Friday, May
23, 2014
We were up
at daybreak anxious to find a tire early and try to get to Birmingham, AL
before dark.
A cold
breakfast of sweet rolls, milk and fruit and then it was directly to Wal-Mart
to buy tires. We didn’t want to take any
chances. We arrived shortly after the
tire center opened only to discover to our dismay they only had one tire in the
proper size for the trailer. We had hoped to purchase three because when one
goes they all go.
For those
who don’t already know this Wal-Marts generally won’t mount tires on RV’s. This one was no exception. So while the guys waited out getting the tire
mounted on the rim I did some minor grocery shopping and then met them back at
the truck.
By now I was
starting to lose the battle with the virus/allergy and I was not a happy
camper. The tire tension was not
something we needed to add to it. Despite my wanting them to the guys decided
to not put the new tire on the ground but to keep it as a spare. After all the remaining “old” tires still
looked fine, no signs of tire wear, bulges, loose tread or anything.
So we headed
out of Van Buren, AR with three old tires and one new one on the ground with a
new one as a spare.
As we drove
along I-40 I watched the scenery fly by.
After a while I noticed that many of the fields had odd shaped berms in
them. The berms were low and curving,
with curving rows laid out evenly spaced in them.
I studied
them for a while and finally asked the guys if they had any idea what they were
for. Dh didn’t miss a beat with his
answer “rice”. In Arkansas? Yep, in Arkansas.
After I got
home I did a little research because for some reason I thought all rice grown
in the US was grown in Texas and I actually had going to see the rice fields
and the processing plant on my list of things I wanted to see when we retire. What can I say, I am weird, I like
agriculture tourism and touring factories.
I like to know how things are grown and processed for us to
consume.
It turns out
rice is one of the biggest products of Arkansas—who knew?
I was so
stunned I forgot to take a photo of the fields as we flew by, maybe next
trip. I scoured the web for photos of
what I saw that were copyright free, but found none, although I did see some
gorgeous photos of the Arkansas rice fields and other rice fields around the
world.
For those of
you who are curious as I was the search term I used was “photo Arkansas Rice
Fields”. It might make a great
homeschooling subject or field trip for some of you. Who knows?
At almost
the exact same time that day as the previous night the second tire on the
passenger side blew, taking out the latch that holds the camper door open when
we are parked as it did. To say I was
not amused would be an under statement.
We were a
long ways from Birmingham and there was no 24 hour Wal-Mart to camp at, so we
found a Flying J station with a Denny’s planning on spending the night
there.
The meal at
Denny’s was disappointing after the wonderful one we had at the Denny’s at
Flying J in Joplin earlier this year. Service
was poor and all bread associated with our meal was burnt badly.
Despite
being tired and tense about tires we realized that although this Flying J
allows overnight camping there was a smell that made even my two healthy travel
mates gag and it just about did me in period.
We all knew
by that point my “cold” was actually an allergy problem. I had all the medicines I needed for it with
me and so when the discussion of going home came up I pointed out I would feel
worse at home because I would have ruined the trip for everyone and I was not
contagious. So we forged ahead.
Sleeping in
the heat, with no air conditioning and a smell that would choke an skunk we
moved on looking for a campground along our route thinking we’d stay in one and
run the air conditioning and put the slides out so we would all be comfortable.
Of course
Murphy is relentless. We never did stumble across one that wasn’t miles and
miles off our route, so we ended up further down the road toward Birmingham
pulling into a Pilot station well after dark and parking between the semis for
the night
While
security is good at the truck stops generally, the rumble of the motors on
semis and their height blocking the movement of any possible cool breeze made
sleeping a little less comfortable than we would like. But at least we were safe, and not in danger
of having another blow out in the middle of the night.
Thus ended
day two of our trip. Jan who is so sorry
she didn’t take photos of the rice fields in AR away from OK.
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