Vicksburg

Our travels through Mississippi took us to two places of note.  First, we stopped for a couple of days in Vicksburg, MS in order to tour the Civil War battlefield in that town.  Then, on our way to Nashville, we stopped for a few days at a very nice state park in the Northeast part of the state, Tishomingo State Park.

Visiting the Vicksburg battlefield was a great experience for me and the girls were kind enough to humor me by allowing me some significant time to experience it.  For those of you who are not Civil War buffs, Vicksburg was one of the key battles of the western campaign during the war.  U.S. Grant marched a large army on Vicksburg in order to seize control of the Mississippi River, which was protected by a massive gauntlet of Confederate guns.  The campaign in Mississippi lasted for several months in the summer of 1863, culminating with a siege of the town of Vicksburg, during which time the Union forces starved out the Confederates and took control of Vicksburg.    This was a huge strategic success for the Union and also was one of the campaigns that drew Lincoln's attention to Grant, ultimately leading to Grant's ascension to the head of the entire Union army.  The battlefield is very well preserved, with the relative positions or the armies well identified and beautiful monuments to the divisions from each state that provided soldiers.

There is a great audio tour drive through the battlefield, a front that was several miles long at its zenith.  It was very informative and is highly recommended if you are in the area.

This image is a good overview of one of the key battle areas.  The zig-zag shaped depressions you see leading up the hills are the remainders of the Union trenches.  As the Union tightened the noose on the siege, they would tunnel closer and closer to the Confederate lines (which in this case are on the top of the far hill) in preparation for a final assault which never came.  General Pemberton, the Confederate commander, ultimately surrendered his forces after 6 weeks of siege.

 

Update

Sorry for the delay everyone, we have been without internet service for a while now.  In fact, we just stopped at a coffee shop in Elvis' birthplace of Tupelo, MS to get some signal and send an update.  Hope you all enjoy the flood of posts below.  We are off to a nice state park for a few days, then up to Nashville to visit some friends.  Check back in a few days!

Resiliency

Traveling with your kid is a very different experience.  For those of you who have done it, you know what I am saying.  With a child in tow, the experiences are magnified, both good and bad.  Over the last couple of days, we have had a couple of bad ones.

 

Maggie has been playing with her imaginary friends quite a bit lately.  Only in this case, her friends aren’t so imaginary.  They just aren’t here.  While she gets to see a bunch of new things, play in a bunch of new places, and run around outside all the time, the reality is, she doesn’t have her friends.  Thus, we have our not so imaginary friends, Henry and Anna.  Two great friends of hers from Telluride who we left behind.

 Yesterday, Maggie was thrilled to discover a small green bug that was hanging out in her bunk.  She even called me over to see it.  “What’s he doing?” she asked.  “I think he is just hanging out and visiting you,” I said.  This was a moment like any of the thousands of small and curious moments you enjoy with your kids when you spend every waking hour with them.  Only it wasn’t ordinary for her.

 Later in the day, Maggie went back to her bunk to look for her little green friend.  Only he wasn’t there.  When she went asked where he went, I said innocuously “he probably just went away.”  This was not the right thing to say.  The next thing you know, she is staring at us, hyperventilating, with crocodile tears pouring down her face.  When she finally gasps enough air to speak, she wails: “BUT IT’S NOT OKAY TO LEAVE!  IT’S NOT OKAY WHEN PEOPLE LEAVE AND DON’T COME BACK!  IT’S NOT OKAY TO LEAVE ANNA AND HENRY!  I MISS THEM!  I WANT TO GO HOME!”

 Next thing I know, it feels like I am standing there, looking at someone holding my heart in front of me after they just removed it from my body with a spoon.  You feel like the worst parent in the world.  Like you let your child down to pursue this dream of yours.

