Happy to be Home Again

We returned home last night after a six night road trip.  We flew to Memphis, drove to Little Rock where Jim gave a Hesburgh lecture to a ND alumni club at the University of Arkansas, and then headed to Vicksburg, Natchez, and Baton Rouge.  Our goal was to follow the Great River Road along the Mississippi.  Jim remembered crossing the big river many times as a boy and wanted to follow it south.

It turned out it was harder than we realized to follow the Mississippi River.  Levees blocked our view, marshes stretched for miles, and diversions in the river changed its path from the towns where it flowed during the Civil War era.   We were, however, able to walk along the river in Natchez, watch barges from a casino parking lot in Vicksburg, and see the mighty river spectacularly from the 27th floor of the capitol building in Baton Rouge.  We know now that almost the only lodgings along the river are casino hotels.  We were happy to stay in historic B and Bs instead.

I posted blogs with photos almost every day mostly as a record for ourselves.

The weather was perfect.  Jim's eye issue and RA issues never flared up at all.  He drove and I navigated and we did very well.  We learned a lot about Civil War (the War between the States), plantation life and the life on a tugboat thanks to Jim's conversation with a disabled boatman in that casino parking lot.  We visited the Clinton Library and saw Central High School in Little Rock. We ate catfish and BBQ ribs and lots of grits.

But we are glad to be home.  The colors here in Indiana are spectacular.  I enjoyed my strong morning coffee with my newspapers today.  I chatted with two friends on my grocery shopping trip.  The library had a requested book waiting for me.  Travel is great in its anticipation and its memories.  Home is good too!