(RV 29) To Tennessee on the Natchez Trace.

1989 was to be a big year in our lives.  A fork in the road type of year. It involved a long year on the road. We were to drive to and spend the summer in Tennessee and Maine as park volunteers. Then return to Conroe, sell our Walnut Cover RV lot, and drive to our new life on the Olympic Peninsula in the State of Washington. From the Atlantic to the Pacific. We left Walnut Cove on April 4. Arrived in Maine on June 5.  Returned to Walnut Cove on September 24.  A five and a half month trip. While we were in Maine we found out that our lot in the new Coop RV park in Chimacum was available. So when we got home we sold our Walnut Cove lot. Sold or gave all of our belongings away except for what would fit on our truck and trailer. We left for Washington on October 24, one month after our return from Maine. We arrived at the Coop in Chimacum on December 6, 1989. It would be a full year for the old prune picker and his wife Jackie.

We said--"Lets take the old military highway, the Natchez Trace to Tennessee". April 5, 1989 we drove 269 miles to Pineville, Louisiana. Then we drove to Natchez. There we got on the Natchez Trace. This is a long thin national park that almost reaches Nashville. We drove 217 miles that day to Jackson, Mississippi. We stayed at an RV park in Brandon on the north edge of Jackson. When we pulled into the park the trailer was leaning to the left. A spring leaf had broken. The trailer was resting on the tires. The spring had to be rebuilt. Luckily it could be done in Jackson.

We drove north. We noticed that it had been spring in Natchez with dogwoods blooming and trees all in leaf. At the north end of the trace in Tennessee it was still winter with bare trees. We drove from Spring into Winter. Merriwether Lewis died at milepost 385.9 of the Natchez Trace. He died of a gunshot wound, either murder or suicide. There were attempts to exhume his body in 2009 to see if it could be determined which it was.

It was 281 miles to the NACO park at Hohenwald. A short distance before we reached the park we approached this underpass.

You can see that route around the road has been dug out to give more clearance. I studied the indicated clearances and thought I was ok to follow the pavement. Not so! Bang! my air conditioner hit the bridge and broke apart. I had to back up and take the dirt route and pay $165 for repairs to my air conditioning shroud. It would have been so easy to follow the dirt road.

You can see that the park is now a Thousand Trails park. It was a nice large RV park.