Sometimes you have to go back before you can go forward

Today: Richland Hills, TX to Memphis, TN

We're off to complete our route 66 journey this year. Last year, we went from Oklahoma City, OK to Santa Monica, CA. This year, we're shooting to go from Chicago, IL to Oklahoma City, OK. According to popular sentiment (and our Route 66 guide book), Route 66 was originally created to handle the flow of people from East to West, so in keeping with that tradition, we're taking the Interstates north and Route 66 on the way back toward home.

This makes our trip (and our blog) almost backward from last year - all of the cool old things come later and all of the long, non-stop driving hours are at the beginning of the trip. Ick. I'll be glad to get this out of the way. Don't get me wrong - I love driving, but all day on the Interstate is not what I consider vacation.

Now - on with the good parts of yesterday:

We left home later rather than early to try to miss the traffic in Dallas and to give us more time to pack up. After a stop for Breakfast and Gas ($3.89/gal), we hit the road and only stopped for ice and lunch. We made our lunch in Texarkana and kept on going. The state sign welcoming us to Arkansas was over the Interstate, so this was the best we could manage.



A couple more hours of driving, and we made it to Little Rock. We stopped in at the Museum of Discovery in Little Rock. It's in the Farmer's Market District. Melissa said that it reminds her of the Dallas West End. There was a Juneteenth celebration going on, so there were many people and not very many parking places.

We enjoyed the museum, even if we only got about an hour there before they closed:


After the museum, we filled up again ($3.85/gal), got some Subway for dinner, and kept on goin'. We did see some interesting crops and sights that are different from home along the Interstate:


We made it to Memphis, TN (the state welcome sign for TN was over the river) and navigated around the crazy drivers to our hotel. The Drury Inn is super-nice (good job, Melissa!) and the kids and I got to go swimming. We're here in Memphis all day Saturday, and spend the night at the Drury again until we check out Sunday morning.