Spring's Great Adventure: Part 2-The Journal of Our Trip to Georgia

Day Four Friday – In the last update I failed to mention some notes for you travel junkies: First of all, the drab dry brown of West Texas greatly improved as we approached Abilene. I guess the classic country western song about “Abilene, Abilene – prettiest town I’ve ever seen” rings true! The scenery changes to farmland, rolling green hills and lots of green trees. 60 miles east of Abilene in Ranger it is just as green with a small town flavor. The park we chose for the third night was almost a mile off the interstate, no road noise and neat as a pin. If we ever get back this way, we would come back to East Texas for a longer visit to experience all that this area of Texas has to offer. But for now, our ultimate destination to the MMAP project in Georgia bids us make our travel through Texas as short as possible.

Texas, as you know, is a very BIG state and it takes several days to get across it, especially when you’re pulling a 30 foot 5^th wheel and only making 300-350 miles each day. (We know for some of you that mileage doesn’t sound like much. In fact when we traveled by car on previous trips, we could certainly do more than that. But those of you who have experienced pulling a large trailer know what a physical strain it can be on the driver to try to maintain two large vehicles in a straight line for 6-8 hours.) By Saturday late morning we hope to be crossing the Texas, Louisiana border and on to Mississippi.

For Friday, the next stop was the Texas Rose RV Park in Tyler, TX approximately 206 miles from Ranger. We would have pushed a little further and tried to make it to someplace in Louisiana, but the long trip on Thursday wore us down a bit, and we wanted to get settled in with plenty of daylight to catch up on laundry – an ever present challenge while on the road traveling every day. And we also wanted to give the weather east of us a chance to calm down a bit. As you are probably aware, several tornadoes have been very active in the area we are headed to. Tuscaloosa, Alabama was hit with a very severe one Wednesday with massive loss of property and several deaths. This worries us a bit – but again we have to trust in God to keep us safe and to give us the common sense to know what to do if we get caught in that type of weather. We have “studied up” on what to do in a tornado, but more importantly we rest in the knowledge that we have a great many people (both family and friends) praying for our safety. In fact, Thursday night we received calls from two of our friends in Arizona checking up on our situation. That warms our hearts and confirms how truly blessed we are.

By the way – I’m brushin’ up on my southern accent – so jus’ wan y’all ta know that east Texas sho’ nuff is purty country. We’ll be back now, hear.

Day Five Saturday- Tyler, Texas to Vicksburg, Mississippi -FINALLY out of Texas and clean through the state of Louisiana….rough roads and a very bouncy ride is the best way to describe the drive on Interstate 20 as we entered Louisiana at Shreveport. It was interesting to see countless billboards advertising the many casinos in the area and then wonder if any of the revenue generated from them went into road maintenance. We doubted it! But the scenery was getting greener with lots of farmland (bottom land I believe it’s called – because of the swampy low lying areas with lots of water).

We also saw lots of beautiful white cranes at the waters’ edge and lots of armadillo – most of which were squashed “road kill” along the side of the highway.


Crossing the mighty Mississippi from Louisiana into Mississippi

A view of the bridge from the Mississippi side

Ole' Man River and the old man!

After getting settled in at the RV park in Vicksburg just across the bridge from Louisiana into Mississippi, we took a quick drive around town and went out to dinner at the local Cracker Barrel for some southern food and sweet tea….YUM!

Day Six Sunday- Sightseeing in and around Vicksburg. There is much more to see of this city than the one day we had. But we made a good day of it. Most of the morning was spent exploring the Vicksburg National Military Park located at the northeastern portion of the city. Established in 1899, the park includes the entire extent of the siege and defense lines in the 1863 Civil War campaign by Union troops, lead by Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant against the Confederate Army surrounding and defending Vicksburg. It is a 16 mile driving tour that commemorates these battles. It includes over 1340 monuments, markers and plaques, a restored Union gunboat and a National Cemetery. It starts at the visitors’ center where life sized exhibits and artifacts from the siege are on display and where we viewed a 20 minute film that recounts the campaign, which was the turning point of the Civil War. It is a must for any Civil War buff or anyone wanting a look into what the Civil War was all about.

