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THE DRIVE BACK HOME NEW ORLEANS TO SEATTLE   Monday, October 2, 2023 They love their beef in Nebraska So here we are at Farewell Bend State Park, just north of Ontario, Oregon, with one day to go to get back home. Back in New Orleans, we thought the third leg of our Mississippi River Road trip would take five lengthy days—instead it will take eleven sometimes trying days. Several of the added days are due to avoiding interstates and instead taking the two-lane highways laced with quaint small towns, and following the roadways of our favorite guide book, Road Trips USA . We also took in quite a number of sights along the way and Roger did manage to stop at (quite) a few historical points. The Broken Leaf Spring Another reason for taking longer was a blessedly brief one. As we were driving through Liberal, Kansas, on our way to Dorothy’s (of Wizard of Oz fame) House, a passing motorist alerted us that we were spewing sparks and smoke from our trailer. Our right leaf spring ...
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  THE BIG MUDDY ST LOUIS TO THE BIG EASY   Saturday, September 23, 2023   Pouring the Itaska water on the banks of the Mississippi Another 1,204 road miles and we have now just finished driving the Great River Road from Lake Itaska to the end of the road at Venice, Louisiana. We properly celebrated by pouring a cupful of Lake Itaska water into the bottom of the Mississippi River and by having a seafood lunch of fried shrimp and seafood gumbo. Lynne was OK with the lunch, but said the water thing was a waste of time—eventually the water would have made it the Gulf of Mexico on its own, by gravity. Oh well---it’s the thought that counts!   Below St Louis, there are two major cities on the river: Memphis and New Orleans. One of our highlights in Memphis was dining at Tops, the yummy BBQ ribs joint recommended by Victor, the manager at the park we used in Memphis. Our other fun highlight was a tour at Sun Records, Lunch at Tops where we got to stand right where ...
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  FROM PUNY TO MIGHTY LAKE ITASCA TO ST LOUIS   Saturday, September 16, 2023 Mississippi Headwaters It has taken us 9 days and 1,428 miles to get us from Lake Itaska to Columbus, Kentucky, starting out where the Mississippi is a teensy creek inches deep and 20’ wide to where it is a river 50’ deep and a mile wide. We followed the Great River Road sign posts, which have kept us off the Interstates (hooray!) and mostly on rural two-lane highways.   After the obligatory photos of standing atop the boulders at the Mississippi Headwaters, we Omnipresent GRR Signage made many well-known and touristy stops and many that were more serendipity. The touristy ones included posing with Paul Bunyan and Babe in Bemidji; seeing the Shot Tower in Dubuque; and doing everything Mark Twain in Hannibal. The serendipity ones were usually those that just happened along the way and included driving through Minnesota’s biggest street fair in Little Falls MN; passing through the pearl ...
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  THE FIRST LEG OF THE TRIANGLE SEATTLE TO LAKE ITASCA   Friday, September 7, 2023   Normal Traffic on the Hi-line To do the Great River Road, it was necessary that we first drive from Seattle to Lake Itasca. This has taken us the past 5 days and 1,608 miles, but here we are--tonight camped out 100 yards from the east entrance of Itaska State Park and ready to see Mile Zero of the Mississippi River first thing tomorrow.   Our first night on the road took us to Uniontown (near Pullman) to visit our nephew Chris and his family. From there, we angled north and west to Havre, Montana, traveling a lonely stretch in Idaho (100 miles of wilderness), and then via Missoula and Great Falls. Once at Havre, we were on the Hi-line, 1890 North Dakota Cabin  aka US 2—a TRULY lonely stretch of highway! This is Montana’s most northerly highway, and traffic consists of seeing another vehicle between you and the horizon. It is Big Sky Country at its finest.   A...
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  GETTING READY TO DO THE GRR* *Great River Road Sunday, September 3, 2023   Wylie at Mile Zero They say that travels consist of three roughly equal parts: Preparation, Travel, and Reminiscing. If so, we are nearly done with stage one, as we are scheduled to hitch up our travel trailer and head east in 24 hours. The Nissan is stuffed with our folding bicycles, two kayaks, a couple camp chairs, and the Honda generator. Meanwhile the trailer has received its first allotment of dry goods and clothing. Today we added the refrigerated items and then all the other things we have forgotten until now. Whew!   All of this began six months ago with a conversation on the dock with our good yacht Guidebooks and Maps club friends, Mark and Peg Cheirrett. They glowingly told us of their trip down the Mississippi River Road last summer. They took a month in their RV to travel out to the Mississippi River headwaters at Lake Itasca, down the Mississippi to New Orleans and then back home ...
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