And then there was RAIN

The drive from Monahans Sandhills was very windy. At one point we heard a loud bang and a flapping noise. It sounded a lot like a flat tire (without the handling problems) but when we stopped to check it out it turned out that the wind had started to unroll the awning. We must have looked hilarious, struggling with the billowing sail trying to get it rolled up again. But we persevered and got it put away. Note to self: always lock the awning mechanism before travelling.

After very large day of 370 miles we rolled into the rollback headquarters of Fort Worth, a Walmart Superstore.  We did a little shopping , found some smoked salmon  (yes, at Walmart, and they had capers too). We had lox on a bagel for dinner, one of my favorite meals.  All your basic  food groups….except bacon……hmmmmm. 

We stayed the night after getting the nod from the Walmart security guy. Always nice to know someone is looking out for you while you sleep.

It had been 25 days since we started our trip (not counting Toronto to Austin) and we had not seen a drop of rain. All good things must come to an end.  This is what I woke up to on Sunday morning and it was minutes away.

I decided we should wait it out and then realized we might be there for days, given the forecast. So we made a run for it.

We had to pass through Dallas, a spider-web of highways, in the driving rain. We left at 7:30 AM wondering if we’d made the right decision. Luckily there is very little traffic because it was Sunday morning. I don’t know if Dallas just has poor drainage or if this was an unusual amount of rain, but by 8:00 the underpasses were starting to fill with water, causing traffic to slow, or stop. We used Google maps with the traffic enabled to see where the worst places were, and took alternate highways to avoid the tie-ups. Since the rain had just started and was forecast to get worse through the day, a flooded underpass could bring us to a halt for hours. It took almost 2 hours to get through Dallas. We saw numerous accidents where a car or truck had hit deep water and lost control. The unit, weighing 29,000 pounds handled the puddles nicely, but we really had to slow down for some of the deeper ones.

Tonight  is our second night in a beautiful State Park in Oklahoma. Arrowhead State Park.  It’s just outside the town of “Canadian, OK”.  (OK, aye) I’m sitting under the awning and its raining.  It’s cool and damp but toasty here, thanks to our recently acquired Propane Campfire.  I never thought I would give in to the convenience of something like this over the real thing, but this thing rocks! Hook it up to the 20 pounder and “click”.... Campfire!  And, you can use it during a campfire ban (which is about all of Texas right now, maybe not so much here).

One more day here and then …..Branson. I’m not too sure what to expect here but “tourist trap” would be at the top of the list. But if we don’t go there, we’ll never know.