Shawnee is where my brother Tim went to college at St. Gregory's College. It's a small little town so I had no problem finding the campus.
After that quick visit I went to a mexican restaurant for lunch and texted Tim the picture of his old stomping grounds. He sent back something saying that was pretty cool and that I should eat at Abulitas, the best Mexican food in town. I looked out the window at the sign and saw that I was already there. Awesome.
After lunch, I had to take a hard look at the map and calendar. If I'm to have a chance to get home and have a day or two to just relax before I have to go back to work, I need to really push hard. I had already planned on blowing through Arkansas without stopping for anything but gas (what is there really to see in Arkansas anyway? Nothing, that's what) but the more I looked at the distance I still had to go and the time I had left, I realized that I would have to more or less do the same through Tennessee. This disappointed me because I was really looking forward to exploring Tennessee's music and BBQ scenes. It didn't look like that was going to happen now, or at least not happen to the extent I had hoped. I'd just have to make the best of it I guess.
I got on I40 and headed east. It really was about as boring as this map makes it look.
The most exciting thing that happened was when one truck would try to pass another truck while only going 1 or 2 MPH faster the truck it was passing. Usually both trucks would be going about 60 or so. The speed limit was 70 so I was typically going 85 or so. Hence the "excitement". That's really about it I'm sorry to say.
I pulled into West Memphis at about 8:30 or so. After checking into my hotel I looked up a BBQ place called Ray's World Famous BBQ and called to make sure they were still open. The guy who answered had an accent so thick I couldn't make out what he was saying. Eventually I gathered that he was asking me what I wanted for a to go box (the only thing they were still serving I think). I said ribs and the guy said a few more unintelligible things and eventually hung up. I went down to this place to (I hoped) pick up my ribs. Outside the restaurant was a cat who was clearly used to getting scraps and looked up at me as if to say "how dare you not feed me". He probably peed on my bike while I was inside.
I got my to go box back to the hotel and found true happiness with each bite. No wonder Ray is world famous.
That's about it for the day. Tomorrow is Nashville and hopefully lunch with Shaun's (my brother) friend, Mary Jean and then Knoxville, hopefully stopping for the night somewhere east of there.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:West Memphis, TN
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