside first thing in the morning.   Good thing we exercised, because the day was filled with good eating.

Lunch came next at Elwood’s Shack, a restaurant that has been at the same location for many years.  It was shack like in appearance but oddly enough was located next to a shopping mall.    I would say it was a barbecue place, but the menu was more sophisticated and varied than that. We were fortunate that Susan’s Mom and sister were able to join us for lunch.  Everyone said that their food was delicious, but Dan and I both had the trout tacos which were fantastic.  Skip also ordered some sides of jalapeño coleslaw, and a margherita pizza, both of which were great.

Surprisingly, one of the museums we wanted to visit in Memphis was open on the 4^th of July.  If you ever get the opportunity to visit the National Civil Rights Museum you should go.  It is located at the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King was assassinated on April 4, 1968.  The exhibits were very comprehensive and well done.  It covered slavery, Jim Crow, sit-ins, Selma Voting Rights Campaign, Rosa Parks, Black Power, Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike, King’s last hours, lingering questions regarding his assassination, etc.  We were more exhausted after the museum visit than we had been after our walk.  The four of us had been juniors or seniors in high school at the time and it made us think back and examine how sensitive had we been to the Black community’s fight for civil rights?  What would we have done differently?  How did the civil rights movement impact our own lives?  What does the future hold for this country in terms of civil rights given current events such as police shootings of unarmed black men (and boys)?     The number of thought provoking questions the Museum generated was unending.

At the time of the King assassination, Dan remembers the riots in Hartford, Connecticut.  His high school, Weaver High, was set on fire.  It was so damaged that it was torn down and a new high school was built at a different location.  Wendy remembers the Hough riots in Cleveland, Ohio, and that the National Guard was positioned at I-271 and Cedar Road which is about 13 miles from downtown.

Then, it was time to head to the Gold Strike Casino located in Tunica, Mississippi.  S&S enjoy going there twice a month or so and were taking us out to dinner at a restaurant they enjoy there called The Chicago Steakhouse.  It was a little too soon for dinner so Dan and I signed up for some free play at the Gold Strike and then headed over to Horseshoe Casino (I think) where Dan, Susan and I spent some time in the private club area relaxing and enjoying drinks while Skip played some craps.  When our reservation time arrived, we headed back to the Gold Strike and enjoyed a fabulous meal.  Susan ate a vegetarian meal, while the rest of us enjoyed our red snapper and grouper dinners.  All of us partook in the crème brulee cheesecake and bread pudding for dessert.  The food was delectable, but the conversation was even better.

After dinner Skip showed Dan and I how to use our free play video poker and we WON a grand total of $25.00.  This was done very quickly as S&S had to get up early for work the next day.   Once back at their home we all headed right to bed.

 

 

Thursday, July 5, 2018

 

Today we were on our own and drove to Beale Street in downtown Memphis.  I’m sure Beale Street comes alive at night with places named Blues Café, Blues City, Jerry Lawler Bar and Restaurant, and B B Kings Blues Club, but during the day it is dead.    We ducked into a Starbucks around the corner to get out of the heat and then decided to visit Graceland even though neither one of us is a super Elvis fan.  We were in Memphis after all.  But that didn’t go as planned either.

When you arrive at Graceland the first thing you do is pay $10.00 for parking.  The next thing you do, or at least we did, is freak out at how expensive it is to visit the place.  The most basic tour that allowed you to tour the home, see his airplane and some exhibits (excluding his costumes) was $59.00 each.  We just couldn’t bring ourselves to part with that much money (and not even see his outfits).  The VIP tour cost $169.00 per person.  To us the cost was crazy, but there were lots of people paying those prices.     We had ice cream at one of the shops selling all kinds of Elvis stuff and left.  No where in our travels had we seen prices even closely resembling those at Graceland.  We were not Elvis from way-back-when, so we decided to leave.

That left us once again with the question what do we do now?  We ended up going back to Beale street and visited the Memphis Rock ‘n Soul Museum.  The best part of the place was all of the music you got to hear from the original blues musicians in the 1920’s through todays artists.  The Museum also traced the history of some of the local recording studios such as High Records and Staxx.  There was a considerable amount of Elvis exhibits including his music, clothing, posters and much more at this museum. It was interesting, but I think both Dan and I were getting burnt out on museums.  I’d like to count the number we’ve been to since we started our trip.

