Stupid is as Stupid does..

Day Four, Thurdsay in Vicksburg Mississippi

Jeff got up about 03:30am... Guess he had to pee from that 5 gallon bucket of ice water he drank at supper last night. So, now we are both up! We decided to attempt to outsmart mother nature by leaving ASAP and ride through what was left of the storms and make it over to Oklahoma on the back side of it. That was our first mistake..

We packed up, well... Wait, I was packed up and ready to go by 4:30. Jeff on the other hand was taking his own sweet time trying to find all his stuff and then re-pack it... And I'll say it again "I wish Becky was here". So, I had time to run up the street to get some trash bags and some duct tape. Needed to engineer something to keep my boots dry.. And I did! It worked (for the most part). So, Jeff finally gets all his "Stuff" packed on his bike and we are ready to hit the road.. 05:00 or so now. It was DARK!! Raining, and windy... "Stupid is as Stupid does" Leaving in this was our second mistake.

We headed out on to I20 at Vicksburg which sits right on the eastern edge of the Mississippi river, which Jeff had never been across. We crossed it in the dark, so he didn't get the full experience...Oh well, we have to cross it again to get home. As we cruised down I20 the rain is getting harder every mile we head west. We have about 70 miles to go to get to Monroe LA where we turn north off the "Big Road".. About 50 miles into the ride today we hit a single lane construction.. I look back, to keep an eye on Jeff and I really can't see him.. He has slowed WAY down. I slowed down so, he could catch me.. At the very next exit I pull off into a truck stop to see if he's ok. He really couldnt see through his windshield, and needed to clean it off. We decided that we should just wait till it got light before we continued on.... The only "smart" decision we had made so far.

Dawn showed us her crack about 7:30... And we felt it was bright enough for us to continue west/NW... So off we go. Still raining, windy and cold, but we are determined! Got past Monroe LA and turned north onto hwy 15.. Going to take that up to El Dorado Ark.. This was a Gorgeous little road, full of curves and hills, old buildings and quaint little towns very fun to ride! Did I mention it was still raining? Well, it was... Still... Kinda put a damper on the ride, but we were gonna have a good time no matter what. Oh and by the way my trash sack/duct tape engineering is working great on my boots! As we crossed into Arkansas I didn't stop to get a picture by the sign. It was pouring.. Seriously! so we kept riding. We pulled into a gas stop at El Dorada AR after two solid hours of riding in the cold, windy rain storm.. "Stupid is as Stupid does". The people in this little town were nice, out going and all thought we were insane riding motorcycles in this weather(they were right).. So, after a short warm up/dry out we decided to change direction to attempt to get out of this BULL SHIT weather.. So, we headed west down hwy 82 towards Texarkana Texas. As you might have guessed Jeff ain't never been to Texas, so why not!

The theory was that the farther west we ride the lighter the rain would get.. Yeah, that was the theory. The sky was getting lighter, but the rain was getting harder, and just it looked like it was letting up, it would pour again. . I had my rain suit on, but it couldn't keep up. I had water going down my back, my front, my crotch...down my legs.. I was soaked. But we kept on riding, only had 90 miles to go to get out of this.. As we pulled into Texarkana the sky's parted and we could see blue sky!! We had been delivered! Pulled into a gas stop to get fuel, dry off and check in with family and emails. Went to get my phone out of the "sealed" pocket of my rain suit and my phone was dripping with water. It was dead!! DAMNIT!!! So much for the sealed part.. Oh well, Jeff's phone still works so we let everyone know to just use his phone till I get mine replaced. The sun is out now... So, we took off for Oklahoma. We turned north at Paris Texas and would cross the Red River into God's Country soon.

The sun was out, it was beautiful!! A nice change to the previous 300 miles we had rode in the Rain!! Crossed the Res River and stopped at the OKLAHOMA sign for pictures.. WE MADE IT!! going to be in Oklahoma city tonight!

We pulled into a casino convenience store just outside Hugo OK to get gas and give everyone updates. About 30 min later the sky's darkened once again and we had a huge storm bearing down on us.. We mounted up and roared out of there racing ahead of the storm. Instead of taking back roads into the storm, I took us up the Indian Nations Turnpike towards I40. About 100 miles due north. We skirted along the edge of that storm for the full 100 miles. Got off the turnpike to get gas right at I40.. Time to head west into Oklahoma City, we are so close now.. Only 90 miles to go!! But that storm was in our way. We rode 20 miles west to Okemah OK then pulled off to put our rain get on yet again..

We were tired of riding in the rain! Took a look at the weather while stopped in Okemah, looked at the radar to see what we were in for. As luck would have it there was a gap between the storm cells so we decided to stay there and wait. Just happened to be a Mexican food place across the street, and an abandoned gas station with an awning that we could park the bikes under.. Things are looking up!

After supper we went back to the bikes and in just a few min the rain stopped.. We had an option to stay put as there was a Days Inn right there but I wanted to get to Oklahoma City! It was only 70 miles... We decided to shoot the gap and pray that we made it! We headed west down 1-40.... In the Dark, but it wasn't raining! We cruised into the hotel just north of the Will Rogers Airport at 9:30pm.. 5 States, 600 miles and 14 hours of riding.. and we made it!!

Going to go visit my Mom today... And Jeff is going to pass off his HD flag..,we head up Route 66 towards Tulsa later today.