I was on the road before 8 this morning, putting Florence, Alabama in my rear view as I headed for the Natchez Trace again. The weather looked promising and the Parkway looked deserted.
In short order, I crossed the Tennessee River. A beautiful sight and a great day.
As I crossed into Mississippi, though, the clouds started forming. I was certain I'd be in rain gear by the time I made Tupelo. But, fortune smiled, and the clouds broke up, revealing a blue sky that went on forever. As I rode the Trace, I started smelling something like burning oil. "Uh oh. That can't be my bike." I didn't see 20 cars in two hours but I bet I saw 30 bikes, all heading the other way. The smell grew stronger and suddenly, up ahead, I saw two guys on what initially appeared to be mopeds. The speed limit on the Natchez Trace is 50 mph and I was doing a little more than that so I came up on them fairly quickly. I slowed down to figure out what they were. One guy was definitely on a moped - he was working the pedals (for exercise, maybe). But the other guy was riding a vintage, e.g. early 1900's Harley Davidson. He was leaning over, giving it all it had and was still just creeping along. That explained the oil smell. I passed and waved and they waved back. A few miles up the road, I came up on another guy, also driving a vintage bike. It wasn't a Harley but a Premier, I think. I'd never seen one before. He was chugging along smoothly but also burning oil so I smelled him before I saw him. Same deal - slow down, pass and wave, and keep moving. Miles ahead of both of them, I came up on two vans with decals on the side - "Motorcycle Cannonball.com". Aha. I passed them, too, and kept on for Tupelo.
I made a good decision to get off the road last night. This morning, I was barely on the road when a deer bolted across. Man, they're stupid. It was way past time to bed down and here's a deer, still out yimyamming around, causing trouble. Further down the road, I also came on two different sets of two dogs, running wild on the side of the road. I slowed, waiting for them to bolt across, but they seemed smart enough to know the deal about vehicles. Lots of other wildlife, too. Yesterday, before it got dark, I saw a skunk waddling around in a field, and today, there were wild turkeys. Lots of trees, lots of shadows. Just a very nice road.
As I got close to Tupelo, there was a welcome station for the Parkway so I pulled off to get some information about Elvis Presley's house. That was a "must-see", insofar as my bride is/was concerned. Two bikers came up and we yakked for a while. Hard core guys from Missouri. One had a regular beard; the other had a tie in his goatee like Lou Albano. "Where you going?" Shrug. "Wherever. We've only done 200 miles a day lately 'cause we don't want to go home. When we get home, we gotta go back to work." Nice guys but they looked like they just got out of prison. I recognized prison tats on one of them, anyway.
I got off the Parkway and went in to Tupelo. I found Elvis' neighborhood easy enough. It's an older neighborhood with small homes. Signs point to his house and you're at 306 Elvis Presley Drive almost immediately. The house is two rooms and was built by Elvis' father, grandfather and uncle. He only lived there for 2 1/2 years, though when his parents couldn't make the payment.
Graceland is really where everyone goes but this is a pilgrimage for true fans. The city bought the house and surrounding property in 1957 and it's been rejuvenated since then. Nice grounds, the actual church where Elvis attended services, a memorial chapel, a story wall, a fountain of life, and a museum/gift shop.
An employee told me that about 100,000 people visit each year. Nice trek where I learned that Elvis got his first guitar for his tenth birthday. His mother paid $7.75 for it. Elvis wanted a .22 rifle or a bicycle but his mother, Gladys, was overly protective. The minister at the Assembly of God church taught him D, A, and C chords, and he learned to play "Ole Shep". History after that. But, Judy and I never could have gotten that big-ass moving van in the parking lot in 1983. I think it was a 26-footer. In addition to everything else we owned, it had our Le Car in the back. As it was, I ripped the van open on an overhang in a hotel parking lot in Sallisaw, OK.
I was riding through Tupelo to get on state road 6 or 278 (as it was both...) when I noticed a huge crowd in a park with signs for overflow parking. Out front were four police Harleys with the officers standing by. I had to see what this was about so I pulled a u (out of sight of the law, of course) and quickly discovered this was a stop for the motorcycle cannonball!
http://www.motorcyclecannonball.com/
I looked up the road and in short order, bikes appeared in the road. The police stopped traffic while the bikes limped in, along with the support vehicles. I ended up with a picture of the motorcycle cops (a dream job if there ever was one), and got back on the road.
