The Road Home 2015 - West Memphis to Sevierville, TN

Did it ever rain in West Memphis on 4/13! It was so bad, we actually got a flash flood warning on iPhone. To make matters worse, about 9:00 we heard some noise outside and it was our neighbors hooking up and leaving. Definitely not a good sign. I looked around and the river did not appear to be rising and nobody else was apparently leaving, so we decided to tough it out. Besides - where were we going to go? Well, we made it through the night, despite all the rain. Reports had as much as 4" falling in our immediate area and while there were definitely some flooded areas near us, we were ok.

Our spot- nice long pull throughs

We got up to the sounds of a pair of Killdear outside our trailer and a barge heading upstream. Got ready to head out.

How they could push that volume against that current and still control everything. Unbelievable!

As we were getting ready to head out we made a change in plans. Instead of driving from West Memphis and staying over for the night in the Nashville area we decided to drive straight through to Sevierville, a trip of just around 435 miles. We got an early start and the plan was to break up the driving - every 2 hrs or so, make a rest area stop. Stay awake and alert being the plan.

First Rest Stop of the day- about 138 miles in to the days trip

Nice clean rest area

And perks for the Troopers. Assigned parking right up front.

Traveling we noted:  Tennessee is bright and green. Most of the trees are leaved out. The Dogwood & Redbud are in bloom. White Narcissus dot the highway banks. In the Smokey Mtns the yellow dandelions are visited by bumblebees. And Robins are everywhere. Beautiful hillside fields are populated with black angus beef cattle.

As we approached Nashville we started seeing I 40 road signs that were kind of different and neat:

"Exit to text it"

"Buckleup Buttercup, arrive alive"----this one appeared about every 2-3 miles or so all the way through Nashville.

Not too bad getting through Nashville, although heavy traffic is not one of my favorite things. But we made it. Mary was glad she wasn't driving.  Knoxville was a little more of the same. Trying at times. You just never know with the crazy drivers on the road these days and especially watching these fools that are always in a hurry. For us, traveling eastbound on I 40 was a good thing today. We did not experience one slowdown or backup all day. Not so for those heading westbound as we counted at least 3 major traffic jams where traffic was backed up for miles and barely moving. And then we cleared Knoxville and took the exit for Sevierville and soon we were checking in at River Plantation RV Resort. And then we were setting up at our site.

First try - after a long day of driving

Re-positioned next day.

Beautiful park. Pretty much full. Had a visitor right after we managed to get settled and unhooked. Big Class A at end of our row were from VT, East Burke. She had to come down and say hello. She and her husband were on their way back to Vt from Florida and this was a stop they made every year. Enjoyable talking with her- they too were worried about mud season. Time for a good nights sleep - after a cold beer. Or two. Definitely a long day. A good nights sleep is in order. Tomorrow we are off to Walmart for some supplies before getting things kicked off with Happy Hour with SKPACRE group.