Riding with Steve

About 200 miles from the Delta and you are in Hot Springs, Arkansas.  The Arkansas Ozarks begin in Hot Springs and end in Eureka Springs, or the other way around.  The main highway is “scenic 7″ that runs north-south and is reminiscent of the Blueridge Parkway or the Natchez Trace.  Highway 7 runs on a ridge up over the mountains from Hot Springs National Park through Ouachita National forest, down to the Arkansas River valley, up into the Ozark National Forest to the Buffalo National River.  Scenic 7 then continues to the northern border with Missouri.

We started the journey in Hot Springs, a town that hit its peak in 1946, and then completely imploded until the 1990′s when it started recovering — it still has a long way to go.  Hot Springs will always be a draw for tourists because, you guessed it, the hot springs.  All around the town they have fountains that dispense the naturally hot mineral water free to the public.  One side of the main street is lined with the national park headquarters and rows of operating bathhouses with baths for women only, men only, or racier yet couples.

Most people bathe nude but we’re just shy.  Anyway we spent a long time with the National Park people learning about the area.  The park is the smallest National Park and has no obvious entrance or exit.   Actually, most of the city of Hot Springs is in the park.

We also ran into a local constable and learned that the town is constantly undergoing all sorts of seismic activity which makes the springs similar to volcanic hot springs.  He said there is real worry out where he lives that the local farm wells will get to hot to use as they are heating up.  He was fascinating and lives on a farm that has been in the family for over 200 years.  The town is pretty touristy kind of like a 1930′s elegance meets Dollywood.

We stayed the night in an interesting B&B built in 1884 by the Pullman family of Pullman Railcar Co. fame.  Mrs. Pullman had the house built for a cool $50,000 — what would that be today.  All the wood in the house was from their properties with cherry in the formal rooms and pine in the kitchen and work areas.  Very cool if you like old places

One full day in Hot Springs and we were ready to go back to the beautiful highway and our own little bubble.

We knew nothing about Mississippi before this trip, I had been to Jackson on business but never really spent anytime traveling the state or meeting the people.  I have been listening to blues music so long that I wanted to take some time to understand where it came from, to feel it, rather than intellectualize the experience.  We left the Trace and headed for the Mississippi Delta with a stop first in Oxford, the home of Ole Miss.

Oxford is a pleasant town with some real life brought by the university.  There is diversity, education, and a larger world view than its neighboring towns.  While most of the towns we visited are dirt poor and their downtown shuttered Oxford was bustling.

Then we hit the Delta!  The Delta is not what I thought, I had it in my head that it was closer to the gulf and the Mississippi River delta, just not the case.  The Delta is the land in the northwest quadrant of the state that lies between the Mississippi River and the Yazoo/Tallahache Rivers.  This is the land where cotton is king to this day and where the plains flood every few years.  It is brutally hot and the job of growing and harvesting cotton has to be a living hell.  It was easy to feel the absolute desolation the sharecropper farmers went through before mechanized agriculture.

We stayed in Clarksdale in a great B&B run by an itinerant hippy for an owner in Santa Rosa (friend of Charlie Musselwhite).  The room we were in has been used by Robert Plant, Patty Griffin, etc… very cool.  The house is called the Clark House because it was built by the Clark that founded the town in the 1800′s

The Clarksdale area is the center of the Delta Blues geography which goes from Helena in the north to just south of Indianola.  It also the home to a ton of blues greats (Join Lee Hooker, Mississipi John Hurt, Muddy Waters..even Sam Cooke) and the famous crossroads where Robert Johnson was rumored to make a deal with the Devil.

We went to a local place the first night for some music called the Juke-Joint Chapel which was very cool and part of a hotel named the Shackup Inn.  The Inn has cottages made out of sharecropper cabins and a multi-room converted cotton gin

The lobby

The next day was taking in the museums in Indianola and Clarksdale.  The BB King museum was unbelievable, so well done, with major sponsors being Led Zepplin, The Stones, recording industry etc.