It was two lane for a while and then turned into a nice, speedy four lane road to Oxford. I got off in search of John Grisham. I couldn't find him. But, I did drive through the town. Old money houses - sweeping lawns with plantation style houses, huge trees. After that, I went on the Ole Miss campus. About 20,000 students and a thousand acres. U of Mississippi is a big place. Lots of brick - mostly red but different shades - with colonnades on many buildings. It looked like a stately campus - except for the stadium which looked brand new. It was also called the Papa John's stadium - there was a huge (and I mean HUGE) sign on the stadium front with the Papa John's logo. Guess they made a significant contribution. I looked up the stats on Ole Miss and it's actually a very good school.
I got back on 6/278 and it continued for a while as a four lane but after I passed the I-55 turnoff (north to Memphis; south to New Orleans), it dropped back to two lanes.
I got to Clarksdale in the early afternoon. Pretty sad. This is the first city I've seen that is truly depressed. Boarded up store fronts, trash everywhere, people hanging out. I found the Delta Blues Museum on... wait for it... John Lee Hooker Drive. Classic. I thought that was great. The museum is in a brick warehouse by the train station. It's an old building.
I went in and looked around. Pretty cool stuff but I really wanted to go to the Crossroads. So, I bought the only t-shirt I wanted to get on this trip, and headed across town.
I stopped to top off the tank and there was a brain-damaged derelict yelling at the cars at a four way stop. He was playing a harmonica, singing loudly (L-O-U-D-L-Y), whistling at the intersection and incorporating three lines into his song shout. "Watch the light" (no light - just four stop signs) "Hey now" and something that sounded like "rurrurruuhh". One hand playing the harmonica and the other pointing. I went up to him and took his picture. I gave him $2 - that's the cost of doing business with guys like that. Pretty solid performance for a guy with no more brain cells.
The Crossroads was a block away. A few years ago, I thought it was going to be like the scene in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou. And then I saw a show where some people visited and that ruined it. In the movie, there was an intersection (ostensibly Highways 61 and 49) and the guys picked up the Robert Johnson character. Maybe in 1937 it looked like that. The legend is that Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil to learn to play the guitar. He was 27 when he died so his story became legendary. The deal was that he left home and a few months later, when he returned, he was a skilled guitarist. Anyway, he wrote a song called the Cross Road Blues that became a classic about a black man trying to hitch a ride so he wouldn't be caught out after dark. Since then, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Steve Winwood, Mountain and probably 20 other groups have done covers of it. So, it's a landmark in blues history. The reality of the place is kind of disappointing so you have to be blind to it. The monument is overgrown with grass and needs a paint job; there's a Church's Fried Chicken across the street; the lot on another side is vacant, full of weeds and for sale; and there are two gas stations on other corners - one with a few layabouts sitting on chairs watching the world go by. I got my pictures, though and then got on the road again.
This time I was on 61/278 south. It's listed as a scenic road. Wide open spaces interspersed with farms growing mostly cotton. I'd noticed some cotton on the Natchez Trace and then again some in fields after Oxford on the way to Clarksdale.
Here, there was significantly more. It was hot outside, and sticky. I was down to a t-shirt and even with the air swirling around me, I was still sweating. I couldn't imagine pulling cotton by hand. No wonder the Blues Men left the Delta.
I stopped in Cleveland to fill up the water bottle with ice. I've been stopping along the route and asking before I took. Each time, in every state, people said, "Sure. Help yourself." This time, the woman told me, "Forty two cents." I told her I'd been in twelve states in two weeks and no one charged for ice. She didn't care. So, I took my business (granted, I was asking for a freebie so technically there wasn't any business) elsewhere. I stopped at the next town, Leland, and the lady squared me away when the ice machine didn't work by going in the back room and returning with a full scoop of ice. For free again. Forty two cents, my ass.
After Greenville, I crossed the Mighty Mississippi on what appeared to be a new bridge. New cables, new road, new concrete, new everything. What a river. I crossed into Arkansas and the roads immediately became the worst in the United States. The view of the river was nice. It was on my right and there were some houses backing up to the river with what appeared to be ten acre lawns in front. Big money. Breaks between the properties allowed me to see the Mississippi and eventually, I came to a point where I could snap a picture.
Cars and trucks zoomed past but no one honked at me like I was being a tool for standing in the road taking photos. Work was being done on the roads and for miles, it was hit or miss. Mostly, it was cracked pavement and uneven surfaces with an occasional smooth piece of road. I was on a two-lane road, heading west. Cotton fields as far as you could see. I stopped and got a few pictures. It was deceiving. Up close, the plants were more than five feet high. From the road, I never would have guessed that. I snagged a souvenier - a cotton blossom or whatever you call it.
