Mountain View, Arkansas

View of countryside as we drove along

Lunch with Cindy & Mike on the White River

Dogwoods flowering in the wild

Fishermen on the White River below the Dogwood

Gourds for Sale

Decorated Gourds

A Gourd Mandolin

We crossed the border into Arkansas around midday, then stopped for 2 nights in a nice campground with very welcoming owners. It was our first chance to catch up on washing and getting back into our RV routine since leaving home. It was 30C when we arrived, breaking records in that town for that day of the year, so we decided to take it easy the first day, and leave the washing till the next day. No sooner had we had our first glass of red wine and our weather monitor alerted us to a 'tornado watch'. Not believing our bad luck, we turned on the TV weather channel, and sure enough, there it was heading in our direction and due to hit around 2am. Well, we figured we weren't going to get any sleep, so we stayed up and watched TV until the threat was removed at 3am. Thankfully the campground had a tornado shelter within several paces of our front door, and we were ready to sprint over there as soon as the campground owner sounded his alarm. As you would know from news reports, tornadoes toss RV's in the air and they can land far away from their moored position. The last place you want to be during a tornado is in a mobile home. We got some rain and gusts of wind, but it moved across the north of us, damaging 70 homes in a Wisconsin town as it swept through that area. When we awoke the next day, it was much cooler, and we did get the washing done. One more night there, and we were out the gate driving to Mountain View where we planned to spend 5 nights at a familiar campground with friends Cindy & Mike.

Cindy & Mike hail from Louisiana, and we met them at this campground 2 years ago. Last year we caught up with them in their hometown of Denham Springs, about an hour north of New Orleans, and again at a music festival in Suwanee River, Florida. Yesterday they took us to a nearby store where outside they sell gourds straight from the farm, and inside they sell the gourds after they have been done up - either as musical instruments (banjos, mandolins etc) or decorative gourds.

Today was a glorious spring day, and after spending the day touring through the Arkansas area near the Ozark National Forest, we can understand why it is called the 'Natural' state. So much natural beauty abounds - especially when viewed with the spring flowering dogwood trees everywhere. We lunched on the White River at Bull Shoals, and the drive there and back was very scenic. We were gone for almost 8hrs and had a great day. The White River is the very same one that got Bill & Hillary Clinton into hot water with the Whitewater (real estate venture nearby the White River) controversy. We drove past the turnoff to the real estate involved. We saw our first deer and bison for the trip, the deer were wild, but the bison were on a farm. Tomorrow we will start attending the country music shows that this town of Mountain View is famous for, and that should take care of the next 3 days!