February-March 2022
On the Road Again… Again
We know we’ve been out of touch with many of you for quite awhile. Not because anything is wrong, and not because we’ve become lazy in our old age (we’ll… maybe just a little), but because we haven’t been traveling and we’ve been locked into problem-solving mode dealing with a few things, coping with a rather cold and unpleasant winter (yes, even in southern Alabama), trying to work with really lousy internet too much of the time, and pondering what might be ahead in the next few years.
We arrived in southern Alabama about the first of November, and hoped to leave right after the beginning of January. Well… that didn’t happen. At the end of December Kathy broke a tooth, which led to a new bridge and an extra six weeks in situ. Seems you just can’t get good teeth anymore - Ha. But we were in a good spot to handle it and really like our dentist, so it was just going to take awhile to do it right now and so be it. The delay gave Rick more time to continue his chiropractic treatments, and we really like our new chiropractor too. So nothing lost really and now we are off and running again, slowly working our way toward California and gatherings with friends and family on the west coast.
One area in our life as wandering vagabonds where steady progress has been made is with Rick catching up on photo processing for our Motor-Museums.com site. You may recall that last fall we were able to make a flurry of visits to half a dozen or so cool automotive museums, so all winter long, here and there, between other chores and activities, a lot of work has been done. Photos from the Studebaker museum in South Bend, IN; the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg in Auburn, IN; and the wonderful Gilmore Car Museum in Hickory Corners, MI are all now in full display on MM. Go take a look. The link above will take you directly to the North America Auto & Motorcycle page of the overall Motor-Museums site. There you can read our description of the Gilmore Museum and link over to the photo site for our photos. If you scan down a little you’ll find the photo pages for each of the other two museums mentioned above.
The winter weather (boy it has been harsh in the northern part of the country this past month) has kept us pretty much on a straight line as we moved west, at least until Arizona, where we are now. We don’t care for I-10 as a travel route any more than you do, but it really is (mostly) shorter than the more interesting roads, stays pretty far south most of the time, if you don’t want to cross into Mexico (maybe next year), and allowed us to have a short side trip to see some friends south of San Antonio. The country north of us all the way has been COLD, COLD, COLD for most of the trip, and even as far south as we’ve been we’ve had lots of overnight temps in the mid to low 30s. No difficulties, but it isn’t really spring yet is it
We know that what you’ve been reading thus far can sound pretty boring. But we always manage to have fun, and the ability to put the Tiger back into harness and begin a major road trip continues to have all three of us jazzed, even a good two weeks into it.
The night before we (finally) left Alabama we were able to hook up with friends who were headed east in their rig, coming from California. We had a farewell dinner at Mellow Mushroom Pizza in Daphne, gabbed for several hours, then hit the road the next morning, each in our own direction. We made it across Mississippi on a badly deteriorated section of I-10, crossing the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; through the huge Atchafalaya Swamp, then across the Sabine River into Texas. I-10 has been in bad shape through here for all twenty years that we’ve been crossing it, but we must say they are doing a lot of work on it right now so maybe it’ll get better over time.
Once you cross into Texas, you’re not far from the town of Vidor, home to the Southern Gold Company which produces Wildflower Honey. We had been in the Vidor area oh, probably 15 years ago, but the honey we bought in a store there has been on my Best Of list ever since… and now we were back to get more. We found the little back road set-up where they do their processing, chatted with the lady in charge, and left with quite a parcel of the delicious stuff. Fulfillment of a long-standing promise we’d made to each other.
Still in Texas, we made a stop in Hallettsville. Over the years, We’ve been collecting visits to a series of wonderful old county courthouses throughout Texas, and Hallettsville owns a real gem. Still in its original location at the center of a city block devoted to it, I dodged cars and took pictures and chatted with the locals. We all agreed it was a beauty. One more for my collection! Note that Texas has 264 counties; we have not made any commitment to see them all.