 Then, we calm her down, she calls her best friend on the phone, talks to her in that semi-coherent stream of consciousness talk that 31/2 year olds use.  She has a cup of milk, some bedtime stories, and she is fast asleep.  Today, she looks at us as we are sitting around the dinner picnic table and says with a 1000 watt smile:  “Mom, Dad, as long as we are together, we can go anywhere and live in Francine.” 

 I read a book once that contained interviews with the Dali Lama.  The author described how when the Dali Lama was told some very sad news, he could visually see the pain and sadness wash over the Dali Lama, who then felt it, remembered it, and let it go.  This is what I thought of with Maggie.  She experienced the emotions of sadness, of loneliness, completely, and then when the time was right, she let them go and moved on.  That is resiliency.  If you watch closely enough, your child can teach you something about how to live your life every day.

MPR - Volume 2.0

Next, we turn to our one, and so far only, special feature of the Slow Lane: MPR aka Margaret’s Playground Review.  Since we last left you, Maggie has enjoyed two playgrounds of note.  The first was at the Mill Creek RV Campground and Resort in Canton, TX.  Let me tell you folks, what this playground lacked in size, it made up for in quality.  As with every blade of grass at this place, the playground was immaculate.  And while it was small, it contained the essence of playground; the Holy Trinity of Fun, swings, rocking animals, and curly slides.  If you were to ask Maggie what more she needed in a park, somewhere in the midst of her 100 word answer, you would hear the word “nothing.”  We enjoyed several sessions at this park rocking, swinging and sliding.  It is as simple as that.  Pure playground joy.  Unsurprisingly, when asked to rate this park on a scale of 1-5 stars, Maggie gave it a hearty 10 stars!

The second park Maggie reviewed was located at Lake Bistineau State Park.  This here park was more of a retro, throwback kind of park.  The kind of parks we played at as kids, back in the day when your parents could let you ride your bike without a helmet and not get reported to social services.  This park contained wooden equipment with metal stairs, slides, and money bars.  Oh the humanity!  Hot in the summer, stick your tongue to it cold in the winter, actual metal, not that ployvinalethalenewhatever stuff they make play equipment out of these days.

Despite its old-school style, this park delivered, with one exception.  One of the ladders leading up to the big slide was missing a rung.  This unfortunate situation didn’t allow Maggie to summit the slide area solo, so the park’s rating suffered a bit.  On the plus side, it had a good ole fashioned tire swing, which was a very cutoff shorts and stick fishing pole kind of stylish.  All in all, Maggie gave this park a solid 7 out of 5 stars.

Check back real soon for more MPR, until then, play safe and wear your sunscreen.

Swamp Thang

Our next stop after leaving the Lone Star Sate was a great little state park in northwestern Louisiana called Lake Bistineau State park.  Don’t even try to pronounce it right.  What you learn in Louisiana is that unless you are from there, you can’t pronounce it.  Now I like to think that I can get in the spirit of a place and kind of slide into the local vernacular a bit, but Louisiana-speak is a near native of Latin for a Midwestern boy.  In fact, we were visiting a bamboo rodmaking Baptist minister friend of mine (yes, you read that right) a few days ago and he was giving us some directions to our next stop.  He said: “just head down here to the stop sign and hang a right.  Take that road to the town of crowVUL, which you northerners would call CROW-ville.  Then follow that road up to the Town of DEL-hi, which if you are from India, you would call Delhi.”  There is no rhyme or reason to it and you can’t fake it.  You are either from there, or your not. 

All that aside, Lake Bistineau was lovely.   It was a quintessential, postcard type Louisiana spot.  Huge pine and deciduous trees reaching right up to the water of the lake, which is full of giant Bald Cypress trees with Spanish Moss hanging down from the branches.  We just hung out, hiked around a bit, and enjoyed the view.  We were planning on renting a canoe to explore the lake a bit, but canoe rentals don’t start until “summer” (after Memorial Day), ignoring the fact that it was about 90 degrees in the shade while we were there.  The other highlight comes when there is no light and you can hear the sounds of the night.  Hollow tree frogs calling out their sweet song to the ladies so loud it sounds like your high school tuba player warming up in your ear.  Crickets, bullfrogs, owls, and other unknown sounds combine intro a cacophony of indigenous audio.  It sounded EXACTLY what the bayou should sound like.  While I loved the experience, I slept with earplugs.  There is no way I was getting to sleep otherwise. 

