Off the Road Again

Whew. I'm off the road again, back in my hometown in Colorado, and staying here for at least a few weeks or more. I'm finally getting my bearings, and have begun seeing movies again.

The trip from Memphis was awesome. I took nine days to drive to Colorado from Tennessee, taking my own sweet time as usual.

First I drove down from Memphis to the mouth of the Arkansas River, and visited Arkansas Post Memorial, which is the oldest French settlement in the region, predating New Orleans. Then I loosely made my way up the Arkansas Valley over the next eight days, stopping in Little Rock, where I visited the capitol and Little Rock Central High School.

I had a nice sidetrip through the Ouchita Mountains, including Hot Springs, and had my tire changed by a very helpful local outside of Mena. I also visited Fort Smith (very nice historical site), the Spiro Mounds in Oklahoma, Geronimo's grave at Fort Sill, and Boiling Springs state park.

By this time I was back on the Great Plains for the first time in a year. It felt like home. It had been exactly a year since I left Colorado.

I made my way up through the Oklahoma Panhandle ("No Man's Land," they call it), to Dodge City, Kansas, where I stayed the night. In Garden City, Kansas, I visited a wonderful little zoo that really astounded me. Then I followed the increasingly dwindling Arkansas across the barren high plains, along the Santa Fe Trail, into Colorado, and finally to the mountains.

In the last leg of my trip, I followed the Arkansas up into the Rockies to Leadville, and to its headwaters at the top of Fremont Pass at the Continental Divide. My last night of camping of the trip was under a brilliant moon in the Rockies beside the rippling river---beautiful. The next afternoon, I drove back up the Front Range to Fort Collins.

One year and four days on the road. So weird that it felt like I'd barely left. My BMW needs a ton of repairs (my parents gave me a new muffler for my birthday---it was at the top of my list). My premium AAA membership expired on the very last day of my trip. It was time to renew, in several ways.

O.K., now let's talk movies. I squeezed in a few during the last leg of my trip, both on the road, and since I've gotten back. It's time to catch up...