Southwest 2021:
Day 22 - Bowling Green


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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, March 9, 2021: There were more leftover kolaches for breakfast. These tasty treats reheated very nicely.
We were off before 7:00 AM, ...
... and heading toward Little Rock.
We arrived at our destination in North Little Rock: The Old Mill in T.R. Pugh Memorial Park. It was closed for another hour but we were able to get some pictures through the gate.
The Old Mill is a replica of an 1880s water-powered grist mill and is famous for being in the opening scenes of "Gone With The Wind." Debbie did her best to crop the above photo as closely as possible ...
... to the scene in the movie. It's only onscreen for a couple of seconds so we can be forgiven for not remembering it. Fortunately, everything is available on YouTube, which is where we got this screenshot.
The park also featured a cool sculpture-like bridge, ...
... and some resident birds.
As we drove away, we passed over the top of the park. When we eventually got back on the freeway, we passed a dead armadillo on the on-ramp. Back when Debbie lived in Texas, dead armadillos were a common thing to see on highways, but we hadn't seen a single one in three weeks of driving in the southwest. Of course, no photographic proof of this exists.
We went to Lonoke next and found this Arkansas Heritage Trail sign for both the Civil War Trail and the Trail of Tears.
We passed the Lonoke County Courthouse and silently pleaded with them to take their Christmas wreaths down.
We were in Lonoke to give The Ocho another badly needed wash. In go the dollar coins, ...
... out come the suds.
Unfortunately, the back door of The Ocho isn't completely watertight against being blasted with a car wash hose, so Tom took some pictures ...
... of the leaky spots for when we took it in for warranty service when we returned.
Back on the highway, we saw a red Thor Sequence but it was too quick to snap a picture. We also saw a couple of cropdusting planes swooping up and down around fields on either side of the highway.
We were grateful when Google Maps directed us to an exit for seemingly no reason until we saw the massive backup of traffic on the interstate parallel to our nice, open frontage road.
Twenty minutes later, we were getting close to the Tennessee border and decided to get an early lunch. We selected Dixie Queen, ...
... a small Memphis-based burger chain.
A Great River Road sign can only mean one thing: ...
... we are getting close to the mighty Mississippi River.
Welcome to Tennessee! This was The Ocho's fifteenth state.
There's the Memphis skyline with Mud Island in the foreground. We had spent time here less than a year and a half ago when the pandemic didn't yet exist.
We passed a Delta Corporation building that resembled the one in our hometown. Before Tom's retirement at the end of 2020, he did a lot of work with Delta.
On our way to Nashville, we crossed over the lovely Tennessee River.
We went to University Motors on the outskirts of Nashville to get a picture of their pink elephant.
We headed to downtown Nashville next, ...
... to see the Tennessee State Capitol.
Tennessee has its own historical markers, and this one discussed the first music published in Nashville in 1824.
There's the Nashville skyline a little closer this time.
All Top Golfs must be photographed. All of them.
It was 3:30 PM when we were greeted by the Welcome to Kentucky sign.
Twenty minutes later, we were pulling in to the Bowling Green KOA Holiday.
It had an adorable camper mounted over its welcome sign.
The park was mostly empty ...
... and we got a nice campsite at the end of a row with a patio area that we didn't use.
Instead of hooking up utilities, we immediately headed back out to the Aviation Heritage Park just up the street.
The park is in the process of building a museum.
This T-38 Talon belonging to NASA was flown by 47 astronauts: every Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo flew this aircraft as part of their proficiency training.
Every aircraft on display was at one time flown by someone with ties to Kentucky. This Lockheed T33 Shooting Star was flown regularly by Air Force General Russell Dougherty, originally from Glasgow, KY, while he served at the Pentagon.
This McDonnell Doughlas F-4D Phantom II was flown in the Vietnam War by Brigadier General Dan Cherry when he shot down a North Vietnamese MiG-21. The North Vietnamese pilot survived the shootdown, and was present 37 years later when Aviation Heritage Park was opened to the public.
This Grumman F9F-5 Panther is shown in Navy Blue Angel colors.
The General Dynamics F-111F Aardvark was one of the first production aircraft with variable-sweep wings and automated terrain-following radar allowing it to fly very low and very fast on bombing runs.
This Sikorsky SH-3H Sea King helicopter completed its service life as an Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) helicopter before being repainted in Marine One livery as a replica of a Sikorsky VH-3D, the official helicopter of the President of the United States.
It was a great visit and it definitely counts as an air and space museum.
In the parking lot, we noticed these really unusual cloud formations. They probably have an official scientific name but they are jellyfish clouds to us.
We headed further down the road to Bojangles for dinner.
Their cheddar biscuits are so incredibly tasty. Great chicken, too.
After sunset, we spent some time in the evening preparing for putting The Ocho into storage the next day.

Day 23 >


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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