Day 34 - 18th November. Goodbye y'all

Our last day here. Usually at the end of a trip, we spend the last day at a bit of a loose end; not wanting to venture too far afield in case for some reason we get caught out trying to get to the airport, but also not wanting to go to the airport too early as there’s nothing more tedious than hanging around an airport.

Our first task is to see if we can extend our check out. Normally check-out is 12pm, but we wanted to see if this could be made a little later as that will give us time to do a few things and not have to keep the bags in the car all day. We were extended to a 2pm check out which was great, so jumped in the car, fighting a reluctant GPS again, and headed back to the Galleria Mall area.

There’s a huge fountain, about 3 stories high, built in a semi-circle with water cascading down both sides. It’s quite a dramatic structure (and very noisy & wet close up). It’s in a largish green park (say about the length of a rugby pitch but maybe ½ as wide) in a very well to do suburb. We took a few photos and then got some takeaway coffees to sit and ruminate on the world going by. Fort a change it was a grey day and a bit cooler, but quite pleasant to sit outside.

Not long after we settled in, a group of about 7 people turned up, all African American and a mix of men & Women with three young girls in tow, and they started to do some interesting walking around & gesturing (all independently of each other) and seemed to be led by an older guy. We were trying to think if it was a therapy session of some kind as he seemed to gather them round occasionally, preach a bit and then they’d all go off in different directions waving arms and talking to themselves. Fascinating the things one sees.

We’d collected quite a bit of coins over our travels –as has no doubt been mentioned, the ticket price for an item almost (depending on the retail rules of the state or city concerned) never includes the tax, so getting to the counter to pay for a $25.00 item invariably needs a total+tax amount of  $26.60 or some such thing, leading to a very large collection of scrappy coins. I’d tried to find a coin to notes machine and we headed out to a Walmart super centre to give it a try, but unfortunately it would only allow us to print vouchers to be used in Walmart, so we spent an entertaining hour looking for something to get.  At least it cleaned us out of coins though.

Then it was back to the Hotel to collect our things and go to the Airport. It was 2pm, but we decided to leave with plenty of time in hand (we needed to get fuel as well) and this was just as well, as the traffic around Houston, which from our limited exposure seemed to build up and crawl almost all times of the day, was doing just that and an expected 30 minute trip ended up taking over an hour.

The skies had been growing ever more ominous and dark, and as we finally made it to the airport and the Avis rental return, the heavens opened and the rain came down in huge sheets. This lasted about 20 minutes or so then just stopped.

The rental return area was huge in scope with each car agency having it’s own huge garage area for returns. We followed the signposts to the Avis garage and then got directed down one of several long narrow lanes of parked cars, all returns. Our car was quickly checked by a guy with a portable, um, car checking device, and then we were out of there. 2600 miles on that car from Pensacloa to Houston, not bad mileage! It’s a pretty good operation though, as shuttles take you from the rental garage areas to the main terminal area, and there are lots of staff on hand to do the heavy lifting.

We’d arrived a bit too early for check in, by about ½ an hour, so hung around for a while, and after a while a few more kiwi’s started turning up as well. The check-in area seems to be shared by different airlines and Avianca were in our spots (though by the slow progress of a family we were watching, it looked like their checking in was all being done manually).

Eventually Air N.Z’s allotted time came and Avianca’s staff all had to move along to a new set of desks, while still having to perform the manual check-in. Not a task I envied.

We had an entertaining chat with our check in lady as she wanted to understand what “sweet as” meant, so while she was loading our bags into the conveyor belt we gave a quick 101 in kiwi-speak. Our two back packs were OK weight wise but our spare bag was about three kg’s over the max limit, however we also had one very light box of stuff, so she let us off.

Then it was hanging round. We found a bar and settled in with a couple of glasses of wine, while our B.777 was manoeuvred into the gate. When one is in far flung lands, there’s something about seeing that Koru on the tail of an aeroplane that just seems to point you home.

There was a very boisterous crowd of Mexican men & women in the bar as well, all having a great (and loud) time , fortunately they weren’t on our flight as by the time they left the rows of empty beer bottles had grown exponentially. I pity their air crew.

Before long it was time to board our flight although board was delayed by about 15 minutes. It seems that the traffic build up that we had encountered at 2pm, had also impacted the crew as they tried to get here in time.

