Transit of Tennessee

Monday, April 08th. Horse Cave, Kentucky. 

We finished off last night near Birmingham by hooking the trailer up to make a quick get away this morning. The weather showed that a line of severe thunderstorms was due to hit right about 8am and then rain continuously all morning. So, I put the hitch on the truck and attached the trailer, attached sway bars and the chains and break-away brake connector. I emptied the tanks and put away the lawn chairs — we were ready to go. 

The nice lady from Sarnia in the site next door asked if we were planning a quick get-away out from under the weather;  they were playing it by ear. They’d left Sarnia on December 15th and spent the winter near Punta Gorda in their fifth wheel — just north of J.C.’s place in Naples. They used to travel around and camp in different locations like we have on our two trips but they found it too tiring, used too much gas, and wanted to settle down in a location Where they could make some good friends. We joked about how everyone knows the names of everyone else’s dogs in an RV park — the best way to make friends. Lorraine and I will regularly refer to things like “The couple in the big Jayco Class A with the 18 year old Westie”. I commented that I could understand the motivation to settle down in a campground like that; this trip has been a little tiring.

Where to go next was a bit of a discussion point that night and again this morning. Lorraine didn’t seem to keen on stopping in Nashville and I was lukewarm to the idea as well. The weather was going to be good Tuesday and Wednesday in Northern Tennessee and Southern Kentucky.  I got to thinking about seeing people on the trip being the best thing we’ve really done so far — the site seeing is fine but the friends we’ve seen are what made this worthwhile.  We’d said we’d see Kip and Trish in Innerkip on the way home and Cliff and Sandy and Pete in Toledo.  Trip planning is quite complicated if you try to align with other people’s calendars.  I realized that if we skipped past Nashville to somewhere in Kentucky we could get to Toledo on Thursday, then Innerkip on Saturday and home on Sunday or Monday while still enjoying good weather somewhere in the middle of the wee

k. A quick check of campgrounds found the KOA in Horse Cave open and affordable and the plan fell into place; Mammoth Caves here we come. 

We did Nashville last year and while there’s a lot to see there I’m kind of tired of people and cities as well after the last 10 days of the trip so finding somewhere a little more rural was a bonus. I visited as a Kid about 1971 or 1972 when I was about ten, Lorraine has never been there. My recollection is that these are pretty spectacular and I owe it to Lorraine to take her here — she loves caves. We’ll see how well this works — the literature recommends that people who are claustrophobic and afraid of heights consider alternatives; I am both.

The trip north, about 530km on I65, was very smooth and a lot like watching a movie of spring in reverse. In Birmingham, the fruit trees were done blooming, the dogwoods just in bloom and all the trees just in the growth phase of the leafing out. As we moved north, first we lost the dogwood blooms then the leaves slowly retracted into themselves. All through Tennessee the Interstate is lined with beautiful and purple and pink blooming trees — wild plum, cherry and redbud. As we passed through Nashville first the cherry blossoms disappeared then the plums retracted to fat purple buds and the leaves changed to catkins on the birch trees and fat keys pendulous on the maples and big red and purple budded trees on the rolling hills. Here in Kentucky even the undergrowth is just at that stage where buds in the undergrowth are set to explode — a few trees her have early leaves but they are waiting for the days of sun and warm nights that are coming this week to explode; Should be good weather to explore the caves.

We spent a fair amount of time on the drive — when not listening to science fiction on the Radio Classics Channel — discussing the trip and whether we had regrets about heading home too soon. There were things left undone for sure and things we’ve learned for our next trip but it’s been good — and not over yet, we’ll be at least another week getting home. This is day 35 our fifth full week on the road and we’ll be a couple of weeks shorter than the original plan but I am running out of energy, and out of money as well. I’m looking forward to getting some work done at home — I’ve got my taxes to finish and the hardwood floor to finishing laying and Ted’s wedding to get ready for; the time to head home is now. 

We drove through straight, only stopping to pee once, just south of Franklin Tennessee. We managed the 530 km on just under a full tank of gas — 70km to empty in just under 6 hours. Most of the morning was gray with occasional rain raising to patchy clouds and misty rain by the time we got to Kentucky. 

We checked into the nice rural park, an older KOA on the side of a hill just north of Cave City with a lovely view of the hills across the interstate. It is a quiet park, not very busy at all which seems strange given the stream of Canadian trailers headed north on the Interstate. We set up quickly set down to a dinner of the left overs from two nights at Jim N’Nicks BBQ; Pulled Pork, Sausage, Collard Greens, Mac and Cheese, Biscuits, Baked Beans, and Steak. Lorraine was so hungry she even ate collard greens; She was almost done when she noticed the biscuits “Holy Shit, I almost missed those...” I was just hungry and ate and ate; there are now no left overs and the nearest Jim N’ Nicks is about 100 miles south...

The dogs like it here and after our late lunch ( or early dinner) we sat out and enjoyed one of our last days of mild weather before heading back to the snow — Round Lake Centre is expecting 10cm tomorrow. I walked the dogs on a long walk through the park past a nice penned area with two miniature horses and a goat and then home to write, pay bills and watch TV.