The Day Started So Well

October 1, 2023 – Day 3

We’re sure there are better ways to wake up than sunrises with alpacas. We’re also sure that list isn’t very long.

They look so hungry, let’s feed them!

Then we headed to a well anticipated rest at the Dr. Edmund Babler State Park in Missouri. It would be our third day of about 400 miles. Easy, right?

Nope. I-70 was punishing, brutal concrete or sometimes tar surface unevenly patched with whatever they could find, be it concrete or tar. We felt like we had been flogged nearly to death. It was relentless heaves and pot holes. Susan lasted about 60 miles and wanted out. Immediately if not sooner. We came upon a rest area and plotted our escape. Paul found Route 40 that parallels I-70W. Speed limits would be 50 to 60, but that’s all we were doing on I-70W so no loss of time there. It is the worst stretch of road we’ve ever driven on. We both like have a bit of “no Interstate” when we can to see more of the USA. We couldn’t make the detour fast enough.

On Route 40, the first town was Cambridge City. It had quaint buildings with great edifices and cool modern murals.

At a traffic light I noticed this building and snapped a photo.

Notice the “National Road” in the name, we kept on seeing National Road.

The National Road (also known as the Cumberland Road)[1] was the first major improved highway in the United States built by the federal government. … In the 20th century with the advent of the automobile, the National Road was connected with other historic routes to California under the title, National Old Trails Road. Today, much of the alignment is followed by U.S. Route 40 (US 40), with various portions …

National Road

So we were driving through corn fields that were well past their prime. Indeed, we later saw them being plowed under.

More murals!

We eventually had to get back on I-70. We stopped for gas and spoke with some other RVer’s who assured us that I-70 west of Indianapolis wasn’t as bad. They were right, it wasn’t as bad, but it wasn’t good either.

We crossed the Mississippi River and saw The Arch!

The time stamp on this photo was 5:41pm Central Time Zone. Way later than we wanted it to be. We had expected to be in camp and setup long before that point. We were seven hours on the road, some of it the worst road we’ve ever driven and we still had a little more than an hour to drive to get to the campground. In rush hour traffic in St. Louis. We were getting tired. And cranky. And hungry. And just wanted to be D.O.N.E. for the day.

We pulled into Babler State Park in Wildwood, MO but had a hard time finding where the campsites were. It is a very large park and there were a few options. We knew it had one and only one dumpsite (here we go again!). We really needed to dump and get some fresh water because we would be there 3 days. Paul saw a possibility, walked over to it and found that it wasn’t. We didn’t want to drive incase we were wrong. Remember we’re about 55′ so turning around is hard. Backing up is impossible unless we unhook the Jeep.

We figured out where the dump station was and took care of “life maintenance.” It near dark when we started filling the water tank we’d need for 3 days of dry camping. We couldn’t back into the site until the water was in. The setup is one potable outlet for a dead end with about 1/2 dozen campsites. To fill from our site we’d need another 50 feet of hose which we didn’t have.

Susan was trying to find something quick to eat while Paul was patiently waiting for the tank to fill. Some parks have water pressure that is high and the tank fills fast. Babler had the opposite problem, it was low and slow. Paul decided to multi-task and unhooked the Jeep while the tank was filling.

The camp host stopped by to check in on us and lit our campsite with the golf cart headlights so we could park. That was really nice of him. Asked if we needed anything.

It was now well after 8pm. We were both beyond exhausted and famished. Susan had found some freeze dried meals from our tent days (susan here: I figured might as well bring them but thinking we wouldn’t use them. Sure was glad to have them. I think we’ll always have a couple on board for those horror show days.) And you know what, that was exactly what we needed, a hot dinner that took only a few minutes to make and some liquid.

Oh, and one more thing. I-70 was so bad (how bad was it!?) Some of the wood trim in the bedroom pulled its screws loose and flopped forward bending the ceiling fan! For now we have a couple clamps holding things in place and we’ll deal with it when we get to Phoenix. We didn’t fare much better. We’d planned to hit St. Louis the next day. However when morning came we chose to sleep in, rest and explore the Wildwood area.

We’ve vowed to never again arrive this late (we’ll see how long that lasts). Honestly, we have no idea how this happened but we think it was 30 minutes here, 30 minutes there, some bad traffic and all of a sudden we were 3 hours late.

Daily: 396

Total: 1,163

Miles/Day: 388

mpg: 7.81