Tulsa, Oklahoma to Murray, KY
Murray, KY to Hopkinsville, KY
569 miles, 12 hrs. 45 min.
Today was a big travel day. The weather was lousy-drizzly
rain-but the scenery made its permanent transition from desert/prairie to
deciduous forest. It seemed kind of suddenly that we noticed it, but I’m sure
it happened gradually! I looked out at one point and felt like we were in a
lush tropical forest compared with the desert landscape that we had grown
accustomed to over the past few weeks!
We were able to alter our route slightly to be able to visit our past youth pastor
from church, Mike Chipman. Eric was really hoping to get to visit him since he
just moved at the beginning of the summer and he had developed a good relationship
with him over the past year. We had originally thought that we might hit
Memphis, TN by driving along Rt. 40 all the way through Oklahoma, but since we
went a little north to Tulsa, we stayed north to Murray, Kentucky, which is
just on the border of Kentucky and Tennessee. This meant that we would travel
through southern Missouri, and we went right through Sikeston, home of
Lambert’s Café. This is the restaurant famous for their “throwed rolls”
(grammatically incorrect, but very fun to witness!). We arrived kind of early
(about 4:00) but that was a good thing-no wait and we knew it would be a lot of
food, so we did not want to have a late dinner. The menu was typical home
cooking, and they indeed do come around with pans of hot rolls on rolling
carts, calling out “Hot Rolls!” and you hold up your hand, and they toss the
rolls across the entire restaurant to you. Hopefully you can it, but if not
(there were a few rolls on the floor), they’ll throw you another. And, they are
very hot too-you have to immediately set it down on a paper towel-hot and
buttery-and they seem to melt in your mouth. We figured out the way to eat
there-you order your dinner, and then, as they walk around with bowls of “pass
arounds”-sides like black-eyed peas, fried okra, fried potatoes & onions,
you fill up on those and the rolls, and then take your meal home with you in a
to-go container for dinner the next day. So it ends up being 2 meals in one!
The kids really got a kick out of the rolls being thrown-they caught several.
One Bay caught ended up being speared by his thumb. One of Eric’s bounced off
of him and landed at the table behind us! It really was fun and a good
experience.
From there we headed to the Chipman’s home. The drive to
their house was interesting. We drove across the confluence of the Mississippi
and the Ohio Rivers, across two VERY narrow, old bridges. The kind that take
your side-view mirrors off. We crossed the Mississippi on one bridge, were in
Illinois for about 2 minutes (on a tiny peninsula where Cairo is located), and
then crossed the Ohio on another bridge into Kentucky. We stopped in for about
an hour visit-it was a school night for both Mike and the kids-and then headed
out toward the highway to get a little blacktop under us before calling it a
night. It was good to see them, and see how Mike was adjusting to life as a
high-school teacher and taking a break from full-time ministry. They are very
happy to be back in that part of the country-close to family and where they
both grew up and went to college.
We thought we might drive as far south as Nashville for the
night (about 2 hours) but the driving conditions were terrible. The rain
combined with the darkness made it so we decided to stop as soon as we got to
the Interstate. We pulled into a Cracker Barrel parking lot and called it a night.
Narrow bridge across the Mississippi-
Eric happy to see Mike again
No comments:
Post a Comment