Unlike our flight over, this one was quite full, as according to our check-in assistant, full flights are the norm not the exception. Fortunately we had paid for allocated seats and down the back of the B.777 just before the galley, are four rows of two seats only abreast against the fuselage side, so Deb & I could sit together without having to deal with a third person. It makes for a much better flight.

So our time in America came to an end with another 13 hour flight (plus an hour from AK to Wellington).

Our trip around the South was quite different from what we had done before – there were less “wow” moments to have with stunning geography and this trip seemed mostly urban with lots of city & museum time, and the driving was over generally similar Interstate scenery (and so all up a bit harder to write about). However we have seem historically significant sites like Dealey Plaza, got to see the Blue Angels, and we  found two places that were nicer than we expected and would like to go back to one day; St Petersburg and Key West.

So that’s this blog all wrapped up, thanks to all who have read and followed our travels as we’ve journeyed through the southern American heartland. Its been a great trip and we will look forward to the next one, whenever and wherever that may be.

Cheers y’all !

Day 33 – 17th November

Our penultimate day in Houston and the U.S.A. After five weeks we have done all we wanted to do and see, and are ready to go home. However we had a free day today, so I looked up the nearest Hobby Town U.S.A Store which was about 30 minutes away, so after a leisurely coffee & breakfast we jumped in the car and headed out to the store. The store was in a strip mall along a wide boulevard so I went to look in there while Deb wandered off to look at a clothing store. Hobby Town U.S.A is a chain Hobby store with locations (as we know) throughout the U.S, but sadly they are usually far out of town!

This particular store was quite a large one and so I spent a few happy minutes browsing coming away with a kit and a few paint sets. There was a Barnes & Noble book store a few doors down (Barnes & Noble are similar to Whitcoulls) so I met Deb there and spent another few happy minutes browsing before we headed into town. There was a place called “Discovery Green” which is a sustainable green space in the CBD so after getting a park close by we headed down there.   

First things first and we stopped at a restaurant along the way for lunch. This place was called Pappasito’s and was a ‘Tex Mex’ type place. The first thing they give you is a small basket of corn chips and salsa, complimentary of course, and Deb & I kicked off with a non-alcoholic cocktail. She got a salmon & mango salad, and I got a fajita with Beef & chicken. Fortunately I asked for a small size as when it came out it was huge! However the food was delicious and after five weeks of food on the road it really was welcome. I’d also ordered a dessert called Sopapilla’s , small pastries covered with icing sugar and cinnamon, drizzled with honey and a caramel dipping sauce. Heaven! However I was as full as a tick so we had to get the doggie bag of shame and left to carry onto the park.

The green space is really nice, it’s a mix of grass, a pond, a hill and various sculptures dotted around. There’s also an amphitheatre and it looks like the area’s used quite a bit for various events & concerts. We wandered around and sat under the shade of some trees and watched the world go by for a while. Opposite the park, and parallel for a distance of about three blocks, is a huge new events & conference center being built which is a stunning piece of architecture. The noise of the construction and roadworks barely penetrated the park area. There were quite a few people dotted around with badges and eating lunch out of large cardboard boxes, and, catching a glimpse of one of the badges, saw they were all from a Japan Space Agency – welcome to Houston!

We wandered around the area for a few blocks but remarkably, and much like Memphis before, the area was very sparsely populated and it felt more like a weekend that a weekday. Maybe the tendency is to stay in the office block rather than go out?

By this time is was getting late, and so we jumped in the car and headed back to our hotel room. Once again, the freeways seem maniacal and it’s seriously like looking at a “dance of the cars” – how there aren’t more collisions I don’t know.

Our flight is tomorrow, sadly it was time to begin our final preparations, so the evening was spent cajoling various items of luggage into the cases we have. Deb’s space management skills come in very handy, and we managed to get it all done.

So tomorrow, it’s off to the airport and home, back to windy and shakey welly.

