9/30 Friday

On the road all day so not much to report. Speaking of roads we were on the Jim Nabors Highway (remember him?) and the Rockabilly Highway. And, about those peanut plants? Well, I looked it up because we saw even more fields, and even larger fields up through Tennessee. It's cotton! My clue was the sign we saw for a cotton museum. TeeHee on us, but they did look like white flowers. Wonder why it isn't being picked? Unless there is a white flower before the cotton?? More to look up but now I vaguely remember that from the Cotton Exchange in Memphis!
The other thing is that we often forget what an agricultural country this still is. The way things are farmed is different, bigger, but so much of the land is crops with big, beautiful mansions up on hills.
Also, at every little crossroad, every little town there is at least one church. From one room storefronts to huge, huge churchs. So, also still a very church-going country. And, we were also struck by the many bill boards with Bible references against abortion, homosexuals, and warning us about hell and some other things I didn't even understand. Plan to make Dubuque tomorrow. Taking our time and enjoyed getting off the interstate. Maybe another trip to hit the things we missed. We passed up the Jesse Owens Museum and Helen Keller's home along the way.

9/29 Thursday

We ended up in Wind Creek State Park near Alexander City AL, which you can see is a lot nicer than where we spent our first night. We left at 11:30 AM and made good time on our new tires and front end alignment. I am a lot less shaken around now. We traveled through Jimmy Carter country in GA surrounded by peanut plants in full flower -- for as far as you can see white flowers. This leg of the trip was redoing a lot of familiar territory. Love this park. Over 600 rv sites! Have to come back.

9/28 Our First Day Out

Well, we got a really early start, 6AM to beat the heat and traffic. Which we did and it went downhill from there. About 95 miles out, on I 75, we had a blowout. Thanks to Jack's good driving skills, we made it safely to the side of the road. Geico, as usual, very accomodating and we had new tire on wheel in about an hour or so. Then to the shop to balance wheels, etc.
There we discovered the need for 4 new tires and front end alignment. Long story about depending on and trusting our Tampa mechanic - so that's the end of that. The owners of the repair/tire shop hooked us up to electricity and we are spending the night here, right off the interstate exit and up on stationary jacks. Yikes! But very nice of them and really not a lot of options. We're comfortable and expect to be on the road by noon tomorrow.
Good thing we built in some cushion travel time. Expect to still make Dubuque by Saturday. Sorry the pictures are in reverse order. Have to remember that.