Southwest 2021:
Day 1 - Missouri


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Southwest 2021: [Day 1 - Missouri] [Day 2 - Kansas] [Day 3 - Kansas] [Day 4 - Ft. Collins] [Day 5 - Perry] [Day 6 - Salt Lake City] [Day 7 - Salt Lake City] [Day 8 - Salt Lake City] [Day 9 - Goblin Valley] [Day 10 - Torrey] [Day 11 - Kodachrome Basin] [Day 12 - Coral Pink Sand Dunes] [Day 13 - Lees Ferry] [Day 14 - Grand Canyon] [Day 15 - Grand Canyon] [Day 16 - Lyman Lake] [Day 17 - Carlsbad] [Day 18 - Davis Mountains] [Day 19 - Marathon] [Day 20 - Arlington] [Day 21 - Hot Springs] [Day 22 - Bowling Green] [Day 23 - Heading Home]

Tuesday, February 16, 2021: After a heavy snowfall the night before, we left home around 7:00 AM. We had just hired a snow removal service the week before and they had come by at 4:00 AM and cleared our driveway and walkway, so it was easy to get out of our garage.
The roads were still covered with snow so it took longer than usual to get to our RV storage facility. We were happy to see that the road to get in was plowed and that we were able to get to our little class B RV.
We got last minute items and all of our food and beverages transferred over from our van. We brought bell peppers, a dragonfruit, grapes, ...
... mandarin oranges, apples, ...
... and a fridge full of food and beverages, ...
... including a freezer stuffed with ice, frozen milk, and cooked ham, chicken, and turkey.
Tom put snow chains on The Ocho and we were ready to go by 8:45 AM. Our mileage was just over 4000.
And we're off!
We made it approximately 15 minutes before we got off the freeway and removed the beautiful snow chains.
It was a good training exercise in how to use them, but we decided that they weren't necessary ...
... for the current road conditions.
We had just seen this sign a couple of weeks earlier when we had returned from our last trip to South Padre Island. This time, we were saying goodbye to Indy.
Tom makes a very handsome chauffeur.
The storm the night before had been very hazardous for truckers and continued to be.
With bitterly cold temperatures, Tom was determined to keep our little RV's gas tank always at least half filled. At each fill up, he washed all of the front and side windows.
Welcome to Illinois! The Ocho had already been here on our way to Texas so it wasn't a new state.
We saw lots of smaller cars in the ditch and/or abandoned in the snow, but it was the truck accidents that really caught our eye.
Oooof. Wonder what's inside those boxes and whether or not they'll get delivered.
Wrecking crews were busy pulling the trucks back onto the road.
This one is all hooked up and getting ready to be pulled.
About an hour away from St. Louis, we passed this miniature version of its famous Gateway Arch.
This is the Chain of Rocks Canal, running roughly parallel to ...
... the mighty Mississippi.
Issouri Welcomes You. Sometimes, Debbie is a little slow with the camera.
We saw two different billboards with the message "Senator Josh Hawley must resign" on them. This isn't one, but the one on the other side was, and we didn't get a photo of it.
Here are some cool icicles along the road to Jefferson City, ...
... the capital of Missouri. Here is its beautiful capitol building.
At 4:00 PM, Debbie had a happy hour date with some friends, so she moved to the dinette area to take the call.
We brought along a couple of Elmaro Winery samples, so that's what Debbie drank with her friends.
It's always fun to see friends, even if it is a virtual gathering in a moving vehicle.
We've learned that there are approximately one million national things - parks, monuments, forests, etc. This area is Freedom's Frontier National Heritage Site. What a cool country we live in.
It was after 5:30 when we arrived at Knob Noster State Park, our destination for the evening.
However, we took one look at the deep snow and the hills and realized that we would never be able to get out if we entered.
So we kept on driving until we found a place to turn around.
This gave us the opportunity to see this white plane on display at ...
... Whiteman Air Force Base.
It was only 3 degrees after the sun went down, so we were in a hurry to get to our backup destination, ...
... the Concordia west-bound rest area on I-70. An owl flew across the road and we passed a field of deer as we were driving the backroads to get there.
We found a lovely place to park near the exit and fired up our generator, our space heater, and our Truma heater to battle the bitter cold.
We made a quick dinner of hot dogs, plus chips and salsa, before heading to bed, where we slept in our fleece jackets and hats for added warmth and were quite comfortable.

Day 2 >


Southwest 2021: [Day 1 - Missouri] [Day 2 - Kansas] [Day 3 - Kansas] [Day 4 - Ft. Collins] [Day 5 - Perry] [Day 6 - Salt Lake City] [Day 7 - Salt Lake City] [Day 8 - Salt Lake City] [Day 9 - Goblin Valley] [Day 10 - Torrey] [Day 11 - Kodachrome Basin] [Day 12 - Coral Pink Sand Dunes] [Day 13 - Lees Ferry] [Day 14 - Grand Canyon] [Day 15 - Grand Canyon] [Day 16 - Lyman Lake] [Day 17 - Carlsbad] [Day 18 - Davis Mountains] [Day 19 - Marathon] [Day 20 - Arlington] [Day 21 - Hot Springs] [Day 22 - Bowling Green] [Day 23 - Heading Home]

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