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TALES FROM THE WEST TEXAS DUST 10/24/2000
ON I-30 EN ROUTE TO TEXARKANA (SPECIAL)--Some trips that I take personally don't usually start out as ones that I would normally write home about; but when the irresistable urge hits for me to do so, I have no choice. Such was the case when I headed towards Hot Springs, AR for the Feast of Tabernacles and the one reason in my life why I would be so compelled to take a vacation more than anything else. It had been a long and rough bus ride going through the night from my home base of Plainview to Dallas--and needless to say, it was especially crowded on the Greyhound bus between Abilene and Fort Worth with hardly a spare seat to house the several items of carry-on baggage that I was taking to Hot Springs. When the bus finally hit the city lights of Dallas sometime before dawn, I was glad for once to take a much needed extended layover to check my balance on my ATM card and make a withdrawal that I would need to pay for my motel room later on that night as well as eat some of the groceries that I had brought with me as food for the trip that I had bought before I left Plainview. After getting myself somewhat situated and then finding out that my bus would not leave for another two hours, I was still definitely wondering what surprizes and divine appointments were waiting for me the further east I went-- especially for a tired traveler like myself who would have just been satisfied with the ability to sleep well on buses (in which has never been my case). When my bus leaving for Hot Springs finally left Dallas around noontime and headed east on I-30 towards Mesquite, it was not easily apparent about a special treat that lay ahead of me. It's hard to tell much, anyway, when all you see are the signs of city life passing you by at about 70 miles per hour and one of your primary thoughts and prayers is wishing that this bus would stop at some store that might take Food Stamps before you cross the Arkansas state line. So it was even more suprising to me when the bus driver, instead of staying on I-30, decided to take the long way around and give me a scenic tour of East Texas that some people might otherwise pass by on the Interstate Our detour starts in Commerce as we go on State Highways 26 & 50. Along the way, we passed by the campus of Texas A&M-- |
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