Marypat turned 70 in June and when asked if she wanted to do something special to celebrate the start of her new decade of life, she announced that she would like to take an extended fall vagabond with our little T@B trailer, and concentrate our time in the deep south. “I’ve never spent any real time down there,” she said. “I want to explore it.”
To tell the truth, I was skeptical. I hadn’t spent much time in the southeastern US either, and in lots of ways it almost felt like a foreign country – food, culture, accent, religion – all kind of foreign feeling, maybe not in a good way. And I admit to having a store of preconceived notions about the south, built out of a lifetime of hearing about civil rights protests, KKK atrocities, miscarriages of justice, and both religion and conservative politics on steroids. Beyond that, I wondered about the wisdom of gallivanting around the south in the heart of hurricane season. I mean, what could go wrong with that?? Never mind the normal conditions of heat and humidity common to that region that gave me pause.
Anyway, for much of the year we noodled around a variety of itineraries, possible destinations, people to visit, and tried to put together a coherent plan. It didn’t come together. In the end, we had a few commitments, a handful of people to visit, a bunch of maps, and a vague sequence of geography, but the rest would or would not fall into place as we went.
So now we’re back. I can report that it did manage to fall into place. It’s almost mid-November and we pulled off a two month road trip that met the bar for Marypat, and managed to surprise me (in a good way).
SOME VAGABOND STATS:
- from door to door, we were out 59 days;
- 16 states, several more than once, as follows: WY, CO, NM, TX, LA, MS, AL, FL, GA, NC, TN, KY, IL, MO, KS, NE;
- no fender-benders, parking tickets, fines, or mechanical issues;
- one 5 lb. propane bottle for heat and cooking, with plenty left over;
- paid nights camping 29 – these ranged from FS campsites that with our Senior Pass cost us $2.50, to RV campgrounds and well-appointed state parks (shower, elec. hookup, laundry) from $20-50;
- free nights 29 – dispersed spots of various stripes, staying with friends/family, and free campsites;
- fewer than a dozen meals out;
- altitude range: from below sea level (New Orleans) to 14,200′ (Mt. Yale, Colo.);
- state high points: Mt. Wheeler (NM), Kuwohi (TN) (formerly Clingmans Dome), Taum Sauk Mtn. (MO);
- river time: Arkansas River between Buena Vista and Salida, CO; Current River, MO;
- weather: remarkably good – three or four showery days, some rain at night or while driving, but essentially no weather-bound days, and the hurricanes this season stayed out in the Atlantic and didn’t even peripherally effect us. Heat and humidity didn’t bear down on us except for a couple of days in eastern Texas and around New Orleans.
- notable wildlife sightings: javelina, armadillo, alligator, desert bighorn, limpkin, manatee, scissor-tailed flycatcher, pileated woodpecker, diamond-backed rattlesnake . . .
RANDOM AND UNSCIENTIFIC IMPRESSIONS:
- the south has more churches than you can shake a finger at;
- from Texas east there’s a lot of “y’all”, “yes sir/maam” and “have a blessed day”;
- the southern accents weren’t over the top, with the exception of “boiled peanuts” which in a southern drawl sounds a whole lot like “bull penis” – just sayin’;
- more people than I expected camping in tents, even in poor weather;
- some folks idea of camping involves golf carts for trips to the bathroom and watching football by a campfire on a television mounted on the side of your monstrous rig;
- Dollar General is the most ubiquitous grocery store throughout the south, combined with corner convenience stores in what often felt like food deserts;
- the south is like anywhere else – mostly nice, friendly, helpful folks – and quite a range of economic status, from ostentatious wealth to abject poverty;
- pit bulls and their ilk are very common;
- everyplace, from Mississippi to Nebraska, has stuff worth checking out . . .
SOME TAKE-AWAYS:
- start out with a sack of quarters to handle laundry stops;
- sprinkle in visits with friends/family but limit them to 1-2 nights – enough to catch up and get a sense for their scene, but not overstaying;
- 2-3 nights seems like a good length stay in most places – you get in a couple of hikes and sights and then move on;
- solicit and pay attention to local intel/tips – they lead to off-the-radar gems. In our case suggestions from locals led to really stellar campsites, dispersed camping in spectacular and unvisited terrain, under-appreciated points of interest and quirky highlights. Some of the more notable suggestions on our trip led us to places like: a campsite overlooking the Rio Grande gorge in northern NM; San Lorenzo Canyon in central NM; Sitting Bull Falls in southern NM; an amazing desert botanical garden outside of Ft. Davis, TX; Balmorrhea St. Park in west TX; Manatee Springs, FL; a seafood festival in Cedar Key, FL; a couple of scenic train rides (Pikes Peak, CO and Blue Ridge, GA); Bankhead National Forest, AL; Carhenge, NE, and more;
- take paper maps and study them, along with the Gaia app to discover out of the way trails and cool stuff. Our map/screen study revealed such highlights as the Blue Ridge Scenic Parkway, the Natchez Trace Scenic Parkway, Meriweather Lewis’ gravesite, Natural Bridge, AL (longest natural rock bridge east of the Rockies), hikes in the Sipsey River wilderness of Alabama, a charming alley art gallery in Hattiesburg, MS, a Pawnee museum in Kansas, Wichahpi Commemorative Stone Wall near Muscle Shoals, AL, and more;
- the government shutdown during our trip forced us to concentrate more on state parks and features than national parks and federal lands. It was eye-opening. Most states have dozens, even hundreds, of state parks, many with campgrounds with amenities. They are state parks for a reason, are worth exploring, and are usually less crowded and bureaucratic than federal lands/parks;
- being self-contained is key. We always had water jugs filled, ice for the fridge and food for a couple of days, so if we ended up in some remote and dispersed spot for a day or two we had our comfy and fully stocked home base;
- the biggest take-away from our time on the road is that I now understand how people can spend years knocking around the country. We truly only scratched the surface of possibilities. In Florida, for example, we hit maybe five state parks and other venues, but there are more than 100 state parks in that state alone. We only spent two or three days in Mississippi. We had a three-day paddle on the Current River in the Ozarks of Missouri, but there are a dozen river possibilities in that region begging for our attention. You could easily spend a month in most of these states and still not get to the majority of worthy sights. At one point our daughter, Ruby, asked us if we were homesick. Actually, no, not at all. Being on the road is such a different dimension that it takes on a life and immediacy of its own and the rest of existence sort of fades into the background.
All that said, it feels really good to be back. There is something satisfying and grounding in having a home base, a daily routine, family and friends to spend time with, traditions to uphold, events to participate in. We are both looking forward to diving back into that scene and girding up for a winter of skiing and community. But the vagabond life has its compelling elements . . . enough so that this may not be the last road tour for this crew.
