The Start of a New Adventure

WHERE ARE WE? Natchez Trace Parkway Parking, Tennessee River, Alabama

Headed out from our nice little spot in the Winter haven Welcome Center about 10.  That's an early start for us!!!  We headed down I-24 toward Nashville.  We saw some evidence of the winds they experienced here from Hurricane Helene.  Lots of the direction signs along the highway are snapped off.  Hey I promise to clean the windshield today!! We have to stop for gas today so I will do it then.

This one escaped the wind

We had hoped to hang out around Nashville for a couple days and do the tourist thing downtown, but it is Friday and we can't find a campground close by, and we would have to find a place for Archie, and, and, and.  Anyhow we have decided to bypass Nashville and get on with our original plan for coming way out of our way to the east.  Yup, we are doing the Natchez Trace from beginning to end, or in this case, end to beginning.  And this is the sign at the end of the Trace!!  So we will start here.

A beautiful drive with a narrow 2 lane road with lots of trees all the way.  It winds up and down and around and we were sometimes doing 45 mph and then we were doing 30 mph.  You do have to pay attention while driving.  The neat thing is that just 500 feet on either side of the Trace in places, is populated areas, farmland and major highways.  But you are in your own little world here as you meander along with no way of knowing there is a real world out there.

Lots of bikers

We stopped to look at some falls this afternoon.  It was a walk of 900 ft so I thought what the heck, I can handle that.  Nobody said it would be straight down and worse still, straight back up!! Oh now that I look at the sign, it does say steep!! My bad!!  And the falls were just a wee trickle of water but it was pretty.

We decided to stop about 4pm today at a free campground.  We were like a dog trying to lay down, driving round and round to find a spot that might support Star Link as well as be level.  We decided on one, but nope, no signal. The trees are a solid blanket over head.  Oh well, we will find something to do.

So I sat outside listening to the 2 Neighbours generators.  I decided to clean the windows like I promised to take my mind off them.  The generators serenaded me all the while I was cleaning.  Went and sat inside and stared at Sue for a while.  It was 32 degrees and we were hot.  We have no cell service either.  After an hour or so, she said that it is only about 9.5 kms to a nice spot by the river that some people told us about at the start of the Trace.  I'm in!! So we broke camp and headed out.  We drove for about 20 minutes and her phone came to life.  That 9.5 kms was actually about 95 kms so now we have a trip ahead of us.  And it is starting to get dark and there seems to be more traffic.  But we did see some lovely sunset colours.  

We drove for about and hour and a half before taking a wrong turn into the parking area we wanted.  It took us down a road that had no turn around for 10 kms and it is now pitch black dark.  I never thought I would get to the point where I didn't enjoy driving at night, but I am there.  We got turned around finally and got parked up beside the river where we were supposed to be.  Archie was not impressed with the shenanigans.  

We will probably stick around here for a while tomorrow.  There are barges going up and down the Tennessee River here and I love to watch them.  Hope to get some pictures tomorrow.  Here is a map of our travels today and where we ended up.  No picture cause its dark!!!  Good Nite!