TX Archives - Our View From The Road

Day 10: Trains, Plains & Automobiles

In the canyon we were sheltered from the sun’s earliest rays and the morning was brisk. We completed our morning routine, vacated our campsite and dumped the tanks (no mess on me).

Our route took us North into Amarillo where we again joined I-40West towards New Mexico. We soon passed the ‘Cadillac Ranch’ where we had stopped last year. The winds were light being early and there were many people adding to the spray paint on the cars embedded in the field.

We stopped again in Adrian, TX to visit the Midpoint Café and enjoy an early lunch. A 50’s style roadside café, they serve the BEST homemade hamburgers we’ve ever tasted.

As we leave Adrian, the landscape begins to change rapidly towards open rangeland. There are very few trees and endless expanses of grasslands.

We head towards New Mexico but stop just before entering at a small mostly vacated town called Glenrio, NM. It technically just across the state line and has 1 visibly operating business, a cannabis shop (now legal in NM).

We didn’t stop for that however, we stopped to look at a now abandoned Post Office and Cafe. Ghosts of a simpler time along old Route 66.

As we head across New Mexico’s barren landscape the temperatures rise and hit 29C by early afternoon. The A/C is deployed. The pictures below don’t do the vastness of the spaces justice and at times you really wonder if you’ll reach to ridge on the distance and what could be beyond? Yep, more trains, plains & automobiles.

Below is a collection of pictures from the day. The sixth picture is of a mountain that we felt reminded us of ‘Jabba-the-Hutt’ from Star Wars. Yep, it was a long day in the sun.

We stopped in Grants, NM at the KOA Journey as a place to rest for the evening. To remind us that we are now at a higher elevation, the chip bag has puffed up due to the lower air pressure. Must remember to be careful opening other containers! (ask me how I know!)

Tomorrow we head into Arizona and make a few more Route 66 stops.

Day 9: Amongst the Mesquite

A short post today as we are staying in Palo Duro State Park for another day; however, we have to change sites as this one is booked by someone else for tonight.

We slept in, a little, until 7:30am and started the day with a cup of coffee as we gazed out upon the canyon walls. It’s 4 degrees outside and sunny. As the trails in the park are closed due to recent heavy rains I went for a short walk along the park roadways. The birds were singing and the breeze was gently blowing (the reason it’s so cold).

We decide to have a full egg, bacon, fried potatoes & fried bread breakfast. A real treat from the yoghurt and banana we have been starting each day with. It was delicious.

Out of the wind the sun is warm, the views spectacular. I’m writing yesterday’s blog post when Barb reminds me that we need to go to the gatehouse and get our ticket for tonight’s site. The drive takes about 20min, we get the ticket and turn around to drive back down into the canyon to our new site (#007) in the Hackberry campground.

The site is a drive through intended for longer rigs than our van but it’s again level and dry. The biggest difference is that we are now near a river lined with Mesquite trees that are just leafing out and we don’t have the majestic views down the canyon we had from yesterdays site. The red stone cliffs still tower above us and we hope the sunset will be as stunning as last night.

I tried the showers in the park and rate them a 4/10. No private change area and shower curtains past their prime. The water temperature and supply was plentiful and the shower itself moderately clean. I used it in early afternoon ahead of the influx of new campers that can’t check-in until 3:00pm as this gave me the best chance of having no-one join me in the shower room. It worked.

The remainder of the afternoon was spent reading at our campsite and enjoying the warmth of the sun out of the still cool breeze.

A quiet evening lies ahead and hopefully a restful night. Tomorrow we head into New Mexico.

Day 8: Texas bound

It rained last night. Not a light Spring shower, nope, a Midwest rolling, windy, thunderstorm. Welcome to Oklahoma folks. The wind jostled the van and woke us both several times throughout the night, but by the morning a light shower was all that remained. The rain was supposed to last the day in El Reno, luckily we were heading West into Texas and would drive out of the rain mid morning.

We were on the road by around 10:00am, enough time for a relaxing breakfast as we watched others depart.

Out on the highway the spray from passing vehicles was bad but as stated above, the rain wrapped up mid-morning and the sun started to appear through the breaks in the clouds showing us the magnificence of the plains.

The temperature climbed into the low 20’s as we headed further West and we found ourselves turning down the heat closer and closer to the point of turning on the A/C. We didn’t, but it was close. The sun blaring in the windows on the South-side of the van really warmed the vehicle.

Nearing the Texas border we took a short detour off of I-40 and onto the historic Route 66 through the towns of Erick, OK and Texola, OK. Erick is still fairly well populated, as a small town but we couldn’t see much in the way of an active commercial district, just many boarded-up buildings.

