Tuesday 5-3 Homeward Bound

 

Overcast Day

Today we started out with fog. It continued being overcast all day. We had no rain.

Yesterday it rained the majority of the day, it also rained early this morning. It stopped about 6:00 am. The weather forecast indicated no rain today and then two more days of solid rain. With all the rain we could not hike the trails so we decided to head towards Texas.

I woke up about 7:00 am. We had a quick breakfast and then we got the Minnie ready to go. We were on the road by 8:00 am. 

Today was a long driving day, we drove about 400 miles. We started at Roaring River State Park in Missouri and ended at a Walmart outside of Dallas in Waxahachie, Texas. We weren't in Missouri for long, it was about 27 miles from Roaring River to Rogers, Arkansas. From there we drove 258 miles to Durant, Oklahoma. Then we continued another 129 miles to Dallas, Texas.

The route we took was a combination of two and four lane highways. At the beginning of our drive Larry had to drive through fog. At times it was very thick.When we got to Rogers we stopped and filled the Minnie with gas. Larry remembered there was a Red Barn Donuts in Rogers. We stopped and bought donuts.  Between Rogers and Fort Smith we drove through the Bobby Hopper Tunnel. This was so cool. We drove through a lot of small towns and saw a lot of ranches with cattle and horses. It was a beautiful drive because everything was so green. A couple of weeks ago the trees hadn't gotten their new leaves yet but today they had them.

 Entering into the tunnel

A truck in the middle of the tunnel

 

At the end of tunnel

About 12:00 we stopped and I made sandwiches for lunch. Larry thought I would like to do a little gambling, I hadn't been to a casino for almost 2 and a half years. When we got to Durant Oklahoma we stopped at the Choctaw Casino. There was a lot of construction going on. They were tearing down the old motel so they could build a bigger one. They also had added on another casino that was totally non-smoking. I entered at the main entrance to the casino and I asked about the non-smoking area. I was told I had to walk all the way to the end. As I walked through the other casinos I noticed it didn't smell of smoke. I thought that the non-smoking casino was going to be a room but actually it was a complete casino. I spent a couple of hours playing and had a great time.

While I played Larry looked for places to stop for the night. The weather forecast for this area indicated rain starting early tomorrow continuing through Thursday. Rather than drive in the rain tomorrow or sit in the rain at a campground for two days Larry decided to continue on to the Dallas area where it was not suppose to rain tomorrow. When I got back to the Minnie we had sandwiches for dinner and then headed on south. Larry thought we might stay at a Crackle Barrel in Dallas. 

 

Larry drove another two hours, much of it was through Dallas traffic. It was very busy. Once we found the Crackle Barrel we parked the Minnie. A little later I went over and bought a strawberry shortcake & ice cream for dessert. 

After dessert I went outside and did some of my steps. I ended up doing 10,000 steps, which put me in 10th place. I'm behind on my weekly goal by 20,000 steps and I probably won't meet my weekly goal. But that's ok. 

After doing my steps I played my games. I did the Event: Hard Road Mini of 5 games. It took me 41 minutes and 37 seconds, which put me in 15th place in my group. I did my Daily Challenges before I went to bed.

Larry went to bed about 10:30 and said the traffic from the interstate was so noisy that I would not be able to sleep, I'm a very lite sleeper. So we moved to a Walmart, that was further off the interstate. It should be quieter. 

We had a very good day.