And so I continued down the road. Very little traffic as there were few towns.
The places were probably twenty or more miles apart, and small town. Somewhere between El Dorado and Magnolia, my phone vibrated. I set it for vibrate since I can't hear the ring and if it does go off, I'll try to stop to see who it is. By the time I do stop, there's usually a message. This time it was from Ruppert who was on a quick break. I pulled over in the middle of no where and yakked with him as a few semis blew past. When we finished the call, I looked up the road and an old beater - it looked like a 70s Ford - came past with a few guys in it. They looked at me and as I climbed on the bike, I looked back. They went a half mile down the road and made a u-turn. I had the bike started and as they came back, I left. I don't think they followed as I didn't see them again. If they were wolves looking for an opportunity, and I would have been broken down, I would have been helpless. It could be they were just a few nice fellas, intent on being good samaritans instead of shitbirds looking for nefarious activity to pursue, and maybe my imagination got ahead of me.
At Magnolia, the sun was starting to fall. The sun had been in my eyes the entire trip through Arkansas so I knew it was going to be sunset while I was on the road. Nowhere to stop in Magnolia, though, so even though I still had 75 miles until Texarkana and it was going to be dark, I kept riding.
As the sun fell, the bugs swarmed. The headlights, signals, mirrors, brake and clutch levers, and most of all, the windshield, were filled with dead bugs. They were splattering on my hands and my legs. When I stopped, my jeans from my knees to my ankles were full of dead bugs. I thought about stopping to clean the windshield but there was no shoulder. Plus it was pitch dark. I was about 15 miles from Texarkana when I ran up against a piece of blown truck tire. Suddenly, it was JUST RIGHT THERE. Dang. Just as my brain told me what it was - and that was after the headlights picked it up but I was doing 60 so I was on it before it registered - it brushed by the front tire and hit the left foot rest and my boot that was hanging off the rest. It was about a foot and a half long and standing on its side - so the width of a truck tire. Scared me but all I could do was keep going. My adrenalin was up after that.
I got to Texarkana on state road 82 and crossed into Texas. At a gas station, I took a picture of the windshield before I cleaned it.
Afterwards, I headed off to look for a hotel. Surprisingly, there were no rooms in the house... No kidding. Everything was full. I climbed on the bike and got on I-30. I was going to stay on 82 but a cop I talked to at the gas station told me Paris, Texas was about an hour and 45 minutes away. On a two lane road. On the interstate, New Boston was only about 20 miles away, still heading west. I got the second to last room at a Holiday Inn Express. The clerk told me they were full up tonight because people couldn't get rooms in Texarkana.
Not sure what I'll do tomorrow. Maybe just stay on I-30 and head for Dallas. It's only two hours away on the interstate. From there, I can get over and take 287 to Amarillo. I'm going to New Mexico from there. We'll see how I feel in the morning.
So that took 13 hours - the tip of Alabama to the western part of Texas. Lots longer than I planned to be riding today but "it be's that way sometimes".
Thanks for reading and posting. More tomorrow.
As I got close to Tupelo, there was a welcome station for the Parkway so I pulled off to get some information about Elvis Presley's house. That was a "must-see", insofar as my bride is/was concerned. Two bikers came up and we yakked for a while. Hard core guys from Missouri. One had a regular beard; the other had a tie in his goatee like Lou Albano. "Where you going?" Shrug. "Wherever. We've only done 200 miles a day lately 'cause we don't want to go home. When we get home, we gotta go back to work." Nice guys but they looked like they just got out of prison. I recognized prison tats on one of them, anyway.
I got off the Parkway and went in to Tupelo. I found Elvis' neighborhood easy enough. It's an older neighborhood with small homes. Signs point to his house and you're at 306 Elvis Presley Drive almost immediately. The house is two rooms and was built by Elvis' father, grandfather and uncle. He only lived there for 2 1/2 years, though when his parents couldn't make the payment.
Graceland is really where everyone goes but this is a pilgrimage for true fans. The city bought the house and surrounding property in 1957 and it's been rejuvenated since then. Nice grounds, the actual church where Elvis attended services, a memorial chapel, a story wall, a fountain of life, and a museum/gift shop.