Day 32 16th November

NASA day today.  The Museum opens at 10am, and the car needs a fill-up, so we headed off about 8.30 so we could get gas and breakfast en-route.  Dora spat the dummy again this morning, she had been programmed with the Space Centre as destination the night before but got her panties in a wad and would give us directions but not show us the map, nor accept any instructions to take us via a gas station.  So between using google maps on the phone, missing a few instructions and improvising a little we made it to a nearby gas station with only a couple of minor tanties and topped up with $20 of the cheap stuff (had to pay cash at the cashier first, the 00000 post code trick would not work this time).  By this time Dora had gotten her act together and we were off, or go for launch – ha ha - Space Centre bound.  It was a relatively quick and easy trip out there, most of the traffic was flowing into the city, and was gridlocked.  We diverted via McDonalds where we had a McGriddle, which is a weird combo of maple pancake used to sandwich sausage pattie, egg and cheese like a burger.  Tasted ok and the coffee was drinkable.  Apologies if I’ve already covered this, but here, sausage is a pattie, if you want what we think of as sausages, these are called ”links” – as in they are in a link, not a flat pattie.

So we arrived at NASA without incident and paid another $6 for parking, on top of the already exhorbitant entry fee (we’ve spent a small fortune this trip on entry fees – Gnnnnn !!) and managed to find a park in the shade not too far from the entry.  My internal compass is so out of whack I have no idea if we will still be in the shade by the time we get back to the car or not, but we should get a 5 degree reduction in internal car heat for making the attempt.  It’s quite warm here, 30 degrees, not a cloud in the sky but a dirty smudge of smog on the horizon.  We’ve been told everywhere that it’s much warmer than is usual at this time of the year.  I digress, back to the Space Centre.  It really is impressive, very large, lots of displays that are very well done and informative, lots of interactive stuff for kids, and perhaps most impressive of all, some pretty good historical artefacts.

When we first arrived there were about a thousand school kids outside, all pushing and shoving each other, yelling and generally being obnoxious.  Well it felt like a thousand, but was probably about a hundred.  So they were herded in before us and scattered like sheep all over the place.  I managed to avoid most of them by going to the International Space Centre exhibit, which was really good. 

The Centre also has several genuine spacecraft, including three capsules from the early days of manned flight when the whole capsule was recovered. They’re tiny and looking inside it beggars belief how an Astronaut in bulky gear could deftly manipulate the mind-boggling number of buttons, toggles and switches all while being in the most inhospitable environment operating a craft that really, always must work first time!

We’d booked a tour of the Space Shuttle and the 747 that had been adapted to return the shuttle from it’s landing point to it’s launch pad.  The plane was the actual real thing, the shuttle on top was a model.  To prove that the concept of attaching the shuttle to the 747 would work, some pretty keen modeller built a remote controlled model of the two, and that included “releasing” the shuttle from the 747 in flight and landing it by itself. One chap who was manning rhe flight deck as a volunteer was most informative to chat to. He told us that the traditional Shuttle cockpit would normally have up to 3,000 switches, buttons & dials, but the newer craft coming online (notably the Orion project for deep space missions) will be more a touch-screen environment as the younger generation of Astronauts are more comfortable and familiar with these that the “steam-gauge” Astronauts of yore.

Once we’d finished there we had a quick bite of lunch and did some more wandering before our 1pm booking for the tram tour.  This loaded us all onto a trolley bus and took us to three separate buildings at the space centre.  First and most interesting was Mission Control for the Apollo missions – the actual Mission Control that managed the moon landing, plus the aborted Apollo 13 which made such a good movie that I am a big fan of. They had the flag that had been to the moon and back (not from the first moon landing but a subsequent one and sadly I can’t remember exactly which one).  They also pointed out the speaker that broadcast those famous words “one small step ….” you know the rest.

We all herded back on the trolley and off to the next stop.  This was the Space Vehicle Mock Up facility, which is basically a huge long hanger filled with cool stuff they have developed or are developing to help with advances in space travel.  The next project on the list is Mars, and they had, literally under wraps, a project that is being worked on in conjunction with Tesla, which will help them reduce the cost of sending an astronaut up to the International Space Station.  Due to the demise of the shuttle program, they now have to pay the Russians something like 80 million dollars to send one astronaut up there.  Tesla is aiming to do it much more cheaply (we can’t agree between us what the savings were, but they were significant) plus it has the advantage of making America more autonomous in the space race.  Yes it’s still a race, and Mars is the next goal now the moon is old hat.  There were hardly any people on the floor, and I did wonder why that was, I expected it to be a busy hive of mad scientists beavering away.  We did wonder if this was mostly for show and the real stuff is done away from the plebs.  Amongst some of the cool stuff that was there, though not being used, was an air floor, that blew air up from the floor to simulate weightlessness.  They also had vehicles that looked like they were used in a science fiction file with multiple legs, plus a couple of robots that were able to turn pages in books without tearing the paper (something I have not managed to achieve and why I love my Kindle) and write a text paragraph without using autocorrect, again, something I have not yet achieved.

