We are HOME!

Yeee Haaaaw, we are Home!  In one (OK, 3) piece(s), and we are all very happy about that.  Not happy that a great trip is over but that we have completed the 4 day effort to get here before the storm.  It was worth it!  We have the camper here at the house, parked on bare frozen ground so we can unpack at our leisure.  I hear rumors of another storm this weekend.  We could have been waiting in NC for another week!

What a nice day for a drive!  Sunny all morning, overcast in the afternoon.  I can't really say there was no sign of the storm though.  We saw about 25 bucket trucks in a caravan yesterday.  I refer to the bucket on a boom trucks that the utility companies use to maintain the power lines.  This was an Alabama company heading north, apparently to stage for quick response to the Nor'easter.  Today we saw a brine truck spraying the interstate in NY.

It does not sound like this storm will be a forecasters daydream.

No photos again today, just driving home.

Again, great trip, great to be home.  I hope all of you who have read this blog have enjoyed it too.

VA to PA

Last night in camp, one day's drive remaining.

Long drive up to Saylorsville PA, and into the snow.  Started seeing scattered snow on the ground soon after entering PA, a few dozen flakes in the air outside Harrisburg.  Just a hint.  We have a little snow on the ground here at Silver Valley Campsites, Callahan thought it was just fine!

I was amazed at the amount of traffic on I-95 between Richmond VA and Washington DC on a Sunday morning!  It was 3 lanes of bumper to bumper traffic anywhere from 0 to 60.  The 0 speed part was a real pain, so we got off in Fredericksburg and took some 2 lane roads for a while.  It took longer according to the GPS, but who knows how long it would have taken in the slooow traffic.  I know for sure it was a lot less frustrating.  Hit the road at 8:30 & got to camp about 6:30.  But it's DST, so it was still sunlight!

It sure has been a great trip, we were reminiscing during supper tonight about some of the camps, some of the hikes, the people, the places.  Wow.  Hurrying to beat the snow storm was not in the plan.  We intended to take out time this week.  But this way I can park the camper in my own yard, who knows when it will melt enough to do that after this storm.

Next trip we won't be back until April!

Crossing the Potomac

Maryland view

Camping in Penn.

SC to VA

Drove through h2 states today, pretty country, low rolling hills and woods.  Driving around Charlotte NC was easy, even in the 8 lane segment near the racetrack.  Saturday traffic was very light.  It was a long day of driving but pleasant. 

The campground here in Bracey VA is very large.  Beautiful lake making a major attraction it has row after row of permanet campers.  Many have roofs bult over the camper, fences, decks, carports for the golf carts & boats.  They look fairly old, like they have been here for a while.  

No photos today, we just sat there in the truck watching things go by.  No overturned trucks, no oddly interesting anything.

The forecast is still good through Monday.  I'll check before leaving in the morning but it looks good.

Tupelo MS to Lake Hartwell SC

I-22 is beautiful, wide, uncluttered and no traffic.  No billboards, no development at any exit.  Rolling hills, trees, much like I-89 in central VT but with the trees cut back 100 yds.  I-22 runs from Memphis to Birmingham.
I-20 is a normal interstate and the closer you get to Atlanta the worse it gets.  It took 1.5 hours to drive the 22 miles around the city, parking lot traffic at every interchange.

That's is the last time I drive anywhere near Atlanta unless actually going into the city for something!

Tonight is Lake Hartwell State Park in South Carolina.  It was nearly sunset when we got here so we didn't get to look around much.  Probably won't get to do much tomorrow before hitting the road again.  Onward to Virginia.  There I'll winterize the camper for the run north to frozen country.  Yuk.  Getting used to warmer weather!

Neither of us took any pictures today.  That's how it goes when you're just driving along.

But I did load up the photos for yesterday so check the Tupelo post again.

Driving to Tupelo

NE Arkansas is also flat farm country.  That was a surprise after the nice hill country around Hot Springs.  I took some photos out the window on the approach to Memphis.  Other than 3 overturned trucks on I-40 it was not a very eventful day.  No, there was not any major wind on the highway, wind for sure, but not enough to explain 3 of them on their sides.  Unfortuneately the internet connection here is crappy and I cannot load any photos tonight.

On the continuing saga of getting through the snowstorm...
It keeps looking like snow up north on Tue. and Wed.  That means getting home Monday or Thurs.  We're moving on tomorrow to be in SC Fri. (tomorrow) night.  That's 3 days from home at our preferred pace.  We'll check the weather and decide tomorrow night.

One of three overturned trucks we saw today

Spray plane and crop spray truck  My past life!

Crossing the Mississippi

Lots of things to stop and see, no time for everything

Hiking in Ouachita SP

Lake Ouachita State Park is 15 miles and on the other side of Hot Springs AR.  The Caddo Bend

Trail is 4 miles around the perimeter of a peninsula in the lake.  Some fine views along the way.  It's most interesting feature of nature is the swath of missing trees from a tornado in 2011.  That area had all the trees ripped out of the ground so it is now regrowing but with much more sparse cover.  The rest of the land is covered in older growth mature trees.