An employee told me that about 100,000 people visit each year. Nice trek where I learned that Elvis got his first guitar for his tenth birthday. His mother paid $7.75 for it. Elvis wanted a .22 rifle or a bicycle but his mother, Gladys, was overly protective. The minister at the Assembly of God church taught him D, A, and C chords, and he learned to play "Ole Shep". History after that. But, Judy and I never could have gotten that big-ass moving van in the parking lot in 1983. I think it was a 26-footer. In addition to everything else we owned, it had our Le Car in the back. As it was, I ripped the van open on an overhang in a hotel parking lot in Sallisaw, OK.
I was riding through Tupelo to get on state road 6 or 278 (as it was both...) when I noticed a huge crowd in a park with signs for overflow parking. Out front were four police Harleys with the officers standing by. I had to see what this was about so I pulled a u (out of sight of the law, of course) and quickly discovered this was a stop for the motorcycle cannonball!
http://www.motorcyclecannonball.com/
I looked up the road and in short order, bikes appeared in the road. The police stopped traffic while the bikes limped in, along with the support vehicles. I ended up with a picture of the motorcycle cops (a dream job if there ever was one), and got back on the road.
It was two lane for a while and then turned into a nice, speedy four lane road to Oxford. I got off in search of John Grisham. I couldn't find him. But, I did drive through the town. Old money houses - sweeping lawns with plantation style houses, huge trees. After that, I went on the Ole Miss campus. About 20,000 students and a thousand acres. U of Mississippi is a big place. Lots of brick - mostly red but different shades - with colonnades on many buildings. It looked like a stately campus - except for the stadium which looked brand new. It was also called the Papa John's stadium - there was a huge (and I mean HUGE) sign on the stadium front with the Papa John's logo. Guess they made a significant contribution. I looked up the stats on Ole Miss and it's actually a very good school.
I got back on 6/278 and it continued for a while as a four lane but after I passed the I-55 turnoff (north to Memphis; south to New Orleans), it dropped back to two lanes.
I got to Clarksdale in the early afternoon. Pretty sad. This is the first city I've seen that is truly depressed. Boarded up store fronts, trash everywhere, people hanging out. I found the Delta Blues Museum on... wait for it... John Lee Hooker Drive. Classic. I thought that was great. The museum is in a brick warehouse by the train station. It's an old building.
I went in and looked around. Pretty cool stuff but I really wanted to go to the Crossroads. So, I bought the only t-shirt I wanted to get on this trip, and headed across town.
I stopped to top off the tank and there was a brain-damaged derelict yelling at the cars at a four way stop. He was playing a harmonica, singing loudly (L-O-U-D-L-Y), whistling at the intersection and incorporating three lines into his song shout. "Watch the light" (no light - just four stop signs) "Hey now" and something that sounded like "rurrurruuhh". One hand playing the harmonica and the other pointing. I went up to him and took his picture. I gave him $2 - that's the cost of doing business with guys like that. Pretty solid performance for a guy with no more brain cells.
The Crossroads was a block away. A few years ago, I thought it was going to be like the scene in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou. And then I saw a show where some people visited and that ruined it. In the movie, there was an intersection (ostensibly Highways 61 and 49) and the guys picked up the Robert Johnson character. Maybe in 1937 it looked like that. The legend is that Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil to learn to play the guitar. He was 27 when he died so his story became legendary. The deal was that he left home and a few months later, when he returned, he was a skilled guitarist. Anyway, he wrote a song called the Cross Road Blues that became a classic about a black man trying to hitch a ride so he wouldn't be caught out after dark. Since then, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Steve Winwood, Mountain and probably 20 other groups have done covers of it. So, it's a landmark in blues history. The reality of the place is kind of disappointing so you have to be blind to it. The monument is overgrown with grass and needs a paint job; there's a Church's Fried Chicken across the street; the lot on another side is vacant, full of weeds and for sale; and there are two gas stations on other corners - one with a few layabouts sitting on chairs watching the world go by. I got my pictures, though and then got on the road again.
This time I was on 61/278 south. It's listed as a scenic road. Wide open spaces interspersed with farms growing mostly cotton. I'd noticed some cotton on the Natchez Trace and then again some in fields after Oxford on the way to Clarksdale.
Here, there was significantly more. It was hot outside, and sticky. I was down to a t-shirt and even with the air swirling around me, I was still sweating. I couldn't imagine pulling cotton by hand. No wonder the Blues Men left the Delta.
