Road Trip Day 2 & 3

Mural

 Sunday Morning - enjoying the best ever cup of hot chocolate and a yummy breakfast in Jackson. Then it was on the road for a full day of driving across Mississippi and Louisiana and into Texas. It was a surprise to see how low the Mississippi River was when we crossed it into Louisiana. We stopped in Shreveport to see a mural I had read about. It was really awesome to see. It is the largest public outdoor mural, title, "The Once in a Millennium Moon Mural" covering a two story brick building in downtown Shreveport. I have seen many murals and I have to rate as one of the most beautifully  painted. The images have an luminosity to it that really is inspiring. It is one that you could study for a long time to understand all the story it has to tell. Something hard to do in just one viewing. It was hard to really take a good photo of it and even harder to write about all the images in it. If you are ever in Shreveport check it out, that's all I can say. It was my highlight for sunday's travel....well so was the hot chocolate with whip cream. We spent the night in Weatherford, Texas which is just west of Ft. Worth. Even on a late sunday afternoon there was a lot of traffic through Dallas and Ft. Worth, so glad I didn't have to deal with the monday morning communte traffic. There is nothing much of interest in Weatherford, a place a  long I-20 with lots of hotels, fast food and shopping malls.

 

Today we have had an all day trek though Texas and it's varity of landscapes, we started in green rolling hill farm lands and then drove through what is called the Hill Country, which is very unique hills and finally to east Texas which is more desert like. We are now in the small town of Van Horn a place that has seen little growth...in fact most of the little towns we have seen along I-20 are on a downward trend with many business  closed and building falling apart in disrepair like ghost town. There were signs on the highway for the business loop road, but then there weren't any businesses.  I wondered what happened to them and what are the people that remind are doing for shopping, I guess is some kind of sign of the times. In any case we did have a very hard time finding anywhere to eat lunch. At least Van Horn did have a nice little cafe we had dinner at. After dinner I walked Patches and saw many closed business here, too. It is mostly motels that are thirving and there are a couple of streets of small houses where people live who service the motels. I did an internet serach on Van Horn and found these photos of the main feature of Van Horn is Threemile Mtn, Here is a photo I found of it in the 50's and then of it today.....

 

 

 

Tuesday Morning and we are soon off on our last leg of the first part of this road trip. Tonight we will be at my cousin's ranch for a few days visit and big birthday bash!

 

Oh, just to let you know, the cats have settled into being on the road, each morning they peacefully have walked into their carriers and spent their day without a word of complaint. They share my bed at night with lots of purrs and cudles. Patches, of course is thrilled, he has always loved to ride in the car and explore rest stops.