We spent some time in Greenwood as well and met this young guy from LA whose dad was a blues addict and moved the family to Greenwood to hunt for the complete history of Robert Johnson — blues guys are crazy but he is credited with finding the real burial site of Johnson. Greenwood is also home to Viking Range Co. and the center of the North Mississipi cotton industry, and still half shuttered.

Some pics of thriving Clarksdale:

Such a soulful city and such a poor place.  As they say in Arkansas, “we love Mississippi and Louisiana, they make us only the third poorest state”

Tomorrow off to the Ozarks

Nashville was great. We always love being there with Mike and friends.  Got  a chance to catch up with the building projects, and spend some quality time with Mike.  Where Mike and this road trip mesh is music and Mike got us setup for a Jackie Greene concert Saturday night.  He was awesome and always happens in Nashville brought out surprise guests — mainly the new super group he is in Triggerhippy, with the Black Crowes guys and Joan Osbourne.

We got home from the concert at 1:30 in the morning.  Forced ourselves up on Sunday morning, packed the car and said goodbye to Kim and Maddie.  Then over to Mike’s place and a quick good bye there.

The Natchez Trace starts at Nashville and winds down to Natchez right by New Orleans — some 440 miles.  We just took it about a third of the way to Tupelo, birthplace of Elvis, and then cut over to the Mississipi Blues Trail.  We stopped all along the way, it was just beautiful!

We took a detour from the Trace and spent the night in Florence/Muscle Shoals Alabama area where we saw a number of cool sights the next day.  We saw Helen Keller’s birthplace, the W.C. Handy house (for you blues guys), a Frank Lloyd Wright House, and unfortunately a closed Alabama Music Hall of Fame.

Back on the Trace in Muscle Shoals and followed it another 70 miles to Tupelo.  Again, it was just so pretty, the cotton fields, Indian mounds, the vegetation of the south, and through it all we listened to KDZU (kudzu classic country) and felt our bodies just slow down a bit.  See y’all later 

We spent the morning in Highlands eating  breakfast in the back of the local drugstore — great biscuits.

Then off to hike to the top of Whiteface Mountain.  The hike was not to long and absolutely beautiful.  From the cliffs at the top you can see forever.

We headed for Nashville to see Mike and spend some time with good friends.  But before we got to Nashville we stopped in Chattanooga to see what it was all about.  We walked around the downtown and I have to say it looks like the whole city was rebuilt in the last 10 years.

Arrived in  Nashville that evening and will be staying for the next 3 days at our friend Kim’s house  which is real close to Mike.  We love spending time with Kim and her family and she has been watching out for Mike since he got to Nashville.  She has known him since he was in the second grade and is his Nashville mom.

More when we leave Nashville!

We spent our last night in Charlotte in a little town of Davidson which is well known for its namesake, Davidson College.  We stayed at the little Inn there and I had a chance to stroll through the college grounds in the morning.

The college is looks very much like where I went to school, Miami of Ohio.  I met a few students and was surprised how plastic they seemed and they had really nothing to say.

Given the Steppford quality we found on campus we quickly got out of there and headed west.  We traveled through southern NC headed for Highlands a beautiful small vacation area in the mountains.  The drive was beautiful and the people interesting.  However, there is one thing I see all over the South — there is just no limit to the amount of stuff that can be put on the front porch or in the yard.

Mini golf and unlimited toy/collectibles.  Anyway we headed into an area around Lake Lure called Chimney Rock State Park.  Here you can climb this towering rock to get a great view of the surrounding mountains and valleys

From Chimney Rock it was off to Highlands which is at 4200 feet in the mountains and has become a mecca of mountain country clubs and spas for the rich folk of Atlanta 2 hours to the south.  They picked a beautiful spot.  We stayed at the Old Edwards Inn and Spa which was fantastic, expensive, and perfect for a beautiful couple like the two of us.

That evening we had a great Italian meal, then off to watch the debate and bed.