Thursday, June 26, 2008

Day 3

June 26, 2008

Today’s voyage started in Joplin, Missouri and went through Oklahoma, including Tulsa and Oklahoma City, through the panhandle of Texas and Amarillo, and into New Mexico, ending at Tucumcari, New Mexico. I had never heard of Tucumcari before (though Mark tells me it’s in an early 70s country rock song called “Willin’”), and I didn’t pick it for any reason other than the fact that there was a KOA there and it was about 1/3 of the distance from West Lafayette, Indiana to Gilbert Arizona , and I divided that distance up into 3 more or less equal parts. Today was the longest of those three parts, at 586 miles. (Though tomorrow is 585 miles -- I did a good job dividing the trip up into equal parts!)

The truck driver transporting our cars to Arizona called yesterday, and he’ll be delivering the two to our house in Arizona today. Joby, the realtor who leased the house to us, was kind enough to offer to meet the truck and receive the cars. So that will be nice to arrive and already have our cars.

Today’s drive was every bit as long as yesterday’s. But in some ways it seemed longer. For most of Oklahoma and all of the Texas panhandle, the scenery was so boring. Just endless miles of nothing. No hills, no trees, very infrequent towns. You could look out either side of the vehicle and see clear to the horizon. I can see why people used to think the world was flat.

For much of the drive it was very windy. And it was a cross-wind, coming from the south and blowing everything northward. It was one of those places where the scrub trees grow at a permanently bent- over angle, from the constant blowing of the wind. They looked like stooped old men. One cool thing about the wind and the landscape – we did see a number of “wind farms” where there were literally hundreds of windmills. And they were not the old-fashioned kind you think of on postcards and in movies. These were the modern ones – big, tall, silver, with only 3 blades on them. And they were spinning fast. It made me curious how wind power is actually converted into electricity.

And why don’t they have wind powered vehicles?? Driving so long in the strong cross-winds was very hard on the gas mileage, even harder than the hills in Missouri. This last tank of gas we only got 5.68 mpg. Wow. The cheapest gas we’ve gotten was $3.64 a gallon and the most expensive was $4.09. So it’s pretty damned expensive to drive an RV across the country!

As we crossed into New Mexico, the landscape started to change. You can see small mountains and mesas in the distance. Lots of red clay earth. But still very windy. In fact, as I sit in the RV writing this post, the wind is rocking the vehicle back and forth. I hope I can sleep! I’ll have to pretend it’s like a cradle rocking.

Josie ate dinner eagerly, after dumping out her breakfast with disdain. Frinka still seems a bit reluctant to eat. He meowed for his wet food (a special Science Diet for cats with kidney trouble), but when I gave him some, he sniffed it, took a bite or two, and walked away. I’ll try again later, maybe with a fresh can of food.

The other two cats seem to be doing well. Mistey has calmed down a lot and is no longer trying to escape out the front windshield. At first, she seemed to think that was a way out of the Ark and would try to climb over Mark and me to get to the windshield. And she howled and howled and tried to hide under anything she could find. But today she was out, just lying like a cat in the middle of the RV floor, not howling, not clawing her way to the windshield. Just cat-napping like cats do. So I guess she’s adapting. We’re still careful when we open the RV’s cabin door to make sure she is locked in the bathroom first, just in case she has any ideas of escaping from the Ark.

The human passengers on the Ark seem a little tired and cranky, but holding up pretty well. One more long day of driving and we’ll be at our new home. And tomorrow’s drive should be more interesting than today’s, as we cross through New Mexico and into Arizona. It looks like we should have some nice views as we head southwest in Arizona towards Gilbert.

I am a little worried about the route Mapquest suggested, as it is on secondary roads quite a bit in Arizona. The route is definitely shorter than it would be if we went all the way to Flagstaff on I-40 and then headed south into Phoenix on I-17. I think I’ll look around on the internet and try to get a sense of the routing options. I don’t want to be driving this big RV on 2-lane, mountainous, windy roads. We’re almost home, so let’s try to get there in one piece.

1 comment:

Leila said...

Ooooh. The route through Snowflake, right? Umm... It's real pretty... did you end up going that way... I suppose I'll find out tonight or tomorrow, but I wish I'd seen this last night, because I would have suggested staying on I40 until Flagstaff.