Our Travels from Bowing Green to Tucumcari, NM

We left Bowling Green KY on April 15th and headed to Memphis Tennessee staying at Tom Sawyer RV Park on the Mississippi River. That river is big, I mean really big & the water flows really fast, and it has a lot of barge traffic. We stayed here two nights visiting the Bass Pros Shops pyramid and Charlie Vergos’ Rendezvous bar-b-q shop in Memphis. It has been raining for a few days and the sky is gloomy and the ground saturated. Can’t wait for some sun-shine.

I have always wanted to visit the pyramid but after seeing it it was not that big of a deal. It is big but it is just like any other Bass Pro Shops store. Lots of expensive stuff and we did not buy a thing. Charlie’s was great. Anytime you can get bar-b-q in an alley in Memphis you know it will be good.

We left Memphis on April 17th (Sunday) and headed to Ozark AR. We were going to stay at a Corps of Engineers park but due to our delayed departure from Bowling Green we had to change. So we stayed at Grape Country’s RV Park in the middle of Arkansas wine country. The park only has eight sites, all gravel, full hook ups, $30 a night, and the owner came and met up after we pulled in. The park stays booked throughout the year. Great place for a night or two. We will be leaving tomorrow heading to our next stop in Weatherford Oklahoma for a couple of days. It is suppose to be really windy… will have to just drive slower than normal if needed but the temp is to be in the 90’s.

Well the drive from Ozark AR to Weatherford OK was windy. The truck and camper did fine, just have to pay a little closer attention to driving. I was tired when we got to the campground. The campground is very nice. All concrete pads and blacktop drives. Its about 2/3 full, mostly full time folks… construction workers installing the wind turbines around the area.

We had some time to eat lunch at the famous Lucille’s Roadhouse and visit the Route 66 Museum in Clinton OK. The Route 66 stuff is fun, also known as the Will Rogers Highway, or Mainstreet America, or the Mother Road. The highway was established in 1926 and stretched from Chicago to California and is one of the most famous highways ever (2448 miles). There will be more Route 66 stuff as we head to California.

Its still windy today (4/20/22 – Wednesday) but is to calm down some tomorrow when we make our way to Tucumcari New Mexico. The high today was 92… hot.

We arrived at Tucumcari NM around 2pm, not too windy today. Flat roads and not much traffic on I-40 so set the cruise (which I hardly ever do) and sailed down the highway at 65mph. The country is forbidding. Its hot, its windy, its dry, its full of wind turbines, and its barren. No homes to see, no fields of crops, maybe every once in a while you might see some cattle or horses. BUT… it is beautiful.

While getting ready to leave Weatherford OK we noticed another couple with a Grand Design 5th Wheel getting ready to leave as well. After about 100 miles we stopped at a rest area and they pulled in a few minuets after us. The man came over and asked us about our fuel mileage. I told him we normally get 11 mpg but this morning it was more like 9. He said he was getting similar but thought something other than the head-wind was causing it. He had an infrared thermometer out checking the temp’s on his hubs. He didn’t say much more, they hopped in their truck and left. We had lunch then left the rest area. About 10 miles down the road there they were on the side of the interstate. Looked like a flat. Made me nervous… we have not had any flats or other issues so far… but that could have been us.

We were going to leave on Saturday the 23rd but the wind on Friday and Saturday was constant at 20-30mph with gusts higher, so we added a day at Tucumcari and removed a day at Albuquerque – went from 7 to 6 days. So we will leave on Sunday April 24th when the wind quiets down. Lots of dust… going to have to really clean the camper. Also, numerous wild fires in the area and Arizona & Nevada. During a normal TV News Cast you might have news, weather, and sports. But here you also have a time slot dedicated to wild fires and evacuations.

The “Blaze-In-Saddle campground is nice and not much $$ for a FHU site. Gravel park, most are in this part of the Country, using small square poles and plastic chains to mark individual sites. The town of Tucumcari is about 5,000, it has a few museums, some Route 66 stuff, lots of murals, and a few local places to eat.

About a year back we ordered the Starlink Satellite dish kit. Eight months later and they shipped it… while we were at Gulf Shores. Took it with us when we traveled back to Bowling Green and activated it. In the beginning they said it would only work at your home address, well since then they have opened it up where it will work just about anywhere else. The Starlink program is a Elon Musk initiative where he sends a rocket full of Starlink Satellites (50) up into our orbit about once a week. You may have seen one of the liftoffs on the news. These satellites allow us to get internet just about anywhere. The only limitation are trees. You must have a clear view to the sky. All we have to do is put up the antenna and plug in the router… that’s it. In about 5-min we have internet. Here is our setup.

Heading to Albuquerque in the morning… see you later.