Homeward Bound!

We arrive home today after 29 days on the road and almost 5000 miles! It’s been an amazing trip, with 19 different visits with friends and family (multiple people in each visit). We stopped in 12 different states, camped in some beautiful parks, and explored cities. We are also looking forward to being home again, though! We’re driving through (more) rain and listening to our Going Home playlist. 😀

After leaving Nashville, we outran the storms and enjoyed a delicious lunch at La Costa, a Mexican restaurant in Crossville, TN.

We camped overnight at Warrior’s Path State Park, just before the Virginia border (we crossed back into the Eastern Time Zone). And we managed to get packed up the next morning (just) before the rain started!

Yesterday, we crossed into Virginia and drove through off-and-on sprinkles all day. We stopped for lunch at Christiansburg, VA. We tried the Cracker Barrel, but there was a 40-minute wait (Sunday), so we went across the street to a diner that hadn’t been shown on the map app. It turned out to be a great stop, a funky little place called Lost in Taste Sports Bar, with a space theme! Cool decor, great food, and fast service.

We spent the night at an old favorite spot, Lake Anna State Park in Spotsylvania, VA. We last camped there in 2019, on the exact same day, April 6! We might have even been on the same campsite. The park has great hiking trails and kayaking, though we were only there for a quick overnight this time. Our site was huge, and it was completely dark and quiet last night … ahh!

We packed up this morning in light rain (much better than in Nashville), and we should be home by 6 pm. Our son has been watching the house for us, but he’s heading to Italy later today! It will be good to be home tonight.

Nashville, Tennessee

Our stay in Nashville was a wet and stormy one, but we still had fun exploring the city. Our first night at the RV park there was a rough one, with severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings starting at 3 am that sent us to the cinderblock restroom building to shelter. It wasn’t a very restful night!

We slept in the next morning but were still pretty worn out. We had 1 pm reservations at The Listening Room Cafe, for lunch and live music. On the way, we drove around downtown Nashville. It’s a vibrant city, full of live music (even at noon!), murals and other artwork, and both residents and tourists walking around.

The show at The Listening Room was excellent! It featured 3 solo songwriters/artists and a duo in a round table set-up, taking turns each performing their own original songs, singing with acoustic guitars. In all, they each performed 6 songs, telling us the story behind each song. They were all talented, and it was very entertaining.

After long naps in more pouring rain, we were both still feeling pretty worn out and sick of the storms! We decided to just go to the mall down the road to grab a simple dinner - we’ve been eating out for a month now - and see a movie. We ate at Saltgrass Steakhouse. My grilled salmon and asparagus were delicious! We saw the movie The Friend (based on the novel by Sigrid Nunez), and it was excellent! We both really enjoyed it. And by the time we came out, the latest line of storms (and tornado warnings) were past.

The next day we went to the Tennessee State History Museum, across from the capitol building. It’s a beautiful museum with great displays covering Tennessee history from the earth’s beginning through modern times. We enjoyed it.

After my nap, I finally made my pilgrimage to Parnassus, Ann Patchett’s bookstore. It was wonderful! It’s a beautiful bookstore, with a great selection and friendly, helpful staff. We bought some gifts and, of course, a couple of signed Ann Patchett books! (videos of the museum and inside of the bookstore in my Texas Road Trip video (week 3).

We ended our time in Nashville with dinner at Common Ground with old friends we haven’t seen since February 2020. We worked together in New Orleans in the 80’s, and they lived near us in Delaware. We had a wonderful evening, talking, laughing, reminiscing, and catching up. Nothing like old friends.

Driving Through Tennessee

We arrived in Tennessee last night and spent the night at T.O. Fuller State Park in Memphis. It’s within city limits but is a nice oasis of nature just southwest of the city. We arrived after 7 pm and left by 11 this morning, so we didn’t have time to explore the park.

Driving from Memphis to Nashville today, I was hit by nostalgia, so we stopped in Jackson, TN, at an old favorite road trip stop with our sons: Cypress Grove Nature Park and Raptor Center. It includes a boardwalk trail system through a marshy area and a rehabilitation center for birds of prey. Our boys used to love to see the huge birds up close. Today, we enjoyed the walk along the boardwalks through the woods, though the boardwalks could use some upgrades and TLC.

They currently have 3 barred owls and 3 red-tailed hawks, some with injured wings and others there for other reasons. It was a nice dose of nature in the midst of the days of driving .

(See the second owl up in the dark corner?)