After our visit to Lake Bistineau and our stop to visit my rodmaking friend, we headed to Vicksburg, Mississippi for a tour of the Civil War Battlefield, but we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves.  We were going to go to New Orleans, but when you are traveling around the country in your own little world, you don’t notice things.  Things like, the weekend we had planned to head down to N’owlins, was the same weekend as a little thing called Jazz Festival and 350,000 other people had beat us down there.  Didn’t think it was quite the right time to drag Francine through the French Quarter.  Oh well, next time.

Some photos of the Lake, just a taste of the Bayou.  I have been experimenting with an old photo technique I used to use a bit, pinhole photography.  Pretty cool when combined with digital cameras.  High tech and low tech collide and create some pretty interesting results. Enjoy.

 

Don't Mess With Texas

Don’t Mess With Texas

You’ve heard this slogan for the longest time and so have we.  We took it seriously.  We didn’t mess with Texas.  Drove across in a couple of days, Louisiana bound.  We crossed the boarder at Hobbs, New Mexico, where Texas is flat, hot, and dusty cotton country.  Miles and miles of cotton fields with ochre colored soil and a cotton gin or two in each small town.  

We stayed our first night at Abilene State Park, just south of the town of Abilene (calling it such is being a bit generous).  The park was lovely, nestled in a quite piece of the Texas hill country.  We camped in a great little spot with beautiful oak trees for shade and a quite little creek rolling by out back.  

By the time we hit Dallas, the geography looked like the Midwest, only 114 degrees hotter.  On a day when it was almost 90, with 50% humidity, we actually had one guy say with his quite, slurred together Texas drawl: “nice spring day tuday, you should see when it gets hot in the summir.”  Curious, I asked: “how hot does it get?”  He replied “hunnert, hunnert en ten.  Humidity up around sixty fiiiiveee PERcent.  Hot.”

The second night we stayed in beautifully landscaped private campground outside of Dallas, in a little town called Canton.  Only this one has no Hall of Fame.  The park was immaculate; you half expected to see a foursome of golfers playing through.  Not only could you camp there on their manicured grounds, but you could also buy yourself a little slice of Texas, a small cabin on one of the “lakes” in the park.  These are not lakes as you native Minnesotans might consider them.  Just large ponds, really.  But they will take a singlewide, fancy it up with a porch, some stone accents, and some nice landscaping and sell it to you for a song.  If anyone is looking to go in on a vacation ownership deal down there, just let us know.  We had a nice mellow campfire and shoved off the next day for the Bayou.

A note about Dairy Queens.  The have a gaggle of them in Texas.  Nearly every town has one, but it is not like your little walk up, only open in the summer, ice cream and hot dog kind of DQ, we are talking a full service Texas institution here.  Along with giant containers containing 100 gallons of sweet tea, these DQs have unique, Big Hat, entrees like the Belt Buster, the Double Belt Buster, and for you big ole wranglers, they will sling you out a Triple Belt Buster.  A triple cheeseburger soooo big, you could feed a small family on it.  Just make sure to loosen your belt buckle a bit.  Lastly, y’all should know you can get everything chicken fried.  Chicken fried chicken sandwiches, chicken fried steak strips, chicken fried ice cream (well maybe that’s a tall tale).  And EVERYTHING comes with a side of gravy.  Just try to save room for the ice cream.

Outside of that, we can’t tell you too much else about Texas, we didn’t mess with it.  Now we know that one can see the Alamo, Austin, San Antonio, and a bunch of cool stuff in between.  We just decided not to.  Oh, and sorry, no pictures.  If you want more, stop and down and see Texas yourself.  The people are very friendly.

