Well, what a day. Learned and saw a lot. As we drove through the northeast corner of LA discovered we were in the agricultural center. Center of what we aren't sure but for as far as you can see are crops, crops, crops. Wheat, corn, rice, soybeans for sure. Something else that was newly planted that may have been cotton. We saw three crop dusters and lots of small rural towns. Home health seems to be big business here as well as agriculture. Moving into Assembly of God and/or Jehovah's Witnesses country. Churches in every little town.
As we drove along it became forest in LA and as we crossed over to Arkansas. Culminates in Crossett AR the home of Georgia Pacific. It is huge, one large industrial complex after another for plywood, tissue, paper, lumber, etc. It goes on forever. Very smelly but it must employ a lot of people. By the way, you don't see Mexican sections in any towns. All of the road crews, etc. that we passed were all white people. So this may warrent some further investigation. Compared to FL, you would expect a lot of Mexicans working the crops. Of course, none of them ready for harvest at this point. But still no Spanish signs, stores, etc. By the way--a cord of wood is a stack 8 ft by 8 ft by 4 ft. One cord makes 7,500,000 toothpicks. One learns all kinds of interesting stuff doesn't one?? Like it took an act of the legislature to pronounce Arkansas as Ark an saw. One group wanted Ar kansas and another wanted it to be spelled Arkansaw.
We crossed the Quachita River and Lake Jack Lee which was flooded almost up to the road.
We essentially had the road to ourselves all day. There is no traffic and great 2-lane or divided highways throughout.
Onward to El Dorado, AR which claim to fame is oil wells and refining. We had lunch in this little place - Johnnie B's with CocaCola stuff all over. Seems to be some dispute about which oil well was first, biggest, etc. in Arkansas. Didn't even know there was oil in Arkansas.
But learned all about it at the Arkansas Museum of Natural Resources. They definitely need to change the name. Only us and one other couple in the whole place. It is fabulous. Maybe it should be called the Oil Boom Museum or something. One section on why there is oil in Arkansas (short version-ocean receded) and the other on Smackover which was the oil boom town in the 20s. Smackover came from Sumac Cover which is what Indians named the area. There was so much in this museum. For instance you can stand in a room like you are in center of earth looking out at oil fields around the globe. There is a hall that is a vertical version of the earth core that led to the oil fields at Smackover, and a section that is a reproduction of the stores, etc in Smackover during the oil rush. Lots of audio and video too. It is really great. Lots of pictures but just posting one because signal is very weak here. It is of the "trailer" the goat woman used. She was an entertainer that played 7 instruments at once. She came to the oil rush to entertain and stayed to raise goats. Never saw anything like this vehicle that she lived in.
Left there and on to a state forest that includes White Oak Lake. Absolutely gorgeous. See picture of view from our site. Going to stay another day. Our RV neighbor invited Jack to go out on his boat to fish. He is very excited. Will let you know tomorrow if they catch anything.
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