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| This shows why I may have been laying awake in Little Rock, Arkansas at 4:51 am! |
It's Sunday morning, November 18, 2018. I know that my body is in Nacogdoches, Texas. I'm reasonably sure that what's left of my brain will be arriving soon, especially after getting a good nights sleep last night. We've spent time in five different time zones this week ranging from 15 hours ahead in Seoul to the eastern time zone in the US. It's enough to mess you up for a while.
Since leaving Seoul on Tuesday we've been fairly busy. First, it was visiting with Sarah, Joey and James in the San Francisco area. Fortunately they live in an area that has not been impacted directly by the terrible fires in California. Unfortunately they are living in an area that has been severely impacted by the smoke from the fires. Yesterday, the air quality in their area was listed as the "worst in the world". Having been to both India and China I can tell you first hand that's not a title you want for what is typically a beautiful area. It was somewhat smoky when we were there, but it has apparently gotten a lot worse. Hopefully there will be some relief soon for everyone who has been affected, especially for those who have lost everything.
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| James teaching us how to put together puzzles |
From San Francisco we flew on to Indianapolis to load and move Ben's furniture to Texas. In addition to the time zone changes we encountered a pretty significant temperature change. In some parts of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos the temperatures had been in the 90's with "feels like" temperatures around 100. In Indianapolis the temperature was in the 20's and the "feels like" temperature was...……...cold. At least we didn't sweat as we loaded the rental truck!
Traveling the way we do has helped us sharpen our skills of working together as a team. From navigating our way around, deciding where to go and what to do, to simply making sure we're not leaving anything behind (99.9% of the time this is me). We needed all our teamwork skills to load the 16 foot truck, which was completely full from front to back. Once loaded we hit the road for the thirteen hour drive to Nacogdoches.
We were thankful for clear, sunny skies for the drive and also appreciative that it took us through some scenic areas, especially in Arkansas where the leaves still had some color. Although getting from Indiana to Texas quickly was our goal we did manage a few adventures along the way.
After driving eight hours we arrived in Little Rock, Arkansas. We had never spent any time there previously and were quite impressed with their downtown area along the Arkansas River. There are tons of trails along both sides of the river, a nice River Market section with shops and restaurants and other amenities such as museums, a convention center and a very nice minor league baseball park. After arriving, and at the suggestion of a couple of nice guys working at the hotel we ate at Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken, which was spicy and good enough to qualify as world famous. Before leaving the next morning we enjoyed a nice walk along just a fraction of the miles and miles of connecting trails.
River Market Little Rock
Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken
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| This was on the museum grounds in the River Market area. When we saw it Beth said "that's from South Korea". Sure enough it was donated to the museum by a gentleman from South Korea. It was built in South Korea and transported to Little Rock. |
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| Arkansas River Front-Little Rock |
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| From the other side of the river |
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| Home of the Arkansas Travelers. Minor league affiliate of the Seattle Mariners. |
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A selfie with Little Rock's most famous former resident...….William Jefferson Clinton! Actually there were tons of bronze statues along the river front...….we thought this one was appropriate for the season. Happy Thanksgiving!
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Thanks to my trusty Texas Monthly Bar-B-Que finder app we ended up at Joseph's Riverport Barbecue in Jefferson for lunch. It was listed in the Texas Monthly Top 50, which is no small accomplishment when it comes to bar-b-que. It certainly lived up to expectations with moist, perfectly cooked brisket and spicy sausage in a crisp casing. Just writing about it makes my mouth water! We knew we'd be getting some good food, what was totally unexpected was the city of Jefferson. It was a small historic town that at one point, thanks to traffic along the river that runs through it, was the sixth largest town in Texas. That was in the mid-1800's. The riverboat traffic is gone but what remains is a really cool little downtown, tree lined streets with well kept homes and a few bed and breakfast places. It's only about an hour and a half north of Nacogdoches and someplace we look forward to visiting again in the future.
Jefferson, Tx
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| Riverport Bar-B-Que |
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Jefferson Downtown
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| This is the new Science, Technology, Engineering and Math building on the SFA Campus. The pod inside is a planetarium. It's an impressive building. Ben treated us to a show at the planetarium. Space is both interesting and confusing! |
We made it to Nacogdoches around 3:15. It was good to see this nice little college town again. Thanks to two young healthy men (Ben and his friend Chris who was a roommate back in the college days) we had the truck unloaded in about an hour. Chris, his wife and two children live here and have been kind enough to let Ben stay with them until he finds a place. It's good to have friends. It's good to have arrived safely and it's going to be good when our brains and bodies reconnect completely!
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A Sunday afternoon walk on the Lanana Creek Trail
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