Ashdown, AR

     We are "camped" at Millwood Landing, about six miles east of Ashdown, AR.  The quotes around the word camped are 'cause we're not sure this is really camping.  We've got hot and cold running water, a kitchen, a/c, comfortable chairs, directv and just about all the comforts of home.  We are definitely enjoying our ourselves.
     We took a drive into Ashdown yesterday and visited a couple of antique stores.  Some very nice stuff and a lot of stuff that fits into the category of "why would I pay money for that?"  We also visited the Millwood Dam on the Red River. 
     As I watched the water pouring over the spillway I was impressed with the power of the water and I realized that for two days in a row I have taken notice of water in a meaningful way.  The day before I stood on the banks of the Mississippi and watched the thousands of gallons of water per second flowing by.  I've made a mental note to myself to be thinking and continuing to take note of life lessons to be learned from this.
     We fished a little bit last night in the lake on the property here.  Fortunately, we didn't catch anything!

We're Doing It!

We casually approached the morning; just not in a big hurry as we want to set a pace for this trip that says "take your time".  At 9am, Erik bid us farewell in the driveway and we were off.  We headed west to Columbus and thought we were going to have an easy day (best laid plans of mice and men!).

The first hour or two was pretty quiet as I think both of us were grasping the reality of what we're doing and that we are actually doing it!!

There was and is some concern about the RV as the farthest we've ever driven this one from home is about 10 miles.  A slight acrid smell in Columbus; thought it might have been a belt, but we pressed and the rig ran great.

An error in calculations today had us spending much longer on the road than we cared to.  Number 1 was forgetting to calculate time change from eastern to central.  Second item and a note to self here, when a street name says it's a road and a drive, MAKE SURE you know which one you need!  We finally rolled into Mountain Lakes Resort at about 5 (Central time, so 6 eastern, making for a nine hour day.  Way too long!!  We will set a goal to never duplicate that feat again on this trip.

Tonight we are parked (see pic below) near Gunthersville Lake (all 63,000 acres).  The scenery we drove through today was beautiful. We plan to stay here two nights and just begin to relax and take a few deep breaths!


Muggy prepared a great meal for us using a convection oven for the very first time and it was superb.  A walk by the lake, a quick swim in the pool and now for some quiet time to read.

We are incredibly blessed to be enjoying this opportunity and we simply must express our thanks to God for His creation and our opportunity to enjoy it!