Back to Tennessee

When we left Gouldings Campground in Monument Valley, Utah, it was around 11 am, and we were a little under 1,600 miles from home (Nashville, Tennessee).  As I mentioned in the last post, we had made the decision we would not be stopping to do any more exploring or sightseeing and would just drive as far as Chuck felt like driving every day.

Because we prefer to travel where we have cell service when we are traveling in between overnight stops, we decided to drive further east on Hwy 160 to Hwy 64 and then head south on Hwy 491 in New Mexico down to I-40.  We had traveled on Hwy 491 two years ago when we drove from Cortez, CO, to Williams, Arizona.

We traveled through the wide open spaces of the Navajo reservation.

The roads in New Mexico were a little rougher than in Arizona but we made it fine without any problems.  Chuck could have probably driven further but we decided to stop somewhere near Albuquerque, New Mexico, for the night, since we had gotten up so early for our tour and to see the sunrise at Monument Valley.

After driving, about 350 miles, we stopped at High Desert RV Park which was about 8 miles west of Albuquerque.  We were given a pull-through site but were barely able to fit both the motorhome and the car on the site.  Since we had plenty of water on board, we decided to only hook up the electricity. We were both pretty tired and were in bed a little after 9.

We left Albuquerque around 7:30 Saturday morning, and continued heading east on I-40.  As we drove through Albuquerque, we could see a couple of hot air balloons in the sky and a few more lifting off from the ground.  Albuquerque, of course, is known for its annual hot air balloon festival in October.  That would be a cool thing to see!  :)

Scattered thunderstorms were predicted for just about everywhere between New Mexico and Tennessee but, based on the weather forecasts, we felt like the further east we could get, the more likely we could avoid severe weather.  I kept my eye on the radar and would see storms along our way but thankfully, we only traveled through just a few sprinkles.

After we passed Amarillo, Texas, we could see the results of some recent rains by all the water lying in temporary lakes along both sides of the I-40.

We wondered if this water tower had begun to tilt because of all the rains.

Many of the rivers and streams that we could see from I-40 were full and sometimes overflowing their banks all the way from Texas to Arkansas.

We continued on into Oklahoma and on through Oklahoma City.  Since it was a Saturday, the traffic was not bad at all.

We passed under the Skydance Pedestrian Bridge that serves as a pedestrian connection between downtown Oklahoma City and the growing Oklahoma River area.

The design is said to be inspired by the "sky dance" of the scissor-tailed flycatcher, Oklahoma's state bird.  Below is a picture of the scissor-tailed flycatcher I found on the internet.  Hmmm.  I guess I see a similarity.  :)

We also passed by Tinker Air Force Base that has a museum of old airplanes including an old Air Force One on display.

Chuck is a real road warrior and he probably could have kept driving further but we wanted to stop before it began to get dark plus the skies were looking pretty nasty.

After driving a over 650 miles, we stopped at Checotah/Lake Eufaula KOA.

We pulled into a very wet grassy site but were able to hook up everything (water, electric and sewer) without disconnecting the car.

On Sunday morning, we again left around 7:30 or so and drove through the rest of Oklahoma, all the way through Arkansas, and on into Tennessee.  We began hearing the squealing noise from the motor off and on like what we had heard last year when we came back from North Carolina.  We could really hear it going through Memphis and we don't know if it was because of all the concrete or what but all I know is that we didn't like what we were hearing!

We considered driving all the way to Nashville but with the Country Music Festival finishing up on Sunday, all the campgrounds were full.  Jellystone, where we normally stay, had one site left at $80 per night!  I called Loretta Lynn's Ranch Campground in Hurricane Mills, Tennessee, which is about 90 miles west of Nashville, and they said that all of the "weekend crowds" were gone and they had plenty of sites available.

Loretta Lynn's is located about 8 miles off the interstate which is further than we typically like to go when we are just looking for an overnight stop; but we have not been able to find any good campgrounds between Memphis and Nashville when traveling through here in the past.  When I went into the office to check in, it was kind of nice hearing the girl's Tennessee Twang.  :)

We left the car hooked up and drove to the sites recommended and barely were able to get into Site #18.  The setting is very nice with lots of shade but if we had needed to pull the coach any further on to the site, we would have had some leveling issues.  After driving a little over 500 miles today, we were all set up on our site a little after 5 and we even got to sit outside for a little while.

Around 7 pm, we began hearing a man playing music on a guitar and we walked across the road to the campground's common area and enjoyed listening to some very good singing and guitar-playing.  He played country, rock and even a little blues.  He was so good that the campers listening convinced him to play another couple of hours.  What a great way to end our day and be welcomed back to Tennessee!  :)

On Monday, we slept a little later because we were going to take the motorhome straight to Cummins and see if and when they could look at the motor.  We arrived at Cummins in Nashville around 10:30 and they said they could look at it within an hour or so.  We pulled around back and waited with the generator on so we could run the air conditioners to keep us cool.  We are definitely back in Tennessee.  90 degrees with 90+ % humidity!  I think I like dry heat better.  :)

The technician hooked up their computer to run engine diagnostics and after a visual inspection of the motor, he found soot around the exhaust manifold where a nut had backed off of a bolt.  Actually, there were a couple of nuts missing.  He said he thought that if he just put the nuts back on that would probably take care of our problem.  He also told us that if that doesn't fix it, we can bring it back after we get back from Fall Creek Falls and the parts would be covered under warranty if it was a leaky gasket again.  They did all of this at no charge!  WOW!!!!!  We went inside to the office to personally thank the service manager before we left!  :)

We arrived at Nashville Jellystone around 2 pm and although they said they had plenty of sites, they had a little difficulty finding us a site that we could stay on through the week, have full hookups including 50 amp and be able to get out with satellite.  We finally ended up on site #427 and really like the site but it is normally $10 more a night because it is an extended pull-through so I don't know if we'll get to be on this site in the future.

We went over to my mom's Monday evening who was very glad to see us and we were VERY glad to see her too!  We went to dinner at Painturo's, one of our favorite pizza places, and then washed and dried three loads of laundry at her place that evening.  We spent the rest of the week running errands everywhere, getting stocked up on groceries for our two weeks at Fall Creek Falls, and spending the evenings enjoying being with my mom and watching the College World Series. And, As you can tell, I have also (finally) been able to get caught up on the blog again!  :)

Since leaving Nashville on April 8, we have driven over 6,000 miles in the motorhome and have had so much fun traveling with Ken and Bonnie and seeing and doing so many incredible things with them.  We still can't believe we hiked to the top of Angel's Landing!  :)  Thankfully, it sounds like Bonnie's dad is doing better and we hope and pray he continues to improve.  Ken and Bonnie, we miss you and can't wait to start out on our next adventure together!