We are currently in Vicksburg, MS at the Ameristar Casino RV resort- really it is the best place in town - no really. The connectivity is not great, but we are doing well and excited to post more of our last few days on the road. Check back in the next few days for the latest update. Jay has some great photos, there is a new edition or 2 of MPR and we have 2 great State Parks to share with you. 

Wind

We drove uphill today.  All day, or so it seemed.  We drove into the wind today.  90+ degrees and winds at 30+.  From Santa Fe to Carlsbad, NM.  It wasn't that far on the map, but believe me, it was long.

One stop.  Roswell, New Mexico.  Intergalactic Ellis Island for our little green space friends.  While we didn't feel moved enough to capture some images for posterity, here are four brief points to ponder.

1.  There are at least 2 shops that claim to be "alien headquarters."  This is confusing.  Imagine traveling light years to Roswell, only to find out you don't know where to stop first.  The Chamber of Commerce needs to clear this up before we experience a celestial diplomatic incident.

2.  There are a few too many gun stores in Roswell.  Perhaps this is driven by the constant threat of space invasion?  The strangest one?  A store called "Discount Guns," which was conveniently located next to the "Little Lambs Christian Day Care."  Praise the lord and pass the ammunition.  At least if it was a Wal-Mart next door they would be catching it all on film.

3.  It is hot in Roswell.  Maybe it isn't all the time, but it was 93 degrees on April 15.  When you have spent the winter in 400 inches of snow at 9,000 feet, this qualifies as really hot.

4. Aliens apparently have bad taste.  I mean really, why Roswell?  No offense if you are from there, but a cosmopolitan city it is not.  Now certainly these guys can't just set their giant saucers down in the middle of Central Park (or could they?) but why not a nice small to mid sized cities with some cultural opportunities and good schools?  They are advanced beings, are they not?

We made it safely through Roswell without any close encounters, which is nice.  Now we only have one more alien land to conquer . . . Texas.

Going West

For more than 100 years there has been a mythology associated with "going west."  Going west is not just simply the act of traveling in a westerly direction, but rather, a mindset and a goal.  It is the search for adventure, a new start, the essence of America, wide open and free.

Over the last several days we have experienced several examples of people who are going west, or have, in fact, gone west.  

South of Alamosa on the New Mexico/Colorado boarder we were stopped by a good old fashioned cattle drive.  While Colorado and New Mexico are both growing and changing, it is reassuring to know that pockets of the real west survive.  While these pictures are vintage 2008, they could be 1968, or even 1948, or even...

These dudes were taking a small heard from one pasture to another and the beef was being a bit unruly.

 

This guy has apparently been doing this kind of thing for a while.  At one point a calf got away and was balking at going through a section of fence.  This guy lassoed the calf with a sort of casual indifference that clearly showed it wasn't his first rodeo.  When we took his picture out the truck widow, he even tipped his hat.

Now not only did we get to experience the true mythology of the west, we also got to experience a sort of new, strange, comedy central type western experience.  Certainly almost everyone has dreamt at one time or another about packing up the car with a buddy and pointing the wheel west.  From Jack Kerouac to William Least Heat Moon, the American road trip is a universal aspiration.

But really, how many of you ever thought about taking that trip in one of these...

That's right.  That is a bona fide Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, which was parked right next to our hotel in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  This baby has seating for 6, surround sound, and wall to wall.  This grand Wiener Ship is currently being piloted around the west by a nice couple who are doing promotional events at Albertson's grocery stores.  What about it?  Travel in style, get paid, and draw a crowd.  What more could the modern day traveler want?

The old and the new are alive and well out here.  A sort of odd juxtaposition that is probably more what the west has always been about.  Miners and wranglers were followed by snake oil salesmen and hustlers.  Today, cowboys are followed by wiener mobiles. 

