Deviations on a Theme Bent and Mangled by the Two of Us

The plan was to arrive early Monday afternoon in Fayetteville, after a leisurely drive from Hot Springs Village. A very rough, almost sleepless Sunday night, though, argued against both an early Monday departure and a straight-through drive to Fayetteville. So, we took it easy. And we figured we would still get to Fayetteville relatively early in the day. But by the time we got to the turnoff to visit a few Arkansas wineries (Weidekhr, Post, etc.), I was absolutely exhausted. I told my IC I needed to take a 20-minute cat-nap. So, I pulled off the road at the entrance to an RV park near the entrance to a winery, locked the doors, kept the car running, and closed my eyes. An hour an a half later, I awoke in a confused panic. I thought I was at a stoplight and had fallen asleep while waiting for the light to turn green; as I said, I was in a confused panic. After I got my bearings, though, we decided to drive to the Post winery restaurant (the Weidekhr place was closed) for lunch. It, too, was closed. But we did partake of a wine tasting, each of us sampling six dry wines. A few were quite good; the rest were acceptable. After drinking lunch, we hit the road again, enjoying candy bars as  dessert.

We got to Fayetteville and wandered a bit, taking a look at the UU church there and otherwise slinking around. Then, we went for an early dinner at Doe’s Eat Place, where we shared a monstrous porterhouse and a bottle of Freakshow cabernet sauvignon, make with grapes from Lodi. After dinner, we went back to our motel (an extraordinarily cheesy Best Western), where we had a shot of high-end tequila and went to bed relatively early. I tried to log on to my computer, but the miserable piece of rotted plastic and magnetic dust would not cooperate. So, I did not even blog yesterday. Not a bit. Argh!  Again Monday night, I slept very, very poorly; I tossed and turned all night. If I got three hours sleep, I’d be extremely surprised. I woke feeling a little like I’d been pinned under a Greyhound Bus overnight. I took a shower in a miserable excuse for a bathtub/shower and dried myself while hoping I would not slip on the dangerously ugly and useless floor.

This morning, we had a superb breakfast at First Watch, then hit the road toward Fairfield, Iowa. We had not made a reservation for the night, figuring it would be easy. But a few hours before we would have arrived, we tried to make hotel reservations. Nothing was available in Fairview, nothing in Ottumwa, nothing in Mount Pleasant…nothing! So, after a number of dead ends, we opted to try Des Moines, the state capital and largest city within easy driving distance. We finally scored a room at a Hampton Inn at the Des Moines airport. On the way there, just after crossing the Missouri state line into Iowa, we stopped at the Amish Welcome Center, where my IC spied an Amish family riding in a horse-driven cart. She pointed and said, “Look, Amish!” For reasons that were easier to experience and understand than to explain, that was incredibly funny. We joked back and forth about being in other circumstances, seeing local natives, and pointing to them: “Look, Cajuns!” “Look, Mexicans!” “Look, Texans!”

Dinner on Tuesday was Mexican at a restaurant just a few blocks from the airport motel. And here we are.  There was probably much more. But I’m writing this a capella and, so, I am leaving out what I don’t remember or forgot to ask about.

Tomorrow (Wednesday), we’ll try to see what Fairview looks like. We have no idea where we’ll stay tomorrow night. We may not stick around Fairview as long as we’d planned. Perhaps we’ll zip up to Decorah, maybe even as far as Minnesota and try to catch up with a friend who’s attempting to outrun us before she circles back to Fairview.

This trip has been interesting, if not especially fruitfull, thus far. We left Fayetteville this morning before getting out to see a tiny musical house, but we vowed to return to Fayetteville in the not-too-distant future to take alonger, more indepth look around.