Once we’d all filed through the building it was back on the trolley for another stop at the Saturn 5 rocket hangar.  This is enormous, and so hard to comprehend, let alone convey the scale of it.  It’s big.

Back on the trolley again and back to the main museum.  While what we saw was pretty interesting, the trolley ride was turgid, way too many people, all yapping when they should have been listening and not following instructions.  You could have whipped around all those places is half an hour with a decent sized group, rather than the 90+ minutes that it took.  Sigh.

Time for a quick sit-down with a coffee and some more exhibits, including touching actual moon rock – ooooohhhhhh 3.8 billion years old !

Finally a stop at the gift store and six hours after we arrived, we headed back to the motel.

Dinner was the same place as last night – hey if you like it, why not ???

Day 31 - 15th November

Not too much to report from today, we left Dallas at about 9am and managed to miss the worst of the rush hour traffic as we headed out of the city while most commuters were heading in.  The drive was mostly uneventful, though there were hundreds of trucks on the road, so we spent quite a bit of time following moving road blocks as one truck would inch past another which took several minutes due to the relative speeds.  I think we’ve whinged about this previously in the blog, we are at least grateful that there are two lanes (minimum) so we can actually pass.  Also the limit in some parts of the Interstate in Texas is 75 mph, so time speeds past.  The drive has been pretty dull this trip.  Texas is flat and boring, not much to see except vast lengths of road ahead.

We arrived in Houston with no problem. Which reminds me, Dora spat the dummy again this morning so we had to wing it until she woke up and started giving us directions.  Sigh.  This will be our last trip with Dora, time for her to be retired I think.  Poor Dora, she has served us well but her unreliability is intolerable.

First stop was a boot shop I had sussed out with a view to trying on some I had only been able to lust after online.  Alas the largest size they had was a 8.5, and despite my best efforts, I could not get my foot in.  They have no zipper, so it was just too tight to get my highly arched feet in through the ankle bit.  And in fact, they did not look as nice in reality as promised on the web picture, so it was no great hardship to settle for what was originally my 2^nd choice, which they had available in my size.  Finally, boots purchased, I am a very happy boot-a-holic J  And the boots have the flower of Texas – the Blue Bonnet, as decoration.  Doesn’t get much more authentic than cowboy boots with the Texas flower.

And for anyone who saw the boots on Facebook, that was actually a mini tin of peppermints in a boot shaped tin, not a real pair of boots J I was being facetious about my boot purchase!

Boots duly bought, we stopped for lunch at a nearby café, and I tried tamales for the first time.  These are a corn based dough which is filled with meat and then steamed in a corn husk.  The café reportedly has the best tamales in Houston, and while I have no frame of reference, they were very good.  After that we hoofed it to a nearby Mall, the largest in Houston.  It really is very large, and very Mally, with many chain stores.  I was not really in the mood to try anything on with my 5-days-in-a-row-without-washing shorts, 2 day old t-shirt and stinky (yes, STINKY) sandals, so I browsed and enjoyed looking at lots of clothes I had no intention of buying, nor could I afford if I wanted to.  The sales people were obviously bored and I was approached MANY times, “can I help you find something M’am” – “no thanks, just browsing” – “well my name’s Betty, so you just holler if there’s anything you need” – yes super polite despite my slovenly appearance.  I guess they are made to watch Pretty Woman as part of their training and do not judge a customer by they smell of their feet.  We are seeing more of a mix of races here, more Asian and Indians, plus quite a few muslims, including a guy with three women following along behind, completely clad in black except for their eyes.

By 5pm we’d about had enough wandering so headed back to the motel to chill for a bit.  For dinner we headed back to the tamale place again, managed to get slightly lost on the way home as we didn’t follow Dora’s directions closely enough.  Prep for the next day included booking tickets online for the Johnson Space Centre. 

Day 30 - 14th November

Today we would be visiting the scene of one of the most famous crimes in history, Dealey plaza and where the assassination of JFK took place. We had also booked tickets to the Sixth Floor Book Depository museum, but the tickets are usually sold on a timed basis so as the museum didn’t open till 12pm on Mondays (usually it’s earlier) we picked 12pm and went into town early to find a park and spend some time on the plaza itself.

