The Passage from Arizona to Arkansas

I've been in Florida a week now and am starting to get settled in (not really a good thing since the whole idea was to get on a boat). I've finally got a spare minute so I'll update everyone on the trip from Phoenix to Port Charlotte.

I left my house around 6:30PM on Oct 1. My car was completely packed as I had several items, including Stella, that I needed to deliver to my sister Jamie on the other side of town. Its a little weird how *little* I was able to fit into the Caddilac... I think I might have been able to squeeze more into the Jetta. Oh well. Bygones.

Anyhow, after dropping off Stella, a TV, and a couple of other smaller things at Jamie's as was at least able to see out the windows again. I decided to hop on I-10 East and start rolling.

A curious thing happened on the way to Tucson. The more I drove, the more I found myself haveing to scrunch my neck to see out the rearview mirror. I didn't really notice it at first. Later I thought I must be on a slight hill as I could barely see the cars behind. It wasn't until I was almost in Tucson city limits that I knew for sure the backend of the car was sinking.

On a lark, I decided to see if I could get a hold of a friend I hadn't seen in 4 or 5 years that, last I had heard, lived in Tucson. I couldn't believe that I actually had Linette's numbers in my phone and that they worked. I got a hold of her and we decided to meet for some coffee (which neither of us had, but that wasn't the point) and catch up. It was nice to see her again.

I decided to see what I could do about my car's rear-end while in the parking lot. I assumed it was a weight issue and figured I needed to change the what items were stored where. I moved the heaviest boxes to the floor of the front seat, the medium weight boxes to the back seat, and kept the lightest items in the trunk. Once I got back on the road the car seemed good. I could see just fine out the rear window again. Problem solved.

Or so I thought.

After heading down I-10 for another 45 minutes or so I noticed myself having to duck my head to see out the mirror again. Argh! There really wasn't any more weight I could shift around and the car didn't seem to be driving any differently. I guess there was nothing I could do. I made it to Wilcox, AZ and found a Motel 6 to crash for the night.

The next day I hit the brief stretch of New Mexico on I-10 which made somewhat nostalgic. Seeing the names of familiar towns on road signs made me flash back to my early teen years which I spent in a tiny town on I-40. While I hated growing up in New Mexico while I lived there I now look back and am thankful I did... the environment and schools there are better than the city, IMO.

I hit El Paso shortly after that. Its a much larger city than I thought. The highways there are extremely confusing which I'm guessing has to do with Mexico being on one side of the highway and Texas on the other. I had planned on stopping there for breakfast, but my attention was 100% on the traffic and the roads, so I decided to just get out of there as fast as possible. There is little, if any, El Paso of the old western songs left.

I can't remember the tiny town I stopped to eat and refuel. The restauraunt boasted "world famous" chicken-fried steak. I found it to be mediocre. The salsa they served with the chips as an appetizer was top-notch though. Almost burned a hole in a me. I wanted more but the 5 alarm fire in my mouth stopped me.

The drooping back-end issue continued. Every time I stopped the car for gas and food the back-end seemed to right itself. After 45 minutes or it was droopy again.

West Texas is a big, empty space. Accordingly, they set the speed limit to 80 mph so it doesn't seem as long between places. While I did get from point to point faster, it still seemed a long way between places.

Another thing I noticed was a freakish number of FedEx trucks driving westward. I must have seen over two hundred trucks between El Paso and Odessa.

I stopped just before Odessa for fuel and saw my first live buffalo. There was a small zoo/park next to the gas station and a couple of buffalo stood close to fence. Seeing them in person is sort of odd. They are much smaller than one would think. I guess I always envisioned them like cows with a large hump on their back. In reality they are more like those miniature ponies with a hump on the back. The hump came up to my eye level, so its head was close to the middle of my torso.

Also at Odessa I checked my tires. My rear tires were almost bald on the outter edges, but seemed very good on the rest of the tire. The "almost bald" part worried me something fierce. How long had they been this way? Would they last the rest of the trip? As I left Odessa I worried about this more and more and finally decided it would be prudent to have them checked out. My iPhone was able to tell me that there are Discount Tire Companies in Texas, so my new plan was to stop before Dallas and look for a DTC in the morning.

Dallas is pretty big, so I stopped in a suburb before it, checked into a Motel 6 again, and went to find some food. While eating at a Chili's, I discovered that there was a Discount Tire Company literally across the street from where I was. Talk about good fortune!

In the same conversation I learned about the tire store I also had a revelation about the quality of the education system in Texas. Both the waiters Chili's that served in my area were young. Young enough, in fact, that the bartender had to bring me my drink because they were too young to serve it. After finding out about tire company I asked if my server if he had any advice about traveling through Dallas... that I was on my way to Little Rock (only about 3 hours drive from Dallas) and wanted to know the most direct route.

He looked at me and said he'd never heard of Little Rock then went to ask his co-server. Apparently he also had never heard of Little Rock so they asked what part of Texas it was in. I explained that Little Rock is the capital of Arkansas and that its NE of Dallas. They latched on to the "NE of Dallas" part and were able to give me good directions from there.

If any of you readers ever find yourself in Texas and needing directions I hope you find this information useful.

The next morning I went to Discount Tire Company as soon as they opened. The fella that helped me decided that my tires would *probably* be fine, but if I wanted he had some used tires he sell me for half-price which were in better shape. I agreed and they went to town. Apparently early morning is a good time to go there. There were 5 people working on my car. It took about 5 minutes for them to make the change and have the car ready to go.

The rest of the journey to my mother's house in Arkansas was pretty uneventful. I'll write about the second leg of the trip next blog.