We left West Helena at 9:30am and took a lunch break parking at a Church parking lot for lunch. As long as it is not a Sunday (today is Thursday) and there are no special services (funeral, wedding, religious holidays or private events) it is perfectly fine to stop at a Church or a school on weekends. This gives us a break from the hustle and bustle of a truck stop where trucks park dangerously close to you and you may not have room to pull out your slides. It is quiet and peaceful and you usually have a lot of clearance to go in and out without any hinderances.
Texarkana is the home of Marguerite Johnson aka Maya Angelou whose book Why the caged bird sings is a top seller.
Our campsite was along the beautiful shores of the Wright Pathan Lake. As always there were NO SWIMMING signs all over even though the heat was enough to make you ignore them. The grounds were beautiful and the park was full of deer. There was a lovely stream running behind our spot. Unfortunately unlike rivers and lakes in Canada, you cannot swim because of a chance of encountering crocodiles and alligators, no matter how hot the day and how enticing the waters.
We rode our bikes around the park among the deer and the ducks! What a beautiful site/sight.
When we want to take the bikes on the truck we unhook the bike from the Solitude’s 1 ½ inch hitch and use an adapter to make our bike hitch fit the truck’s 2” hitch. Our Rack attack Bike rack is more than 25 years old. Our two boys now 24 and 26 went to a play based school Froebel education Centre on Dundas and Mississauga Road from Kindergarten to Grade 8! Some parents got together and started a bike club for the kids. They made them T-shirts and called the club the “Mud Maniacs”. The T-shirts were printed with mud splashes on the back and you never could tell if the shirt was really muddy. I have never met more holistic, fun and open minded parents, in any other school or university since. We rode 10km each Wednesday evening 3 parents with 10 kids ranging in ages 6 to 12 through the Credit River Trail in Mississauga starting at Erindale Park just across from the school. Both our kids are still bike enthusiasts to this day preferring the bicycle to a car any day. For that reason they both live in Downtown cores, one in Ottawa and the other in Toronto.
Today, the spring that locks the rack in place (in three different angles), gave out. We decided to buy a simple bike blanket that swings behind the truck from a local Walmart. It was only $70 but such a nuisance to load the bikes on that we gave up. We decided to keep the receipt and return it in the next town.
In the mean time we decided to research some bike racks and buy one soon. We narrowed down our search to these three.
- Thule Easy Fold XT2
- Kuat NV2.0
- Thule T2 XTR Pro
The one store that carry these coming up on our trip is the Bass Pro Shop in Denham Springs, Louisiana – Let’s see who wins!
