Well we are going to make up some mileage today, plan be on the road by 9 am, going to make a run up I-40 to Oklahoma City area, it’s about 400 miles (600 kms), should be a six hour drive and with any kind of luck should be settling in by 4 pm.

Yesterday was a reasonably sunny day, solar produced 102 amp / hours, this morning the outside temp is 58 or 12 degrees, coach temperature 65 or 17, it is going to be a cold wet day as we are at or near the forecast high now, the batteries are in good condition as the furnace did not come on last night at all, just the boiler to keep the water hot. We have decided to make a push to Oklahoma today, Miss Laurie has called about a site for the night, as we are expecting freezing temperatures tonight. We will have rain this morning but should drive through it early afternoon, the forecast is showing a warm up with Amarillo TX having a high of mid 60’s on Friday and low 70’s on Saturday before plunging to a high of 34 on Monday and a low at night of 19 or -11 degrees. This is why a couple days of pushing should get us to New Mexico before the big chill comes in early next week.

By staying on the I-40 corridor it is the shortest, straightest, so obviously the quickest and even Dallas TX is going to be below freezing next week, so even the I-20 route has cold ahead, so we just need to get west far enough to be avoid the cold. We are at mile marker 241 so we have about four hours to the Oklahoma state line and the end of the rain.

As I look around the parking lot this morning, I cannot believe how many rigs have slides out, the Fifth wheel beside me has three on this side only…sorry people this is not right, if you need that much space overnight, you need a campground, you are not lot docking people, you either are just ignorant or stupid, at Walmart NO SLIDES and NO JACKS, the class “A” behind me has the front wheels jacked right off the ground. Seriously have some respect, and don’t ruin it for us that do. If you want to lot dock when you travel, buy a rig that will allow you to do that, we see this all the time, at least some people will park to have a slide over a grassed area, not this group, middle of the lot multiple slides out! Sorry that rant has been building all week!

As we crossed into Oklahoma, Thunder developed a little cough, we have driven about 240 miles (390 kms), only on hard pulls up grades, still able to roll along at 65 mph or 110 kmph, but is starting to cause some issues. So we have limped into Chandler OK, to our reserved spot, and extended for an extra day so I can resolve the issue…see life on the road is not always smooth…just saying

Day 766

Well our decision was to head south on I-65 and then west on I-40 so we managed to get on the road by 10 am with overcast skies, we did not hit any rain but drove about an hour before we had sunshine. The Tennessee roads are not up to the level of Kentucky highways, traffic was reasonably light with just one back up in Nashville but it only set us behind a few moments. It was a warm sunny day and we crossed a time zone so we were off the road by 2 pm but actually drove five hours and covered almost 260 miles (418 kms) , a little more than normal but still not a bad day with 60+ degrees and sunshine.

We found a spot at a Sam’s Club in Jackson TN, we parked on the extreme southern end of the lot, and are now surrounded by a number of large motor coaches, in fact Thunder is almost the smallest in the group, and that is not normally the case. It was clear over night with the temperature being 41 or 5 degrees and today may reach a high of low 70s or 20s but Thursday is looking for below freezing temperatures overnight….time to keep moving west. Control panel this morning battery voltage 12.3 volts, batteries at 84%, solar yesterday produced 112 amp/hours, coach temperature is 60F and the furnace is running occasionally, all and all we are in fine shape this morning. Miss Laurie got to watch “The Voice” and “This is us” last night, again an hour of generator to help the batteries through the night, didn’t need the heater as the coach was around 70F, we did turn in a little early, just not used to the time change yet.

It’s Wednesday and we will be heading west on I-40 through Memphis and on in to Arkansas, most likely in the Little Rock area but we will see, our plan is to be on the highway by 10 as usual but nothing else is solid, I have to get the maps out and scope out todays travel, need to have a couple of possible boondocking spots for tonight.

Well things sometimes just don’t work out, a glance at the trip computer on Thunder tells an ugly tale. Notice almost five hours and a distance of 135.6 miles, 19.3 gallons, average speed 28 miles per hour and only 7 miles per gallon, these are not numbers normal numbers but are because of a double fatality on west bound I-40. A tractor trailer driver drove into the crash truck (the truck that is designed to protect workers), then hit a patrol car, injuring the officer, then hit three DOT contract workers killing two of them, all of this with all the flashing lights of any construction zone and the blue flashing lights of the cruiser, this at approximately 3 am this morning. Two in hospital, two dead and I suspect a truck driver in jail, this is why we never drive at night, too many chances of some fool falling asleep at the wheel, I know it can happen during the daytime but more likely at night.

We are settled into a Walmart with about a dozen, RV’s and tractor trailers, in Forrest City AR, not where we had planned to be tonight but with the highway back up and detour, it was the best I could do. As we watch the weather and the cold snap coming through we may be adjusting our route to take us down I-30 into Dallas and west on I-20, then we can start working north west and maybe take in Roswell NM, that should be entertaining but we will check in the morning to see which looks best…stay tuned.

Day 765