Getting into town was pretty straightforward; we’d hit morning rush hour so no whizzing cars and getting to the Elm St off-ramp was also no drama, phew. We managed to find a parking lot on Elm close to Dealey Plaza where we paid $15 for up to 24hrs parking (not bad we thought).

The plaza itself is all quite accessible and it’s a lot more compact that either of us imagined it would be. The street’s length between the Elm St turn to the triple underpass, where the shooting took place, would be no more than a couple of hundred meters, and the plaza itself is only several dozen meters wide at the top point.  The other thing of note is that the infamous “grassy knoll” where the ‘other’ shooters are supposed to have been, is almost right next to where Abraham Zapruder was filming the motorcade. We’d always envisaged it to be in another location, eg across from the motorcade’s street. So the grassy knoll, Abraham Zapruder’s spot, and the Book depository all occupy the same side of the street.

As we were looking around, a number of touts came up to sell glossy magazines about the shooting (complete with gory autopsy pictures) as well as newspaper reprints but we shooed them away.

There were also two “x” marks in the street to indicate where JFK’s car was at when each shot was fired, though I understand these were placed by members of the public and are not any ‘official’ marking. 

So we first went to the spot where Abraham Zapruder was filming, and could see that he had a prime location for filming the motorcade after it turned onto Elm and went down towards the underpass.  We then went to the grassy knoll, really a small slope up towards a wooden fence that bordered a carpark and was also next to the railyards.  This was where some people thought the shots had come from initially.

On the ground, the window on the sixth floor of the book depository is kept open and from there you can see that Oswald had a prime spot to take his shots as the motorcade moved away from him in the same line of sight. I’d always though he had to move his rifle from one side to the other, but now I can see that he just had to move it upwards to keep tracking the car. That to me makes the concept of the lone shooter more plausible now.

We spent an hour or so going over the ground and went to the other side of the plaza to see the whole length of the street and take some photos. With still time in hand before the museum opened we went to the Museum store and café for a bite & coffee. We have found that a latte with an extra shot of espresso makes for a pretty decent flat white alternative.

At 11:45 we duly took our place in the queue at the museum, showed our ticket and picked up our audio tour device, and then went up to the 6^th Floor. The 6th Floor area has been designed to lead you around the room following a timeline of the day’s events and aftermath. It starts with a small background as to the reason for the visit and why JFK was unpopular to some Americans (he was not the uniting force that some myth would have us believe). The tour then takes you through the shooting timeline. The corner of the 6^th floor where Oswald positioned himself has been walled off by a glass wall, but the boxes he used to hide and provide a support for his arms have all been arranged as best they can determine. There’s also a large model of the plaza and building with string used to show the bullets trajectory to the car at each time that he fired.

The tour then goes through the aftermath & funeral, and also touches on the many conspiracy theories that have sprung up about the assassination.  There’s also a replica of the rifle used, and the tour of the floor finishes with the legacy of Kennedy and some of the things he tried to start during his thousand days in office.

There are no photo’s allowed on the 6^th Floor, but the 7^th floor is open and we were able to position ourselves in the corner above where Oswald was hiding, and take some photos of the street down below. There are more trees now covering the line of sight than there were in ’63, but it’s still easy to see the track of the motorcade away from the hiding place.

It was an amazing experience to see this ground, and to finally see how the land lies despite having seen it in various documentaries and films. I think being able to walk the street enabled us to get a better sense of the perspective from all angles.

We’ve also come away with two differing viewpoints; Deb is leaning towards the theory that there was a conspiracy of some kind in that Oswald did not act alone, but I have begun to believe the lone gunman theory as I can now see how he could have got three shots off in the space & Time he had. I purchased a book from the store that claims to put those theories to bed, so now I have to read and retain the information so that I can confidently argue my point.

Following our time at the museum, we decided to go over to the “Geo-Deck” tower a few blocks away. The tower, which looks like a large singer’s Microphone stood on end, contains an observation deck that allows great views of Dallas. The entry fee was $16 (almost everything needs an entry fee) and we got escorted into the tower where our “ambassador” spouted a few facts & figures on the way up. The observation deck was pretty amazing, and we could walk the circumference of the tower for some amazing views. We could also see the whole of Dealey Plaza from the perch so took a number of photos for the record. After a few pictures, including one of a very spaghetti-like interchange we headed back down and went back to the 6^th floor museum café for lunch. Two rolls, two coffees and a couple of ‘cakes’ came to $40! Yikes.

