Our 2023 Westward Journey, Part 1

Over the past 1.5 weeks, we traveled from Batesville, IN to Tucumcari, NM. That is pretty fast traveling for us. We normally stay in each stop for a few days to a week with sometimes a one night stop in between our longer stops. Since we got a later start that we originally planned, we decided to move quickly through a few states so we could spend the time we had planned for New Mexico. We ended up with 5 days in a row of travel, with 4 one night stops before we had a 3 night stop.

That much driving was difficult on both of us, since we both had to drive. We haven’t yet had the car set up with the equipment to flat tow it. Tim is driving the car and I am driving the motorhome. Tim is still having carpal tunnel problems so his fingers go numb while driving and my arm still gets stiff when I am driving. With that in mind, we planned stops approximately every 200 miles, so that gave us a little time to explore a little in each place that we stopped.

We usually aim to arrive at our destination by 2 PM so we have plenty of time to relax and recuperate before the next day’s drive. We left Indian Lakes on a Friday and headed towards St. Louis where we had reservations for Saturday night. We didn’t have any planned stop for Friday night so we drove about half way and then looked for a place to stop for the night. We had never stayed at a Crackel Barrel and heard from other RVers that is a good spot to dry camp for a night.

In the cracker barrel parking lot. this isn’t where we parked for the night. Forgot to get a picture so tim took this as we were preparing to leave.

We wanted to try out our generator, so thought a Cracker Barrel was a good idea. We stopped at one in Terre Haute, IN. They had at least 8 RV parking places in the back lot but more than half of them were filled with cars. The lot wasn’t that full at 2 PM so I am not sure why the cars were parked there. Luckily for us, an end spot was open, so we could open up the bedroom slide for the night. We ate a nice lunch and confirmed with the manager that it was ok to stay. Good thing we stopped when we did; a rain storm rolled in and it rained for the rest of the day.

We used the generator and it worked well to run the air conditioner as well as use the microwave to heat up dinner. Crackel Barrel has a good deal; you can order a to go meal for $5 with the purchase of a meal in the restaurant. Both of us got a to go meal so we had that for dinner and I had enough of my lunch left that I had it for breakfast the next day. Good value and a comfortable, safe place to stay for the night.

We headed on to St. Louis the next day and again it was a bit rainy and cloudy. Our stop for the night was the RV Park at DraftKing at Casino Queen. This casino is actually located in East St. Louis, IL and is directly across the river from St. Louis, MO. The RV Park has a great view of the Arch and while maybe not in the best neighborhood, it seemed pretty safe. It was a gated campground and was fairly full. We didn’t go over to the Arch but enjoyed the view and got some decent pictures.

the view from our site. even with other campers in front of us, still a pretty decent view.

With the uncooperative weather, we just decided to hang out at the casino for a few hours. We started with a late lunch at the bar and enjoyed chatting with the bartender and waittresses. I had a very nice cocktail and then ordered the bologna sandwich. Yes, you read that right. Not something I would normally get out at a restaurant, but I thought it was so funny to see it on the menu. I had almost bought bologna at the grocery store recently when I saw it on sale and thought I hadn’t eaten that since the girls were little. I didn’t buy it because I didn’t think Tim would want it. When I saw it on the menu, I had to get it. It was delicious, Shaved and then fried bologna, with cheese, red onion and mustard. After our late lunch, we tried our luck at the slot machines but didn’t do very well. Tim said that I was bad luck. I always say that I never win and he usually wins. So with me watching him, he didn’t win.

the bartender made me an excellent bourbon manhattan

Since we didn’t actually stay in Missouri, we had to make an overnight stop as we headed towards Oklahoma. Sunday was our 35th anniversary so I planned a stop that was about an hour north of Branson. The initial thought was to get in by 2 pm and if we felt up to drive down to Branson to have a nice dinner and perhaps catch a show. If we weren’t up for that, our alternative plan was to go drive part of US RT 66 which was nearby and see if we could find an old fashioned diner and tourist trap gift shops. Well fate was against us that day. We were about 10 miles before our exit, and traffic was totally stopped on the interstate. We ended up sitting on the highway for 2.5 hours before we started moving. There had been an overturned tractor trailer and a fire that totally closed our side of the interstate. By the time we checked in and setup at the campground, we just went to a local restaurant for dinner and called it an early night. Not what we had planned for our anniversary.

since we didn’t go anywhere on our stop in missouri, I got a few pictures of the murals in the building at the campground while i did laundry in the morning before we left.

The next night was much better. We stopped at the KOA at Will Rogers Downs and Casino near Tulsa, OK. It was a shorter drive and a beautiful day so we were in and parked before 2 PM. We got a site that backed up to the race track and even though there weren’t races scheduled that day, they were out training the horses that afternoon. We enjoyed sitting outside and watching the horses run. Since we weren’t far from Rt. 66, again, we decided to take a drive and look for diners and gift shops. Unfortunately, that part of Rt 66 looks like any other modern day road, lots of chain stores and fast food restaurants.

sunrise over our campsite at the racetrack

We finally found a nut store that had a deli, gift shop and an RV dealership all in the same place. It ended up being a good place to stop; we ordered sandwiches, browsed the shop and their Christmas store in the back as well as Tim went and browsed at the RV dealership. We bought some of the coated nuts for snacking later on and headed back to the campground where we watched the horses again. After dinner, we walked over to the casino to check it out. Definitely a much smaller casino than the one in St. Louis but Tim ended up a bit luckier at this one. To help with his luck, I sat at the bar while he gambled. Maybe I was bad luck!

the christmas store was our view as we ate our deli sandwiches.

Our neighbors from the campground also came over to the casino and we ended up having drinks with them and chatting for awhile before we all called it a night. The next day we headed into Oklahoma City where we finally had a longer stop. We had a 3 night stay there and spent quite a bit of time touring the city. I think I will save that stop for the next blog post as I think it deserves its own post.

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