Onward ==> Mississippi ==> Louisianna

Hi everyone,

On Wednesday we left Decatur AL on schedule, heading west across northern Alabama to catch on with The Natchez Trace Parkway. The scenic parkway runs 444 miles diagonally NE to SW thru Mississippi, actually starting in Nashville TN and ending in Natchez, MS. We jumped on at Cherokee, AL, drove about 4 hours and got off near Jackson, MS, the state capitol.

I hate to say this because we didn’t do the parkway justice by exploring any of it's historic spots, but in my opinion, in terms of scenery, if you’ve seen a few miles of it you’ve seen ‘em all. No disrespect because it is a great drive, well maintained and beautiful territory. And, it has the feel of a private road, manicured landscapes all along and smooth pavement, plus we practically had it all to ourselves yesterday. The speed limit is 50mph throughout, a good thing because it’s a 2 lane bi-directional highway with no paved shoulders. It was a sunny drive today with blue sky and puffy clouds, but very cold to step outside, near 32 degrees.

It was starting to get cloudy when we got off the parkway near Jackson Mississippi. We spent the night in Canton, MS at Movie Town RV Park, a Good Sam Park. It was just freezing here mid-afternoon, and sure enough overnight the pipes (I should say all outside hose fittings) froze solid, so there was no running park water in the am. Our on-board water supply and pump worked great though, so we were OK. It’s good that our on-board fluid tank compartments are warm.

Today’s (Thursday) forecast is for treacherous ice storms ranging from Texas to Tennessee in the afternoon, with 1-3 inches of snow north adjacent to the ice, all that moving SW to NE across Louisianna.

When we got up Anne was eager to get out of Canton, so she made a plan for us to drive above the bad weather, across Mississippi on Rt. 20 to Vicksburg, continuing on to Monroe, LA and almost to Shreveport before heading south to Ajax, LA (that’s right, Ajax). That’s where were staying tonight at Country Livin' RV Park, a Passport America Park near the Red River.

Well, Anne was right, her intuition was good even though we drove thru plenty of sleet, and we out ran the storm by staying north and west of it, and we have a nice place to stay tonight. It is supposed to rain and freeze here overnight but we don’t care. We’re tired so we’ll just stay here, relax and plan, and it’ll melt tomorrow. Don’t tell Anne I said this, but I think her real motivation is for us to get delayed long enough (or get snowed-in long enough) so we can enjoy that world famous Bar-B-Que in Huntsville TX mid next week. I'm not gonna complain, gotta pick your battles right !!

We enjoyed clean hot showers this afternoon, and one of Anne’s specialties for dinner, Cornish game hen, so we're content for the evening. It’s 10pm now and I’ve already disconnected and drained out park water hose. I’m sure to see some melting going on tomorrow, so I hope to hook it back up in the morning. It’s supposed to be 22 degrees tonight. I know,,,, it was colder in Dallas (not far from here) and El Paso than it was in Green Bay and Alaska today. Maybe we brought the cold with us? In fact, many of the roadways we used yesterday are closed today due to the ice storm.

We miss you all, and thanks tons for being there with us.