We next headed a bit further south in Texas, dropping down southwest of San Antonio to the funky little wide spot in the road called D’Hanis. Nothing here except the nice Escapee park known as Lone Star Corral. We’d tracked down friends whom we (correctly) thought might have gone to ground there. They had purchased a lot in the park shortly before, and were busy fixing up stuff. And the “stuff” to be fixed unfortunately was the remnants of almost the total destruction of the campground. Last April they had suffered an enormous hailstorm (“…hail bigger than you could hold in your hand”) which did tremendous damage to the rigs parked there, along with many of the permanent structures. The park was open, but still getting caught up. We had a nice visit, spent the night, and were soon on our way again.
We had set a couple of special goals for the following day, but although we had a nice drive through some of the Texas hill country to get to them, neither came to fruition. In years past, we’ve had some fine Italian meals at a small restaurant in Leakey, near Lost Maples State Natural Area. We got there with perfect timing for a delicious lunch, only to find the restaurant closed. Bummer. Oh well, we were planning to spend the night up off I-10, in the small town of Ozona, which has a charming little spot called The Cafe Next Door. Super nice down-home food. Well, no longer. It seems that it succumbed to the economy, the pandemic, or a combination of the two. Double Bummer. As always, we survived and kept moving along.
It takes a helluva long time to drive across Texas (but you already knew that). Still on I-10, that night we found ourselves facing a horrendous wind out of the west (yes, bringing more bad weather) as we were approaching charming (?) Fort Stockton. Not a good night to keep going. We spent it in a parking area tucked between two very large vehicles, protected from the wind, and actually had a quiet and pleasant evening. Not too shabby, those big trucks, when you need them. We were fighting some pretty bad winds most of the trip, some days driving right into them. The Tiger handles the wind really well, but our resulting mpg readings ranged from almost 16 (our usual flat freeway calm day level) down to barely 11 for a couple of tanks. Ouch.
The next day we moved on into New Mexico; approaching that state line, we remarked on some of the important rivers we’d crossed in Texas — the Sabine, the Guadalupe, the Llano, the Pecos. But never the Rio Grande; we’d not gotten down that far south (it forms the international border with Mexico). El Paso was its usual mess — no matter how wide a loop you take around that sucker, it’s a real zoo, and growing all the time.
The highlight of New Mexico this time through was crossing the Continental Divide, at about 4500 feet. Please don’t get us wrong, we love that state; but not on I-10 in the middle of winter. I can remember back in December 2001, when we first ran away from home and were coming east from California, on a motorcycle; I was freezing my tush off on the back of that bike at 34˚ Fahrenheit, crossing New Mexico on I-10. Not fun.
But now we are in Arizona, and have been enjoying ourselves here for a bit. Stopped in Benson to meet with some folks, then more folks in Tucson, then down to beloved Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument for three lovely days in the desert. We absolutely love this remote and quiet spot just up from Sonoyta, Mexico, and always wish we could stay longer. The cactus are handsome, the flowers are just now starting to come in, and the late sun on the mountain peaks quite a sight.
Soon, after visiting our great-grandson in the Phoenix area and then some more desert time, we will be popping back into California and heading up into the San Luis Obispo area, our old haunt that we left on that December day in 2001, for a few weeks before moving further north.
So — what’s the skinny for the summer, you ask? Well, the plans they are a changin’ as always, so don’t make book on anything said here, but in a general sense we’ll be moving up through California and Oregon, cross over into Nevada to head down to the Las Vegas area for a granddaughter's wedding at the end of April, then begin heading north, visiting friends along the way in Utah and Idaho as we head for the border. Our plan is to spend the summer in Canada and maybe Alaska. We want to get as far north as we can — keeping away from people is one goal (we don’t think Covid is done yet) — and have you heard about the new extension of the road that goes to Inuvik in the Northwest Territories? You can now drive all the way to the Arctic Ocean and the settlement at Tuktoyaktuk. Pretty cool, huh? After that? We’ll see.
When we know, you’ll know. That’s the best we can do. Future messages are bound to be more interesting than this one, but at least we can give you a sense of Arizona cactus and Texas courthouses.
For now, stay safe, stay happy, and enjoy life wherever you are.
Rick & Kathy & HTBOTRALT (Happy To Be On The Road Again La Tortuga)
Ps: all four of the desert photos are from Organ Pipe National Monument in southern Arizona.