Monday June 14
All that scenic driving yesterday didn't leave much room for dog walking. And when we got back it started in raining and didn't stop until almost six. So I took them for a walk with umbrella, and after Zack had his little exercise, went on to take Molly for a long walk. We didn't make it all the way to the boat ramp before I grew very hungry. (I'd skipped lunch, after all.) So she got about half the walk she needed.
She got another one after supper but still could have used a good long jog. Maybe today. No--wrong choice of words. Definitely today. The problem is, the next campground is barely one and one-half hours from here. If we were to stick strictly to the three p.m. check-in rule, we wouldn't leave here until one-thirty. But we don't expect the other campground to have a gate with limited entry, so we should be able to drive right in any time.
Bye, campground.
Bye mountain we never climbed.
Bye lovely flower.
Bye Great Plains State Park.
LATER: at about 2:30 p.m. I should be working right now but I don't want to. The drive took an hour and a half, with no stops other than traffic lights. I thought, when we started this retirement traveling thingy, we'd be spending more time on Interstate Highways. But we don't. Other than I-35 between Dallas and Killeen and I-45 between Dallas and Corsicana to get to Killeen, interstates don't seem to take us anywhere that we want to go.
So instead we traveled through Hobart and Rocky and New Cordell (missed that one) and Clinton, Oklahoma, slowing down to 35 miles per hour or even 25 at times. I don't actually recall any traffic lights although there might have been one or two.
No more mountains.
It was a strange drive. Going north, we passed a few more "mountains" but then hit long stretches of rolling plains. When we turned west, after crossing I-40 at Clinton, we went across a red-dirt erosion field of deep ditches and rather lovely green bushes. And then it went flat again. No mountains around this lake-it's flat as pancakes here.
Having not planned out this trip very well--remember, this was just a substitute for the long anticipated week at Palo Duro Canyon--I didn't have a campground map or anything. So when we came on the park headquarters to the right and camping area to the left, I was only looking to the right and neglected to tell Ed to turn. There was nowhere else--we headed across the dam and away into space. It took a very sharp right hook to get turned around and back where we belonged.
And then, when we got here without a map, there appeared to be no numbers in the campsites at all. They were all pull- throughs, angled to give the door side a view of the lake as well as the camper next to you. We asked a guy outside his RV, fiddling with his boat, and he said he was in seven so that made our "six" right beside him.
Later we found a very faint 6 painted on the electric box.
So now I'm sitting inside because it's 101 outside but only 86 in here with both air conditioners running full blast. I promised Molly a jog, but there would be no shade trees to jog under and I'm not acclimated to 101 yet. There are some trees here, just enough to keep our satellite dish from pointing South and just enough for some shade to side under. But not--not for jogging. It would be great day for swimming; that's it.
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