Walking in the rain

Everyone was gone when we woke up at the campground today. After our cup of coffee, we got everything ready to go and by the time we were ready to leave, several other RVs were already arriving for the day.

We drove about 130 miles on the Trace today. We made several stops along the way and learned a lot more about the history of the Trace and what life was like for the people who once traveled this trail on foot.

We are fascinated with the bright colors of all the wildflowers here. The yellows, reds, pinks, and purples offer a spectacular contrast to all the green everywhere. Every possible shade of green in nature is present here.

We passed the halfway point at milepost 249.6 where post riders from Natchez and Nashville would meet to exchange mailbags for their return trip. From here, it would take five days for mail to arrive in Nashville TN, and seven days to get to Natchez MS.

At milepost 266 we stopped at the Tupelo visitor center, where they have lots of educational information about the Trace. On a lighted map of the Trace we saw the “you are here” spot and saw that we were getting close to the Alabama border. After Tupelo we noticed how the terrain changes, suddenly there are more hills and curves on the Trace.

The Trace crosses the state line into Alabama at milepost 308.9. We got off the Trace and drove east towards Tuscumbia AL to Spring Park.


Spring Park is a very pretty park with a playground, pavilions, stages, and restaurants. Walking around the park we saw the world’s largest manmade natural stone waterfall and some pretty amazing statues in remembrance of the Trail of Tears.


At the park someone directed us to the Helen Keller house and because it didn’t sound too far we decided to walk there. Little did we know it was a couple miles each way, going up hill some of the way. On the way back it started raining on us. This was quite the adventure for us.






Back at the park we saw a huge fountain with a center jet that shoots over a hundred feet into the air. On weekend evenings they have a water show with color lights, choreographed to the music of Alabama's artists. Tonight the show started at 8 pm, lasted about half an hour, and it was very nice.

A park employee who had stopped to talk to us earlier, gave us some info about the area and said it would be ok for us to spend the night in the park. We found a spot in a corner of the back lot and we parked for the night.