BIG BEND trip
Oct. 14-21 2017
PART 1

To fight the forces of loom and doom, we burped out an encore of our 2011 trip to Big Bend National Park in Texas. You know what you're gonna do with these photos? Peep 'em. You always do.




I'd been trying to get this since the late 1980s. On I-71/75 south at Richwood, Ky., the KY 338 marker on the BGS was one of the state's last round 3-digit markers remaining on a BGS. It was probably posted in the 1970s and remained in 2017! Nobody except a Roads Scholar would notice or care.




On I-71 heading into Louisville, we detected this old car with a Trump sticker. Why would anyone who has to drive a 40-year-old car support Donald Trump, unless it's such a classic car that it's started appreciating in value? But it has an Ohio plate, so it's not Kentucky's problem.




On I-65 in Louisville, you can see the pictures of famous Kentuckians on the buildings. I think I got the one with Diane Sawyer before, but not the one with Colonel Sanders.




The guy on this billboard looks like Archie Bunker! We now return you to roads, already in progress.




Loretta Lynn! I think this is I-40 on the west side of Nashville.




Luyben Hills Road in Kingston Springs, Tenn.




West on I-40. I-840 - which bypasses Nashville well to the south of town - was practically a brand bippus-bustin' new Interstate. The 77-mile route was renumbered from TN 840 in 2016, though it was completed in 2012. The Tea Party - despite claiming to support reduced government spending - tries using I-840 as a justification for their costly and ridiculous eastern bypass plan around Cincinnati. Uh, Cincinnati isn't Nashville, geniuses. Besides, Cincinnati already has an eastern bypass. It's called I-275. Nashville didn't have an outer loop before I-840. Plus, the northern half of I-840 was killed for the same reasons that ought to nix Cincinnati's eastern bypass.




The stub at the end of I-840. The overpass is the ramp from I-840 to I-40 west.




Tennessee actually named a state park off I-40 for Nathan Bedford Forrest, a man who was involved in the Fort Pillow massacre and who later became a Ku Klux Klan leader. The park was established in 1929, but places outside Tennessee have built monuments to Forrest much more recently. Controversy has arisen about the naming of this park.




I-40 continues. This sign is for the Casey Jones Home (not the Casey Kasem Home). Casey Jones also inspired the "Through, through, through...He got the train through" segment on Sesame Street.




There's a Tina Turner museum!




Not exactly sure where this is, but they seem to be building a new exit off I-40 outside Memphis.




I-40 near Memphis with a Ronnie Milsap billboard.




This has to be that really bad traffic jam on I-40 in Memphis.




I think this is I-40/55 in West Memphis, Ark. Notice the white pickup on the right that's towing 2 cars.




On I-440, which bypasses Little Rock, Ark., we look up the Arkansas River to see Little Rock in the distance.




I-440 ends ahead and effectively becomes I-30. That intersection also births I-530, a spur to Pine Bluff. Clinton National Airport is Arkansas's biggest commercial airport. Its official name is Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport/Adams Field, named for the former President and First Lady and for George Geyer Adams, a city council member who was killed during his National Guard service. A 2013 survey ranked this airport the worst out of 67 American airports.




The exit from I-440 to Bankhead Drive is elevated and hits Bankhead in midair.




Martin Luther King Road at the edge of Malvern, Ark. Pretty sure this used to be US 270.




Interesting sunset on I-30 outside Texarkana, Ark.




I'm still not used to the idea of I-49 anywhere but Louisiana.




Busted, na na na na na na na na na na! (Sung to the tune of the Batman theme.) On I-30 at Mount Pleasant, Texas, you can see the police have someone pulled over.




I-30 in Rockwall, Texas. Rockwall County built its new courthouse on the suburban fringe instead of downtown? Not in my America!




I-30 in Garland, Texas. I can forgive Bass Pro Shops for getting its own road considering their bubble gum selection was better than that of Kroger or Walmart.




I-30 approaches Dallas.

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