The best activity for the day turned out to be a visit to the Bass Pro Shop.  A pyramid had been built in 1991 to house sporting events and went bust in 2007.  In 2013 it was turned into a huge Bass Pro Shop, along with a hotel called Big Cypress Lodge.   It was amazing.  Inside it looked like a swamp including water, trees, and buildings.  It was very Disneylike including elevator rides to the top of the pyramid, streams, restaurants, a live alligator display, large fish tank with game fish, along with the usual merchandise. It was packed with people.  After purchasing some local BBQ sauce, fudge and socks, we started back to S&S’s.

It was time to eat again.  This time the four of us went to their favorite Indian restaurant, Bombay House.  As expected, it was very good, and we didn’t leave hungry.  Back at their home we talked more and went to bed.  It has been a perfect visit in so many ways.  Hopefully we won’t wait too long before we get together the next time.

 

Tuesday, July 3, 2018

Because breakfast did not come with our hotel, Courtyard by Marriott, YELP directed us to a little place called Mugs Café.  They offered drip coffee that you could buy by the cup or unlimited refills.  That in itself was different, but when I saw how they produced their coffee it was more understandable.  It takes a long time for a single cup of coffee to be processed.  Mugs is a neighborhood joint and was patronized by a wide variety of people, including a bike club of about 20 people our age.

After breakfast we headed to the Clinton Presidential Library and Archive.  On our way we drove through Little Rock and made a brief stop at the State Capitol building. The Presidential Library is in a beautiful modern building that is located close to the downtown area and is near the Arkansas River.  The building was dedicated in September 2011.    After watching the orientation video, we took a tour with a very knowledgeable docent.  As expected the place is huge and it was nice having someone point out the highlights of our 42^nd President’s accomplishments.  It would have been impossible to read everything in every exhibit.  Just like the Reagan Presidential Library, there was a re-creation of the oval office, which is always decorated by the current president. There was even mention of the impeachment so that fact wasn’t glossed over.  I tried not to think of what a Trump Presidential Library would look like and imagined the walls filled with ‘tweet quotes’.

We spent several hours at the Library and enjoyed a lovely lunch at the restaurant in the building called 42 Bar and Table.  More time could have been spent at the Library, but we wanted to leave enough time to visit Central High School.  The High School building itself is massive, and it is still used as the community’s high school.  The Supreme Court handed down its 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education stating that segregated schools denied students “equal protection of the laws” under the Constitution’s 14^th Amendment.  On September 4, 1957 nine African American teens tried to enter Central High but were blocked by the Arkansas National Guard.  Governor Faubus cried that “states ‘rights” were being violated and had called out the Guard.  President Eisenhower had no choice but to back the Supreme Court decision and used 1,100 federal troops to enforce the civil rights of the nine kids.  The bravery of the students, as well as their parents, cannot be understated.  It was a violent time and angry crowds beat both black and white journalists.   There is a lot more to the story, but that would turn this blog into a history lesson.

Visitors are not allowed to enter Central High, but there was a very informative visitor center across the street from the school.   Unfortunately, we didn’t get a chance to fully explore that museum because it was closing early for the 4^th of July holiday.  On another corner across from the school is a gas station that has been preserved in its original state.  The pay phones at the station were used by reporters to tell the world what was happening in Little Rock.

After all we had seen it was actually therapeutic to get in the car and drive in silence to our next destination, Memphis, TN.  Instead of going directly to the house of my cousins Susan and Skip Rossen, we went to the beautiful new home of Greg and Melody Usdan and their two adorable sons. Greg is the son of Kay, Skip’s sister who tragically passed away unexpectedly about a year ago.  Skip and Susan had brought in barbecue from a local restaurant that was quite wonderful.  But it was more wonderful reconnecting with family I hadn’t seen in many years. After eating and a quick house tour, we headed back to the Rossen’s lovely home.

 

 

 

 

 

Monday, June 2, 2018

We regret that we didn’t allow for more time to be spent in Oklahoma City.  There are things to see and do there that would have easily filled a full day.  However, before heading to Little Rock, Arkansas, we made time to visit the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum.

The Museum is in a gorgeous modern building, and just like other museums we’ve tried to take in with limited time, we couldn’t enjoy all it offered.  It featured an American Rodeo Gallery offering tributes to movie cowboys, a native American gallery, an American rodeo gallery, large sculptures-both indoor and outdoor, and art of the West. There was an interesting map of all of the native American tribes that existed across North America, before they were all forced onto reservations and/or forced to move from their traditional lands. There was an annual art competition underway where the selected participants displayed their work and offered it up for sale. (We couldn’t take pictures of the artwork.)  The talent of these current artists is spectacular, and many of the pieces had been sold.  Too bad we couldn’t afford to invest in an up and coming artist, but the lowest price I saw was $1,800 for an itsy, bitsy painting.

