Friday, March 9 - Happy March Break to all, especially teachers and students who have to put up with each other day in and day out. You deserve a break for sure. Have a great week.

We are now just outside of Texarkana, on the Arkansas side, having spent the day churning down the highways and biways from Austin. All has gone well, with fairly heavy truck traffic, but not overly so. We escaped the interstate for awhile, bypassing Dallas, so that made it a little more pleasant. Found a nice r.v. park, and Gail made a great dinner (gumbo supreme).

We enjoyed our last day in Austin by biking (surprise!) over the river, parked our bikes, locked 'em up, and did a fairly major walk around the downtown area. Headed west on 5th street to the Whole Foods store, which is one of the best grocery stores anywhere. Many choices for lunch, so we did it there, despite the abundance of tempting food trucks in the area. Then we walked back east, then north to the Capital to have a look around the grounds. Inspected the huge monument to those who fell (on the Confederate side) during the Civil War. Offsetting it, though, is an equally impressive monument to African Americans, so I guess it's balanced out. We finished off the afternoon biking along the river on both sides again, a nice 10 mile ride. Great biking. Never saw so many fine young bodies, male and female, doing their thing along the trail.

The town is getting ready for Fiesta, which is a huge event throughout the downtown area. There will be music on every corner for several days, and lots of hootin' and hollerin' to go with it. It's pretty chaotic, as traffic is snarled, many streets are closed, and thousands of people come for the fun. This is the start of College Week, one of three, so there'll be loads of young people celebrating. Good time for old people to make their escape, although it would have been fun to take in some of the music.

Speaking of which, on Wednesday night we went back to Saxon's Pub, to listen to a band led by Walt Wilkens. Give him a listen if  you can find him on Spotify. Good sounds, and they had a lot of fun on stage. Three nights in a row of clubs, so we took it easy last night, going back to Uncle Willy's for the fourth night in a row. Guess we qualify as okay, as the bartender gave us a pair of nice beer glasses as souvenirs. Met a young guy there who works for the ball team in Corpus Christie, a farm team of the Astros. He's really excited with his job, which is to do video and editing for the manager/coaches/players. Because his team did so well at supplying players to the Astros, they will all, him included, be getting World Series rings. He can hardly wait, like a kid before Christmas.

Below, Gail along the Colorado River in the middle of Austin. We had great riding and were so lucky to be located in Austin where we were, having such immediate access to the city. Came to believe that Austin is one of our favorite cities.

That's our update. Tomorrow we head for Memphis, where we may stay tomorrow night. All for now. Stay tuned. More later.