The Salida Times

Salida is one of those towns that reminds me of what Colorado really is like, what it was like when I first moved to Colorado in the early 90s.  While this area is growing, this is still a small town with beautiful surroundings, lots to do, and cool people who appreciate where they live.  While we come here often, it has been nice to be able to stay a while and enjoy ourselves.

Our time here has been spent playing outside, fishing, restoring a bamboo rod, eating too much good food, drinking some great wine, watching the mountain bluebirds, finches, and chickadees visit the feeder in the crazy spring weather, and just socializing with our friends.  Here are some photos...

Maggie decided that our buddy Dave could use some help around the farm.

Maggie also decided Dad needed some help building a bamboo rod.

The Arkansas River in early spring, plenty of snow on the peaks still.

Lisa got in the act with some fishing.

A nice Arkansas River brown trout.

Although we haven't really started camping with Francine yet, we are beginning to settle into the rhythm of life on the road.  Life's pace is slowing a bit and you can feel yourself becoming more in tune with the world.  You start to notice things other than the clock, the schedule, and "what's next."  You start to get outside more just to be outside, not because you want to do something.  

Next stop for us is Santa Fe, which we are looking forward to.  We will visit some friends and get a chance to see Lisa's parents before they head north for the Summer.  After that, we will be heading south and east with Francine.

A Programming Note

We have added a link at the bottom of the page that takes you to a map of our journey...so far.

Now appearing . . . MPR

Today we are introducing you all to a new "special feature" of the Slow Lane. For obvious reasons, this new feature is entitled Margaret's Playground Review (MPR). MPR will periodically bring you cutting edge playground reviews from across the nation, straight from 40 inch playground force to be reckoned with, Maggie.

For our first report, we feature the playground at Longfellow Elementary in Salida, CO. This is a classic elementary school playground with a compelling mix of old and new equipment intelligently placed across sand, grass, and hard playing surfaces. Special highlights include multiple slides, swings, bouncing animals, and climbing apparatuses.

We started of the day with some classic sliding, followed by running, some rocking animals, and wrapped things up with multiple climbing excursions. This playground is bigger than many elementary facilities and it made for a great play session.

When asked what she would rate the Longfellow playground on a scale of 1-5 stars, Maggie enthusiastically gave it 10 stars. Clearly a great review from Maggie. No doubt the bar has been set high for future playgrounds, we'll see how it all shakes out in future editions of MPR. Thanks for tuning in...

The Journey Begins - FINALLY

Well, we have finally begun our journey in earnest. It took more work than we ever imagined to get everything in storage and get on the road. We left Telluride late morning, Easter Sunday and made it to Boulder in 9 hours. Not bad for our first drive pulling Francine full to the gills. We spent most of the week decompressing and enjoying time with Nana, Bapa, Auntie Missy, Uncle Mark and the cousins: Cooper, Thatcher, Mollie and Gracie. Maggie had a blast playing with everyone.

The week was a whirl wind tour of Pearl Street, Boulder, Estes Park, the Denver Zoo and Erie's new Rec Center. We also spent time taking care of the mundane but important items such as dentist, eye doctor, vet and hair cut appointments. We also spent a few days cleaning out and organizing Francine. We left even more things in storage at the Elder Hake home in an effort to truly simplify, though we still have a ton of creature comforts.

We received several packages while in Boulder. Including one that contained our new mascots, Harold and Maude. Thanks to Ginna and Mark for these wonderfully tacky friends, which no RV should be without.

On Wednesday the 3rd of April we looked at the weather forecast and decided it was time to head for Salida, as few days of snow were predicted. We made great time and now we are enjoying time with our friends Dave and Janet. They have a beautiful home with views of the Collegiate Range. Jay and Dave are already working on making bamboo fly fishing rods and Maggie is feeding the llamas. Lisa is enjoying reading and cross-stitching and not packing! Trout fishing is in the forecast, so stay tuned for some serious fish tales!