The Illinois Memorial - inside are plaques listing the hundreds of names of men who fought for Illinois at the battle of Vicksburg. My mother's family was from Illinois and members of her grandmother's and grandfather's family fought in the Civil War from that state.

Statue of Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant

Dedicated to Brigadier Gen. Lloyd Tilghman of the Confederate Army, killed in battle.

Cairo was the first vessel ever sunk by an electrically detonated torpedo (now called a mine.) It had only been in service less than a year. It sank in 12 minutes and lay in the silt at the bottom of the river for over 100 years before being salvaged and restored in the 1960's.

Vicksburg National Cemetery. Of the nearly 17,000 Union soldiers buried here, 13,000 are unknown. Established in 1866, the cemetery is also the final resting place for veterans of the Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II and the Korean Conflict.It was closed to burials in 1961.

After finishing up at the Military Park, we shot over south of town to The Tomato Place, a funky little roadside market/shack that sells locally grown fruits, vegetables and melons in season and bakes breads, pies and cookies daily. We picked up some large juicy vine ripened tomatoes and a large glass of fresh-squeezed lemonade.

In the afternoon, we explored the old historic downtown area.

Old train depot being restored

Kids cooling off in the fountain at the Children's waterfront park

The classic riverboat at the waterfront

Another "must-see" for anyone visiting Vicksburg are the life-like murals lining the levee wall at the downtown waterfront. They depict various periods of history which developed the city. It’s a great way to get a peek into Vicksburg’s history from its beginnings, through the Civil War, the Steamboat era, the Great Bear Hunt with President Teddy Roosevelt, African American History and much more. Each painting has a plaque explaining what is being portrayed in the picture. Below are just a few of the 32 murals:

Day Seven Monday- With the temperatures soaring to 90 and the 50% humidity feeling like 90% to this “desert rat”, we headed out from Vicksburg to Montgomery, Alabama. We had originally planned to stay on I-20 passing Tuscaloosa and stopping outside Birmingham for three days prior to going on to our final destination in Georgia, but instead we opted to head south east from Vicksburg via state route 80 to Montgomery, AL. Interestingly, we had changed our plans prior to leaving Arizona and well before the severe tornadoes that hit the Tuscaloosa and Birmingham areas. Our reasons were solely based on an Army Corp of Engineers RV park we wanted to stay at and some sightseeing things we wanted to see in Montgomery. It’s amazing how God continues to work things out for us. On the drive to Montgomery we listened to radio reports of the condition of the tornado ravaged area. These reports confirmed that finding an RV park with electricity and no damage might have been difficult at best – impossible at worst if we had kept to our original route. What a MIGHTY God we serve!

Our stop for the next three nights is at Gunter Hill Army Corp of Engineers RV Park. It’s a fantastic park thick in the trees and on the banks of the Alabama River, 8 miles from Montgomery. It’s the best bargain to boot – at $9 a night (on a Golden Age Pass). Even though it is only water and electricity (no sewer hook ups) our site is just steps from a large bath house with huge clean shower facilities and a new laundry room with two new washers and two new dryers that only cost $1/load (and for those of you that have done your laundry in Laundromats while on the road, you will agree this is a bargain!) The lack of sewer hookup is no problem. With a dump station at the exit of the park – we will leave here Thursday morning with a clean black water tank. The sites are large and there are very few other campers here since it is mid week. Zoe loves it too – lots of birds and squirrels to cause her to wiggle in excited anticipation for a walk around the park.

Tuesday and Wednesday we will do some sightseeing in Montgomery and then post a final travel journal update after we reach Flovilla, Georgia on Thursday, giving y'all a look into what we discovered in our exploratin of Montgomery.