My First Adventure

Hi! It’s Flat Nathan.

I went on a long trip with Papa and Fisch. We left Lonsdale, Arkansas, early on Friday morning (March 6). The weather was warm, about 70 degrees. The truck smelled a little “skunky”. We were carrying a load of skunks to Dillon, Montana. Yes, I said a load of skunks. My papa is a trapper.

Papa was driving, and he stopped at the Oklahoma line while Fisch took our picture. The weather was still warm. We went through a lot of toll roads. Papa griped about them.

We drove to the Kansas state line and took another picture.

We stopped at a Bass Pro Shop in Kansas so Papa could spend his Christmas gift card that he had gotten from Amanda. He bought some shirts while Fisch took my picture with some of the animals. I had fun.

By the time we got in to Colorado, it was cold. We spent the night in Denver. We left on Saturday morning and started seeing snow. We had to go through some more toll roads…three short ones for $2.50 each. Papa really griped about them! When we got out of the city we started seeing some pronghorns.

Next we drove through Wyoming.

In the Medicine Bow Mountain range just west of Laramie, there was a giant snowstorm. We saw an 18-wheeler that was turned over on its side. The roads were slick and the wind was blowing hard. This slowed down our travel time, but we did not have any trouble.

We were driving Papa’s new truck. It has 4-wheel drive. Papa got a new truck for Christmas. It came with a 3 months free trial of the Sirius XM radio. Papa loved it! My Mom and Dad bought Papa a 1-year subscription to it. Country music is the only kind of music that Papa listens to. Fisch and I like old time rock and roll, but not Papa. It’s country… all country, all of the time. So thanks to Mom and Dad, Fisch and I got to hear a lot of old, dead people singing country music. Although, I did think Monsters Holiday by Buck Owens was very funny. We saw some more pronghorns and a few elk, and a lot of snow. Papa and I tried to get Fisch to make a snow angel, but she said "no".

By the time that we got into Idaho, the weather was good. There was still a lot of snow on the ground.

We saw two bears going up a mountain. They were too far away to take a picture. We saw mule deer, pronghorns, elk, and magpies. Magpies are really cool looking. Papa tried to catch two of them. He wanted to take them home and name them Heckle and Jeckle.

We ran into another snowstorm close to the Montana state line. We made it to Dillon, Montana, around 6:30 p.m. This was our destination.

Here we spent the night at the home of Dr. Nettles and his wife Charlotte. Charlotte had made pheasant dumplings for dinner they were excellent. We had a very pleasant visit. The next morning, we unloaded the skunks and headed back home. We wanted to go home through South Dakota so that we could see Mt. Rushmore. But after looking at the weather report, Papa thought that it would be best to go home by the southern route. We headed south, crossed back through Idaho into Utah.

My papa had been to 35 of the 50 states. Counting up those states was just one of the games that we played on this trip. He had not been to Utah. Now he can’t say that anymore.

Now, he has been to 36 states. We saw the Great Salt Lake, then we drove through Salt Lake City. We saw some very steep mountain passes, salt mining, and coal mining. We spent the night in Price, Utah. We visited a cool dinosaur museum.

The next morning we ate breakfast at McDonald’s. (I wonder whose choice that was? Ha, ha!) There we saw Ronald McDonald’s train.

Then we got back into Colorado and headed south towards Pueblo. We got to the headwaters of the Arkansas River. It had beautiful clear water, and there were a lot of people fly-fishing there. You could wade across it in hip boots. We saw more snow, a coyote, and some elk that were eating out of a hay storage place. (I bet that they were not supposed to be there.) In southern Colorado we saw a lot of desert type of ground. We saw prairie dogs and pronghorns.

We even passed through a sand storm between the Colorado and Kansas state line. We crossed back into Kansas and spent the night in Garden City. In Kansas, we saw some gigantic feedlots, a lot of wheat fields and pheasants. Going south, we passed through the Oklahoma panhandle and into Texas.

We went to Shamrock, Texas, but we did not find any leprechauns. We hit Interstate 40 and drove all of the way across Oklahoma. We stopped and ate lunch at Santa Fe Steakhouse. It was cool. We ate peanuts and through our hulls on the floor. Some ladies from the red hat club were there and one of them took a picture for us. That’s me on the bull.


Next stop was the Arkansas state line and the Visitor’s Center. Now that was our Arkansas tax dollars at work! Our Visitor’s Center is something to be proud of. We drove through a rainstorm in Clarksville, but it was clear when we turned down Hwy 9 at Morrilton and headed to Papa and Fisch’s house to spend the night.

It was quite a trip: 3710 miles in 5 days, two snowstorms, a sandstorm, and a rainstorm! You never know what you might get in to with Fisch and Papa! Thanks for taking me on my first big adventure. Stay tuned! Maybe I will go to Pennsylvania next and ride back to Arkansas with NayNay and my 3 cousins.

Thanks!
Flat Nathan