No good plan lasts long when the weather is involved.  Getting home is getting "interesting".  There is now snow in the forecast for Knoxville TN this week.  The heck with that.  We're now headed to Tupelo MS tomorrow for a couple days, then Royson GA and probably Hendersen NC before turning north for the final 2 day run.  We may even delay the arrival for a day if the snow makes that practical.  We won't know that for a few more days when we see what this long range forecast turns out to be in the short range.

These pictures are of the camp in Lake Catherine State Park

Hiking in Lake Catherine SP

We hiked two llop trails here in the park today.  Didn't even have to leave the campground.  Fine trails, well built, nice switchbacks.  Tomorrow we'll go across town to another park for some more hiking.  With all the flowering plants here our allergies are also discovering that it's spring here.  No bugs yet, that's fine.

I've looked ahead at the weather trying to get back up north with the least frost.  Not happening.  There will be a couple chilly nights, going to have to drain and winterize the camper before the last night in PA.  Looks like we'll go through TN, it's too long to go back south just to go north again, and it's even cool down there.  Roughly: Jackson TN, Knoxville TN, Roanoke VA, Harrisburg PA, home.  We'll spend a couple days somewhere, probably Jackson.  No need to hurry home either because the weather is pretty much the same in each place for the next week.  But there is hardly any snow in the forecast so we're happy with just simply cool.

Into Arkansas

After 2 days driving we left Texas and got into Arkansas.  Nice place, but I seem to say that a lot.  Alternating flat land and sometimes steep rolling hills, i.e. not too high.  Lake Catherine State Park is on an impoundment of Ouachita River.  We thought it would be a dark sky place like the last few nights because it was a long narrow dead end road coming in.  But there is a lot of light across the pond.  Entergy Arkansas.  And street lights in the campground.  Good grief.  We are still west of the Miss. but it has an eastern feel to it.

Crossing the Red River in AR.  Note the separate bridge for the gas line.

Back to driving low hills among the trees

Lake Catherine from the visitor center

Some seasonal residents in the park

Across north Texas

Another day, another 300 miles of Texas.  Feels like it anyway.  Today we went from Quanah to Bonham TX, through Wichita Falls (the only town name I recognized).  Lots of flat, lots of rolling hills.  Lots of oil wells.   More cattle than previous days.  And a section near Gainsville with horse farm after horse farm, must have been over a dozen big farms each with acres of white fenced pastures.

Nocona (named for Peta Nocona, a Comanche chief) is the home of Nocona Boots, we saw the factory but since it's Sunday there were many closed up towns, not just businesses but whole towns closed.  We noticed an interesting museum in Nocona, Tails & Trails, with a history of the town and the boots that made it famous and a collection of old cars and old farm equipment.

Bonham State Park is set on a small lake with a few miles of trails around it.  Nice quiet comfortable place.  James Bonham was one of the heroes of the Alamo.  The town was the home of James Wesley Hardin (gunfighter & outlaw).

It was overcast and sometimes raining today, so the photos are generally from the truck window.  Too often the window was closed so it's through the dirty glass too.    Lousy photography but you still get a feel for the countryside.

Carlene was quite taken by the color of these purple blossoms on the trees.  We saw them often today.

Back to hiking in the trees!

The Texas Panhandle

Left New Mexico behind to head across the panhandle.  Now it looks like we'll cross the northern edge of Texas too.  We had wanted to camp in OK, but the OK state park system won't do online reservations less than 5 days in advance.  All other states we have stayed in allow one day.  So much for OK.

The change in landscape has been very interesting.  A lot of people say it all looks alike out here.  I see a lot of variety during a day's drive.  The very stark, flat, desert of eastern NM gives way to equally flat Texas but the land use gradually changes to irrigated agriculture.  It seems that the panhandle is cotton country.  Then the mix of ag and wind turbines.  North of Lubbock we run into turbines as far as we can see both north and south of us.  I didn't notice how far we drove by them, but a couple years ago we saw the same sight for 50 miles west of Amarillo.  It was cool to see the number of farms producing both cotton and electrons.  That's followed by some low rolling hill country.

Then I saw 4 deer right on the side of the road.  No, not road kill, live deer.  Thinking about becoming road kill by the looks of things.  I had seen some raised deer stands a few miles before.

Tonight we are in Copper Breaks State Park in Quanah TX.  The town was named for Quanah Parker, the last war chief of the Comanche.

Some different than the cactus country we have been in.  But onlu because of irrigation.

A bit of rolling hills.  Hey, it's all relative.

Hiking in Copper Breaks SP

The greenish color is the copper deposits