We stopped for lunch at a nearby Tacos 4 Life, a chain we’ve been seeing since Texas. The tacos were delicious, with lots of different types and options. Even better, for every taco or other dish ordered, they donate a meal to feed a hungry child. Great business model!

We’ll be arriving in Nashville in about an hour for a few days’ stay.

Arkansas

Arkansas has always been one of our favorite states. It earns its nickname, The Natural State, with so many beautiful and varied state parks. We didn’t have much time there this trip - mostly just driving through yesterday and today - but we saw friends and family and stayed in a gorgeous state park.

We camped last night at Lake Fort Smith State Park (new to us and apparently newly renovated). It has about 30 campsites, almost all with a view of the lake. Ours was huge, surrounded by pines and birdsong - very peaceful.

We drove to Fayetteville to meet family for dinner at Penguin Ed’s BBQ. Very tasty BBQ, which we’ve now eaten in GA, TX, OK, and AR! It was wonderful to be together again and enjoy their company.

We hated to leave that beautiful place this morning, but we had a long day of driving ahead. Western Arkansas is very hilly, and eastern Arkansas is completely flat! We finished our first audio book of the trip today.

We stopped for lunch in Little Rock and met up with old friends we hadn’t seen in 15 years! It was great to see them again and catch up.

Now, we’re almost to Memphis for a late arrival at T.O. Fuller State Park and a quick overnight.

I’m grateful to our son for watching our house while we’re away and sending me photos of the flowers just starting to bud in our yard! Big difference from what we’ve seen down south!

Edmond, Oklahoma

This northern suburb of Oklahoma City is where my husband went to high school, where his parents lived for 45 years, and where we used to visit them with our sons several times every year. The area has a lot of fun things to do, but this visit was all about visiting old friends.

We arrived at Arcadia Lake Central State Park and set up our camper. My husband headed out to play golf with one of his old high school friends. After my nap, one of my high school friends picked me up for dinner. It’s a crazy coincidence, having grown up in western New York State, but my best friend in high school and I both married men from Oklahoma! I used to get to see her every time we visited, but we hadn’t had time together since 2014. We went to Bricktown Brewery for dinner. The food was great, we talked for hours, and it was wonderful to reconnect!

The next day we met another group of friends for brunch. They had “adopted” my in-laws (and vice-versa) many years ago and were there for them when we couldn’t be, living so far away. They are friends who are like family ❤️, and it was wonderful to see them again and catch up.

After brunch, we all went to the cemetery to visit the graves of my husband’s sister, parents, and grandparents. It was good to all be together.

That night we met up with my husband’s friend (the one he golfed with) and his wife for dinner at Texlahoma BBQ. It was good BBQ and good conversation!

We had a nice campsite at Arcadia Lake, with redbuds (Oklahoma state tree) in bloom all over and a lilac bush blooming on our site. Now we’re on our way to Arkansas and stopped at another Bricktown Brewery for a delicious lunch!

Lake Murray, Oklahoma

After a long day of driving through heavy traffic in Austin and Fort Worth, we arrived at Lake Murray State Park in Ardmore, Oklahoma. Our part of the campground was out on a peninsula, with water views all around. Our campsite was right on the water. It was a very beautiful, peaceful spot, and I got a great night’s sleep with a light breeze blowing and the sound of the water lapping the shore.

We got an early (for us) start the next day, and drove to Edmond, a northern suburb of Oklahoma City, where my husband grew up, for a couple of days of meeting up with friends.

Austin, Texas - Day 2

The rain continued, but we still had a great day in Austin. Our great-niece recommended Blanton Art Museum at University of Texas. It’s a sprawling, beautiful campus, and we enjoyed the museum. A long-time virtual chronic illness friend met us there. We’ve been corresponding and interacting in online support groups since 2011, so it was great to finally meet in person!

She gave us some great recommendations for lunch, but I was pretty wiped out and it was raining harder by then. We decided to just eat across the street at Bullock Texas State History Museum. Lunch was just a mediocre cafeteria, but the museum looked really nice, from what we saw. We also got a good view of the capitol building.

After a nap back at the campground, we headed to South Congress Avenue, a really cool area! Lots of shops, restaurants, bars, ice cream places, taco stands, and more. We met our great-niece at Joann’s Fine Foods, a funky restaurant with creative Tex-Mex dishes. It was wonderful to see her and catch up on her new life in Austin, and the food was delicious!

To see video footage of Austin and the rest of our trip, visit my YouTube channel.