Tag: Travel

Day 2769

The (Show Me) State

So, why is Missouri called the “Show Me” State?

Well I asked Chat GPT and this is what it found: Missouri is known as the “Show-Me State,” a nickname that reflects the state’s reputation for skepticism and a demand for evidence before belief. While the exact origin of the phrase is uncertain but more research points to a number of possibilities but the one I liked the best and was the most widely recognized story attributes the phrase to U.S. Congressman Willard Duncan Vandiver. In 1899, during a naval banquet in Philadelphia, Vandiver is reported to have said: “I come from a state that raises corn and cotton and cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I am from Missouri. You have got to show me.”

Happy Saturday morning. Way back in Texas we topped off Thunder’s fuel tank at the Buc-ee’s in Amarillo, and I thought I would try and make it all the way to the Buc-ee’s in Springfield Missouri some 550 miles (885 kilometers) away. And this morning we are only 80 miles (129 kilometers) away from finishing that challenge as the fuel gauge is reading just under the 1/2 mark, but I have had a change of plan because when I checked the fuel price on Gas Buddy at the Springfield Buc-ee’s it is $2.99 per gallon and with my Open Roads plan I can purchase fuel for $2.77 a gallon so I will not be buying my diesel at Buc-ee’s this time.

5:20 am was wakeup time this morning, and Mister Sam was much happier to see me this morning, so after his treats I was allowed the best part of a hour of lap time then he went to bed and I perked some coffee, breakfast was sausage patties and fried eggs with a slice of sour dough toast and some salsa on the side, and yes my coffee had a wee blessing of the Irish. Our departure time today is 9 am at the lates, as today will be our longest day yet with hopefully a break in the middle plus we need to fuel up today as well.

Today’s destination is a Cracker Barrel in Arnold Missouri, we have never been to this destination before as it is a few miles away from our normal route, but is very close to a very dear friend that we are going to catch up with. The only issue is that it will be more than four hours of drive time, it is the weekend at a restaurant so we need to arrive after lunch but before dinner to get an overnight spot. The climate has changed drastically, we both felt the change in humidity while travelling yesterday and the amount of standing water is such a change from the desert. Our overnight at the Missouri welcome center was reasonably quiet, this is a newer rest area where the RV parking is separated from the trucks making it quieter being away from refrigerated trucks that run all night long.

On the road before nine and we are going to stop for fuel in about 80 miles (128 kilometers) and it doesn’t take long to see why we normally try to avoid travel on the weekends, traffic seem heavy and the cars are either speeding or holding traffic up, we make it to Springfield MO and pull into the Buc-ee’s to top off Ruby’s fuel tank and for Miss Laurie to grab some supplies, its just after 10 am and the place is jammed but we sneak out the back and roll down the road to a TA truck stop where I top off Thunders fuel tank it took 69.747 Gallons (264 liters) the pump price was $3.329 for a total before discount of $232.19. Between the two stops we lost 45 minuets, so our ETA is now 1:54 pm, if all goes well we should have time for a lunch break.

At 12:30 we pull into a rest area for a bit of a break and some lunch, Miss Laurie made a wrap with some cold cuts and peppers, not enough to make us sleepy but enough of a break for Mister Sam as well as us before the last two hour push. We had a couple of sprinkles on the windshield before lunch and a check of the weather map shows we could hit some rain near our destination. And we did hit some rain, in fact some very heavy rain for the last fifteen minuets, if there had been a suitable spot we would have stopped and waited it out, but there wasn’t and we couldn’t so we continued on. At our destination there were no other RV’s but of course there was a couple of vehicles parked in the RV/Bus spots, who knows why, just ignorance or stupidity I guess, but I got to detach Ruby in the rain as we are too long all hooked up. I’m sure this will be a tough spot to get out of tomorrow (Sunday) morning, but that my friends is an issue for tomorrow.

Today’s numbers: 286.4 miles (460.9 kilometers), 5.02 hours of run time, consumed 36.2 gallons (137 liters), averaged 56 mph (90 km/hr), and fuel mileage of 7.9 mpg (27.77 liters / 100 km) the solar will not be one of our better days but we our batteries were at 96% capacity when we stopped at 3:00 pm.

It has been a cold wet evening, the rain is suppose to stop overnight, and we have a breakfast get together scheduled for eight o’clock tomorrow morning with someone very special, luckily it here at the Cracker Barrel.

Day 2768

Half way there!

Today we will cross the halfway mark of this adventure at least distance wise, I’m going to take a different route around Oklahoma City witch will involve a little more toll road but hopefully will avoid a never ending construction zone in the city. The storm warning overnight was right on the money, and at 2 am it started and rumbled through till 3:30 with thunder, lighting and heavy rain, hell it rained so hard it washed most of the bugs off of the windshield.

It was 6:20 when I rolled out of bed this morning, maybe more of a nature call than anything else, dawn was breaking but some dark clouds to the east so no sunshine yet. I slept well until the storm hit and was able to fall back to sleep later, and the last time we were in Oklahoma waiting for our new windshields we had similar storms. As I’m typing this morning there seems to be a lot of train whistles this morning that I never noticed till now, the noise from the interstate is building as well, but it didn’t seem bad last night. Mister Sam greeted me this morning for his snacks but then headed for the big bed, he doesn’t like thunder so would have had a bad night along with not liking travel days he has been having a bad week period.

Well our route today will finally get us off of I-40 which we have been on since Tuesday morning, just a few miles of I-40 then the 344 Turnpike around Oklahoma City to I-44 which will take us right to the Mississippi River. Route 66 which ran from Chicago to Santa Monica and has been our route although most of the old highway was replaced by the interstate highway system but shows up along our route with roadside attractions right through to St. Louis.

Breakfast this morning was bacon on toasted sour dough bread along with a cup of fresh perked coffee that may have had a wee bit of Irish blessing. If all goes well this should be another four hour day, and should get us into Missouri. Our elevation at Oklahoma City is 1500 feet (457 meters) and today will be a series of rolling hills some only being 50 feet (15 meters) of roll and some having over 300 feet (91 meters) of roll, our elevation will descend as we get to Tulsa and the Arkansas River where the elevation will be 500 feet (152 meters) then climb back to 1000 feet (304 meters) at the Missouri State line.

So we managed to get on the road by 9:00 am and had good driving conditions pretty much all day, the new turnpike route reduced traffic and while a few mile longer was faster, and other than a couple of construction zones where the speed limit dropped below 55 mph (88 km/h) the cruise was set at 65 mph (104 km/h) and we made good time pulling into the Missouri Welcome Center by 12.45 pm

Today’s numbers from Thunder’s on board computer: running time 3:53, distance travelled 238.6 miles (383.9 kilometers), average speed 61 mph (98 km/h), consumed 28.5 gallons (107.8 liters) for a fuel mileage of 8.3 mpg (28.3 liters / 100 km). I have to admit I was very surprised by todays fuel mileage, I had set the cruise control at 65 instead of 64 and with the hills, it makes very little sense, but after eight years of travelling I just thought it was time to analyze the numbers a bit closer and if I can figure out how to improve the fuel mileage I will do it.