Once we finished, it was getting late so we walked a few blocks but couldn’t see any signs of interesting retail activity, so jumped in the car and headed back to the motel. We happen to be directed through the spaghetti-junction we’d photographed earlier, and the GPS had a hard time figuring out where we were. Fortunately the traffic was moving very slowly due to road works closing a lane and a breakdown further along also causing a jam, but once we got past that we sped up and were back at the hotel in a short time.

We decided to cut our Dallas time short and head to Houston tomorrow, a day early, so that we have enough time at the Space Center as well as get all our last packing sorted before we leave on Friday.

Over the last couple of days we have been watching event in NZ from afar. The news has also made it over here with some segments on CNN & Fox, and making to the “ticker tape” news ribbon. Amusingly, this morning the segment showed the three cows stranded on an island and we couldn’t help but be amused that this may be the most lasting image of the disaster that Americans may have! We have also been keeping an eye on Wellington as that has been getting flooded out due to the torrential rain, our poor lovely city is being hammered!

Day 29 - 13th November

We awoke to a text from our house sitter, Rowan, to the effect that there had been a significant earthquake in NZ, but the house and occupants were OK. That began a day of great unease for us as we watched events unfold from afar, feeling quite helpless and sad for our home country as it went through this terrible events. We kept ourselves glued to Stuff and Facebook during the day as we drove from our overnight mid-point stop in Texarkana, on the Texas/Arkansas border, to our penultimate destination, Dallas.

We made good driving, again managing to dodge the multitude of trucks on the road, and got to our chosen Hotel by about midday. Unfortunately our hotel room wasn’t ready, and so with car full of luggage, we picked a local mall to go and spent a few hours at until 3pm.

We picked the North Park mall further along on the I-30 into Dallas, as this also had a boot shop that deb was keen to see. Going along the freeway, there was a curious optical effect where the city’s high-rise buildings seemed to be quite distant, then suddenly appeared much closer.

As has probably been mentioned in a previous post, driving a city freeway system can be very fraught. Often there are exit only lanes that can trap you, and after going past an exit there may be a need to have to quickly cross two to three lanes of traffic to be positioned for the next correct exit or off-ramp. Add to this other cars whizzing past at all speeds and cars frequently changing lanes suddenly and without warning, and changing lanes is a bit of a mission as well, because cars tend to hang in the blind spot. Dallas was no exception, and after we’d negotiated our way through the network and to the mall we were both happy to just stop and take a breather.

The mall, North Park, is pretty much like any big mall. Two floors with major department stores at each corner with many smaller shops and boutiques jammed in between. Deb had earmarked a shop for some boots to look at, and we found it without too much issue (and by looking at a store map) but although they were nice, they weren’t the “wow” factor she was looking for.

We had a bite to eat at the food court and watched with admiration as a young Latina woman corralled and fed a raucous and fidgety group of young kids whose vocal volume seemed to be permanently set to loud.

After that we split up so Deb could look at clothes and I could see if the place had a book or toy store, but the closest was a Disney store where I picked up a small die cast model of an X-Wing for $10.

I happened to be wearing a t-shirt with a silver fern on it, and two gentlemen walked up and asked me if it was a silver fern, to which I replied in the affirmative. They said they’d been in NZ a few months ago and had heard about the quake, and were hoping and wishing the best for the NZ’ers, which I though was a very nice sentiment.

We met up about 3:30 and jumped in the car to head back to the Hotel, and again negotiated the freeway of terror. The Hotel we’d booked was about 7kms out of the central city but this worked out pretty well as it keeps the costs down but having a car means we can go into town and the short distance doesn’t make for any hassle.

We spent the rest of the day watching updates unfold from NZ.  

Day 28 - 12th November

Stopped at Little Rock for a while then carried on and stayed in Texarkana for the night. Not a whole lot to report for this day. Mostly driving. Although the award for the worst coffee we have had on this trip goes to a food stand in a market food court in Little Rock, where the coffee was weak and the whitener had some kind of weird flavouring.

We stopped at Texarkana for the night to recharge and then carry onto Dallas the next day.