A beeline for home

Fridays drive: Foss Oklahoma to Tupelo Mississippi. 662 miles

Friday October 25 2018

We continued our journey home with another long drive on interstate 40. FlyingJ travel centered spaced out every 300+/- miles made fuel stops very convenient for us. Despite 40 being a major east/west truck route traffic flowed smoothly until we neared the Mississippi River.

About fifty miles west of Memphis everything just stopped. We inched forward for a very long time, with no indication of what the problem was. There was no construction, no lane closures, no emergency vehicles, just a long line of traffic barely moving.

Slowly traffic began to move and soon we were back up to speed but now traffic was all bunched up. Running turnpike speeds in bumper to bumper traffic is stressful but we had to stay on I-40 to cross the Mississippi river at Memphis. Stopping for the night in Arkansas was not an option; all the area campgrounds are on the Tennessee/Mississippi side of the river.

By the time we got to Memphis the sun had set. Memphis is a major shipping hub with truck traffic 24/7, there’s Friday night traffic, all the campgrounds are off the highway somewhere and Memphis is a high crime area. I decided to stay on the highway and drive on to Tupelo some 115 miles down the road.

It was an easy run, my only concern was deer running into the road and that never happened. At Tupelo we again assessed our situation and decided to check out the local Wal-Mart as an overnight stop. There were already several RV’s and about 8 trucks lined up in the back of the parking lot. We joined them and had a very restful night there.

Our journey today was totaled 662 miles.

Saturdays drive: Tupelo Mississippi to A H Stephens St Pk in Georgia. 373 miles

Saturday October 26 2018

We moved from Tupelo Mississippi to A H Stephens State Park in Crawford Georgia today. It was an easy run, there was the normal congestion thru Atlanta but traffic flowed without stopping.

Notable in today’s journey, we left I-40 in Tennessee and have been traveling on 78 and I-22. From Tupelo Mississippi to Birmingham Alabama is one of the nicest roads in America. Thru rolling hills in northern Alabama, the highway department has manicured the landscape back for a hundred yards on each side of the roadway. It is a most pleasant driving experience.

I-22 in Alabama

Nearing Birmingham GPS Aimee and I had another of our infamous disagreements. I have no idea what route she was trying to take us on, but I knew the way to the Flying J travel center and then on thru the city. We kissed and made up on the other side when we both agreed to drive on I-20.

A long time ago

Birmingham always brings back memories for me. A long time ago I was training at Jungle school in nearby Anniston and was volunteered for funeral detail on weekends. On one Saturday we drove to Birmingham to a southern black church for the funeral of a young soldier who was KIA in Vietnam. That was quite the cultural experience for this white boy from suburban Newark Delaware.

Our camping neighbors at A H Stephens State Park

We reached our planned destination for the night at A H Stephens State Park about 50 miles east of Atlanta. (Stephens was the last vice president of the confederacy) The park was having a Halloween themed weekend and was full of local campers. The park employees found us a spot for the night in the equestrian section of the park. It was a newly constructed camp host site behind the horse stables. It was a little muddy getting to the site, we didn’t care, the horses didn’t seem to mind the intrusion, it was a very quiet and dark night.

We covered 373 miles on Saturday.

General outline of our trip

Sunday October 27 2018

Last day on the road, we can almost smell the ocean. We know the way home by heart, well most of us do, GPS Aimee had weird ideas about getting thru Florence. The fastest way home from west of Florence is to take I-95 north to exit 181A Hwy 38 to 501. There is one traffic signal as soon as you get off 95 and then it is smooth sailing at mostly 60 mph until you get to Aynor.

After nearly two months on the road we arrived home early in the afternoon. It’s good to be home.

I don’t really know what our total mileage was for the trip; I would guess it was about 5000 miles. We spent $3240.22 on fuel, most of that in the motorhome, maybe a couple hundred for the truck we tow. Our lodging costs where significantly less at $787.86., this is because we spent many nights at no direct cost to us. We camped 17 nights at Thousand Trails parks which are free to us as members. We also had two visits to Kamp Kolman totaling 10 days. (Kamp Kolman is Dave and RaeAnne’s driveway) We spent one night in a Wal-Mart parking lot which was also free.