Texola however is practically a ghost-town. Wikipedia lists the town as having 42 residents in 2022, we saw none of them.

We stopped in Texola as Barb had read that an old one-room jailhouse still survived from the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. We found it on a back street made of concrete blocks and a concrete roof. It’s as unspectacular as the town, but here it is with some other pictures. The list of names is evidently the school graduating class list from 1938; however, no sign of a schoolhouse remains and one wonders why it was engraved in stone and now stands besides the jail.

Returning to the I-40 we soon entered Texas and stopped in a rest stop to have lunch in the van.

Arriving in Amarillo we took the ring road around the South of the city to Canyon, TX to top off with fuel and groceries before heading to Palo Duro State Park where we will be camping for the next two nights. We had visited last year and did some hiking but this year have been able to successfully snag a couple of sites courtesy of the Milddogs and their Campnab subscription.

Our first night is in the Mesquite campground at the Southern-most end of the canyon. The site (#090) is perfect. Quiet with amazing views (see below) and level-enough that we don’t need to add blocks to level the van.

We enjoyed a quiet afternoon relaxing in the hammocks and made a Texas steak dinner before watching the sunset and the stars appear overhead. We’re both looking forward to a quiet day tomorrow before moving to a second campsite within the park.

‘night Y’all.

Day 41: The start of our drive home

So here we are, the beginning of the end. Today we begin our drive towards Ontario & home. It will take a few days, but compared to the past few weeks our pace will seem meteoric as our goal is to cover distance and not dawdle about.

The sunrise was beautiful as we watched through the Mesquite trees while eating breakfast. We packed up the van and headed out. The Bisons politely congregated near the entrance to the park allowing us to take some final pictures.

We headed North across country towards the I-40E. This route had us driving through some small towns that for the most part are now almost ghost towns as most of the Main Street stores are sadly vacant and boarded up. One of the towns, Memphis, TX has all of its downtown streets paved with cobblestones which have it a really charming feeling, that is until you see all of the vacant shops. Sad.

Once on the I-40E we quickly cross into Oklahoma. Near Hydro, OK we stop to look at our last Route 66 site, Lucille’s gas station was operated by Lucille Hamons from 1941 until her death on August 18, 2000, the site was added to the US National Register of Historic Places in 1997.

We are accompanied by strong crosswinds as we cross Oklahoma; however, the grasslands slowly disappear and by Oklahoma City many more trees can be seen including now large leaf deciduous trees and larger conifers. Large-scale farming has been replaced by smaller farms interspersed throughout the wooded hillsides. By the time we get to the Arkansas state line, the farms have mostly disappeared (as have the winds) and now the scenery is forested hillsides amongst the lakes and waterways that will become the Ozarks.

After almost 9hrs on the road, we pull off at Russellville, AR and pull into the Cracker Barrel parking lot where we will have dinner and spend the night.

Day 40: Caprock Canyon State Park 2

I’m up at 6:45am to turn on the propane and then the furnace. This means going outside at 6C in my shorts. Brrr. However, the warmth from the furnace feels nice and by 7:30am the inside of the van is a toasty 18C. Time to make some coffee.

We move from the Wild Horse campground to the regular campground today but first it’s time for eggs and sausage cooked on the griddle. We figure this will be the last griddle cooked meal for this trip so a little extra time is spent cleaning after we’ve eaten.

We pack most items into the passenger area of the van as the move to the new campground is only a few kilometers. Once ready, we back out of our site and leave the campground turning away from our destination as we want to briefly explore the deeper areas of the park. Some of the road is very steep and not accessible to those with trailers. The tenting campgrounds look nice but remote; however, they have fantastic views of the red canyon walls.

We see a few Bison grazing near the road and taking a drink in a lake.

We visit the park office to get our tag for the new campsite but we can’t occupy it until 12:00pm. Off to the showers! Ahhhh, hot water. This is nice. We both are less smelly as we arrive at our new campsite.

We’ll only be here for the day and overnight, but we both agree that this is the nicest state park campsite we’ve had all trip.

We have lunch and go for a walk along the canyon edge and take a few photos. We see a herd of Bison not far away, but watch them to ensure they’re not looking our way and potentially blocking our return to the van. No problems, they’re busy grazing and are far enough say that we pass without them paying us any heed.

Sitting under the shade structure writing this and I just got blasted by a dust devil that blew right through our site. Might need to clean the van out again as the door is open!

We spend the remainder of the afternoon planning the last few days of our trip and chatting with friends and family.