As we’ve driven East, we’ve also headed back into humidity.  It started in Oklahoma City and it followed us into Arkansas.  Along with the humidity has also come green landscapes.  We are now back in the land of deciduous trees and weather but, we can no longer gaze far off into the horizon.  We have experienced drizzle the past two days, something we hadn’t seen for the entire time we’ve been gone.  I suppose all of this is preparing us for being back home.

We arrived in Little Rock at 8:00 pm and after an extremely mediocre dinner at a local Italian restaurant we headed back to our hotel.  We may get to bed early tonight, something we haven’t gotten into the habit of doing despite our early wake-ups.  So far, we have traveled for more than 7,777.7 miles (a lucky 5-digit number); and still counting.  Tomorrow we drive to Memphis where we’ll spend time with cousins Skip and Susan Rossen.  We will be putting the blog on hold until after we leave their home.

Happy 4^th of July to everyone. (Jonathan… Happy Birthday!!!!!!!!)

Sunday, July 1, 2018

Oklahoma City was about four hours away from Amarillo.  Much of the highway paralleled the original Route 66 so we took in a few more attractions.  The first Route 66 point of interest was a tilting water tower.  Since we saw it from the road we didn’t take the time to stop.  We did stop in Shamrock, TX to visit a beautifully preserved Cononco Gas station built in the 1930’s.  It had a gift shop and café attached to it but both were closed on Sundays.  In Clinton, OK we spent some time at The Oklahoma Route 66 Museum.  Although it was similar in scope to the other museum we saw earlier on our trip, it offered some more interesting historical information and offered more sophisticated exhibits.

I can’t recall if I mentioned earlier that Route 66 was completed in November of 1926 running from Chicago to the Santa Monica Pier in California.  Until then, most of the roads were dirt and gravel. Before there were gas stations on every corner, fuel was purchased from liveries, repair shops, and general stores.  Drivers would pour gas into buckets and then use a funnel to transfer it into their cars.  Since gas tanks were smaller back then, drivers had to stop about every 70 miles to refill. (I wonder what they did about bathrooms?)

The main reason for building Route 66 was to move crops and natural resources to market.  It turns out that is the same reason that the highway system was built that replaced Route 66.  President Eisenhower had seen the Autobahn in Germany and was determined that the U.S. improve its highway system.  (NOTE: From Oklahoma City going East we will no longer follow the old Route 66, which heads North towards Chicago.)

We were both expecting Oklahoma to be dry and barren like much of the Texas panhandle, but it is relatively green.  It even had clusters of trees.  Arriving in Oklahoma City reminded us both of Cleveland, although Cleveland is a larger city.  The streets of downtown Oklahoma City were extremely quiet.  Because we arrived at about 4 PM, we decided to first visit the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum.   It commemorates the loss of 168 innocent people killed when the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building was bombed at 9:01 AM on April 19, 1995.  The Memorial is simple in design with a shallow reflection pool.  Each person lost is represented by a bronze chair.  The monument also included the Survivor Tree.  An elm tree that dates back to 1927 and somehow withstood the bomb’s blast.

The Museum was quite impressive with state of the art interactive exhibits and lots of videos.  It brought the tragedy into clear focus again and made it clear that something like this could have happened anywhere—and could happen again.  It told the story from the point of view of survivors, family members of those who lost loved ones, rescuers, medical professionals and other authorities that were there that day and, in the days, to follow.  It also showed visitors how Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichcols were apprehended and brought to justice.  The Museum was beautifully done and was a very moving experience.

It was then time to look for a place for dinner.  As usual, we had skipped lunch since our breakfast had been so large.  Our AAA book mentioned a part of town that had been revitalized, “Bricktown”, similar to the Flats in Cleveland.  Just like the Flats it was once a dilapidated warehouse district, but now was filled with restaurants, bars, hotels and even a mini amusement park with mini golf, bungy jumping and laser tag.  Instead of the Cuyahoga River running through it, there was a man-made canal running through it with small boats you could hire to take you around.  The area was quite busy for a Sunday evening.