I stopped in Cleveland to fill up the water bottle with ice. I've been stopping along the route and asking before I took. Each time, in every state, people said, "Sure. Help yourself." This time, the woman told me, "Forty two cents." I told her I'd been in twelve states in two weeks and no one charged for ice. She didn't care. So, I took my business (granted, I was asking for a freebie so technically there wasn't any business) elsewhere. I stopped at the next town, Leland, and the lady squared me away when the ice machine didn't work by going in the back room and returning with a full scoop of ice. For free again. Forty two cents, my ass.
After Greenville, I crossed the Mighty Mississippi on what appeared to be a new bridge. New cables, new road, new concrete, new everything. What a river. I crossed into Arkansas and the roads immediately became the worst in the United States. The view of the river was nice. It was on my right and there were some houses backing up to the river with what appeared to be ten acre lawns in front. Big money. Breaks between the properties allowed me to see the Mississippi and eventually, I came to a point where I could snap a picture.
Cars and trucks zoomed past but no one honked at me like I was being a tool for standing in the road taking photos. Work was being done on the roads and for miles, it was hit or miss. Mostly, it was cracked pavement and uneven surfaces with an occasional smooth piece of road. I was on a two-lane road, heading west. Cotton fields as far as you could see. I stopped and got a few pictures. It was deceiving. Up close, the plants were more than five feet high. From the road, I never would have guessed that. I snagged a souvenier - a cotton blossom or whatever you call it.
And so I continued down the road. Very little traffic as there were few towns.
The places were probably twenty or more miles apart, and small town. Somewhere between El Dorado and Magnolia, my phone vibrated. I set it for vibrate since I can't hear the ring and if it does go off, I'll try to stop to see who it is. By the time I do stop, there's usually a message. This time it was from Ruppert who was on a quick break. I pulled over in the middle of no where and yakked with him as a few semis blew past. When we finished the call, I looked up the road and an old beater - it looked like a 70s Ford - came past with a few guys in it. They looked at me and as I climbed on the bike, I looked back. They went a half mile down the road and made a u-turn. I had the bike started and as they came back, I left. I don't think they followed as I didn't see them again. If they were wolves looking for an opportunity, and I would have been broken down, I would have been helpless. It could be they were just a few nice fellas, intent on being good samaritans instead of shitbirds looking for nefarious activity to pursue, and maybe my imagination got ahead of me.
At Magnolia, the sun was starting to fall. The sun had been in my eyes the entire trip through Arkansas so I knew it was going to be sunset while I was on the road. Nowhere to stop in Magnolia, though, so even though I still had 75 miles until Texarkana and it was going to be dark, I kept riding.
As the sun fell, the bugs swarmed. The headlights, signals, mirrors, brake and clutch levers, and most of all, the windshield, were filled with dead bugs. They were splattering on my hands and my legs. When I stopped, my jeans from my knees to my ankles were full of dead bugs. I thought about stopping to clean the windshield but there was no shoulder. Plus it was pitch dark. I was about 15 miles from Texarkana when I ran up against a piece of blown truck tire. Suddenly, it was JUST RIGHT THERE. Dang. Just as my brain told me what it was - and that was after the headlights picked it up but I was doing 60 so I was on it before it registered - it brushed by the front tire and hit the left foot rest and my boot that was hanging off the rest. It was about a foot and a half long and standing on its side - so the width of a truck tire. Scared me but all I could do was keep going. My adrenalin was up after that.
I got to Texarkana on state road 82 and crossed into Texas. At a gas station, I took a picture of the windshield before I cleaned it.
Afterwards, I headed off to look for a hotel. Surprisingly, there were no rooms in the house... No kidding. Everything was full. I climbed on the bike and got on I-30. I was going to stay on 82 but a cop I talked to at the gas station told me Paris, Texas was about an hour and 45 minutes away. On a two lane road. On the interstate, New Boston was only about 20 miles away, still heading west. I got the second to last room at a Holiday Inn Express. The clerk told me they were full up tonight because people couldn't get rooms in Texarkana.
Not sure what I'll do tomorrow. Maybe just stay on I-30 and head for Dallas. It's only two hours away on the interstate. From there, I can get over and take 287 to Amarillo. I'm going to New Mexico from there. We'll see how I feel in the morning.
So that took 13 hours - the tip of Alabama to the western part of Texas. Lots longer than I planned to be riding today but "it be's that way sometimes".
Thanks for reading and posting. More tomorrow.
