HEY POP, I MADE IT TO LITTLE ROCK, AK

I was in Montgomery, AL yesterday – right around a 7 hour travel day. The first half of the drive was wretched and rainy, but we all know I don’t mind driving slow so we chugged our way right through it. The second half of the drive wasn’t as bad but the potholes in Arkansas are crazy and make for a full time attentive driver. I’ve been listening to The Hobbit, and what an enjoyable book. The man reading the book does voices for each of the characters, he sings the songs, and it feels like I’m watching a movie really. It seems a pretty apt book choice for a wee little woodland creature such as myself venturing off on my northern migration. If you haven’t read the Hobbit, it’s about a little Hobbit named Bilbo Baggins, he and a troupe of Dwarfs are off to claim a well guarded treasure and honestly take back some stuff that was STOLEN. So far, they’ve been nearly eaten by Trolls, Goblins, and Spiders. They’ve been thrown into jail by the Woodland Elves, and now they’re gonna face a dragon and I’m pretty sure I’m only about halfway through so you know it’s gonna be good. I’ll keep you updated on that.\

“There is a lot more in Bilbo than you guess, and a deal more than he has any idea of himself.”
Gandalf, the wizard

At my halfway gas station stop I met a lady with the cutest little golden retriever puppy, at least that’s what I think it was. She also had three other dogs in the car who turned out to be little dogs like Oscar. She told me about each of them, I forget their names but one was a teacup Chihuahua, one was a white Pomeranian, and one was supposed to be a Maltese mix but she’s sure he’s not because he’s nearing 30 lbs. It turned out she had come from the direction I was headed, I was near Memphis when I stopped, and they had just come from Little Rock. She said the storms had turned their 2 day journey into 2 days and rocks and trees were in the road. Thankfully my trip here was not marked by any of that, but I did see the scars from the storm where it had broken branches, pushed over large tractor equipment, and the drainage ditches were all full mere feet from the height of the road and some exits closed completely due to flooding.

The campground I’m at tonight is on a lake/ river I’m not quite sure but the water level is pretty high from all the rain today. When I first arrived, I realized I had the incorrect address punched into the old maps app, because it had said I’d arrived but I was just in front of someone’s home. Thankfully it was a pretty decent view and only 10 more minutes to the actual State Park. I’ve since walked around quite a bit, and what nice walking paths it has here. I can’t say I’ve done much else productive or fantastical with my day outside of making my dinner and typing up this blog post. I think I’m also settling back into life on the road. It’s weird to move around more again but I’m getting back into the swing of things. Thanks for reading, and I’ll post another update soon!