Not knowing where we would end up for dinner we had parked the car in an attended lot and took a walk around.  We ended up having a pleasant dinner at a New Orleans style restaurant called Jazmoz Bourbon Street Café.  After dinner we thought we would have to drive at least 20 minutes to find our hotel, but when we put the address in our GPS it was literally around the corner from the restaurant.    That was a pleasant surprise, but we could have saved ourselves the parking lot fee.  Oh well. Tomorrow we will explore some more of Oklahoma City and then we’re off to Little Rock, Arkansas.

 

 

 

Saturday, June 30, 2013

What should we do in Amarillo?  We knew nothing about this panhandle city of about 190,000 established in 1887.  It has always been and continues to be a major cattle-feeding and shipping town.  Turns out that there was plenty to do.

Horses are beautiful animals, but they aren’t our thing.  Dan never took riding lessons, and while I did, the horses never listened to me.  I would end up stuck in the mud with a horse that wouldn’t move or end up in the opposite direction I was intended to go.  To put it bluntly the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame and Museum wasn’t exactly a place we would ordinarily visit.  The building was lovely, and it offered an appropriate venue to honor the equine champions as well as the people who helped them reach their potential.  However, it wasn’t a museum we would re-visit.

On the other hand, we weren’t expecting much of the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum in Canyon, TX, about 30 minutes outside Amarillo in the town of Canyon.  The Museum sits on the campus of West Texas A&M University and was really a fascinating place.  There was far too much for us to see in one visit and is a place we would definitely go back to should the opportunity ever present itself.  We particularly enjoyed the exhibit telling the Panhandle Petroleum story.  It included amazingly complicated maps that identified who owned what property and oil rights above and underground.

One exhibit featured windmills used to draw up water from an underground aquafer that runs under the Great Plain. (There are windmills all over the place in Texas drawing water up from the aquafer.  What will happen when the aquafer is depleted, since it is not renewable?) The Great Plains is the largest geographic region in the United Sates.  It stretches from about Edmonton, Alberta in Canada to San Antonio, and from the Rocky Mountains to the Missouri River.  It is defined as being a semi-arid, flat, treeless grasslands.  It accounts for nearly half of the nation’s irrigated farmland and would never have happened without windmills drawing water up from underground.

The exhibits were well designed and varied.  There was a gun exhibit which was larger (big surprise there) than we’ve seen before.  It included a reconstructed pioneer town, oil derricks, dinosaur skeletons, a special exhibit on pop art, and much, much more.  Too much in fact for me to review in full.

Close to the Museum is Palo Duro Canyon State Park.  Just like the Grand Canyon, the land all around it is completely flat and the Canyon appears almost out of nowhere.  While what we saw today is nothing like what we saw at the Grand Canyon, it is a pretty place and much greener than the land surrounding it.  It was the site of one of the last battles between the U.S. Calvary and the Indians.  The Calvary burned the Indian’s supplies and took 1,400 of their horses.  Left with no choice, the Indians drifted back to their reservations.  We took about an hour or so to check it out the Canyon and then headed back to Amarillo.  We had one more sight to see, “quirky” Cadillac Ranch; another Route 66 tourist stop.

Fortunately, Cadillac Ranch was located close to our hotel.  Just outside of town, on a frontage road, in the middle of a dirt field you’ll find 10-graffiti covered vintage Cadillacs half buried hood down in the ground.  We had first inadvertently gone to a souvenir store called Cadillac RV that featured several old Cadillac’s and a huge cowboy touting the 2^nd Amendment but were politely redirected to the correct location.  Sure enough, we weren’t the only crazy people seeking out this wonder of the world.  There were a lot of people there along with spray cans of paint.   You can actually smell the paint from the road.  You had to be careful not to be sprayed upon as young and old alike expressed their artistic selves. Clearly all of this paint is helping keep the Cadillacs from rusting into nothingness.

Dinner was Tex-Mex, at a place called Jorge’s Mexican Restaurant.  It was very busy, and Dan and I enjoyed our dinner of fajitas with mixed vegetables.  We were more than ready to get back and relax, but I suggested we stop at a Western store called Cavender’s.  It was a costly decision.  I’m sure it is partly due to the fact that we are heading home and leaving the West behind, but Dan and I both purchased “cowboy” shirts and Dan a belt that we hope he’ll actually wear when he gets home.  It is definitely cowboyish, but not over the top – we hope.  I suppose the same can be said about our shirts.  We’ll see.

Tomorrow on to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.