Author: bbpeck

Bob and I left Little Rock, Arkansas, this morning to drive about 6 hours to Laurel, Mississippi. We have wanted to come to Laurel for a few years, as we are fans of the home renovation show “Home Town” and the hosts, Ben and Erin Napier, who do the home renovations.

We had a much flatter drive today than we had yesterday. This made Bob happy. We were also both happy that the rain and storms we thought we might be driving through did not pan out.

Our first stop in Laurel was the Visitor Center where we learned about other famous people from Laurel, MS.

We are staying at an Airbnb in Laurel as there weren’t any good hotel/motel options downtown. We were not able to check in until 4:00 pm, so we had a look around the downtown area while waiting, and had an unexpected find.

The best part of this part of our day is we got to see both Ben and Erin in his shop while they were shooting a tv episode! We were not allowed to take photos, but the staff member by the window where we looked in said that they renovate about 4 homes in the Laurel area every 8 weeks.

We were sent information about where to park and how to get into our Airbnb at 4:00 pm. We are here until 10 am on Saturday.

Bob and I are having a lazy, rainy Wednesday. Since the drive to Little Rock, AR, from Fayetteville was a little less than 3 hours, Bob and I had a leisurely morning in The Graduate Hotel in Fayetteville before getting on the road. Since we are staying at a Marriott property in Little Rock, we had requested a check in of 1:00 pm (versus the standard 3:00), and we learned after we had left that our room was ready and we would be able to check in early.

The initial part of the drive was rain-free, which was nice as we were coming through the mountains, but the last hour of the drive was wet.

We arrived a bit after 1:00 and were able to check in. We were in room 1517 in the last hotel and room 1518 here. Hopefully we don’t forget tonight and try to get into room 1517.

We have access to the Member Lounge here, so we headed there for a free lunch. We’ll be back tonight for a free dinner and tomorrow morning for a free breakfast before we head out for our 5 hour drive to Laurel, Mississippi.

It has been raining off and on since we arrived, so we have explored the large Little Rock Marriott Hotel, which is right downtown and has a convention center attached to it. We visited the city years ago shortly after the Clinton Presidential Museum opened to see that and downtown Little Rock, do some hiking in nearby state parks, and visit Hot Springs.

Some pics of the surrounding area.

And a few pics from our walk around the hotel, including a sign that caught our attention.

Bob didn’t realize he was that well known in Arkansas, but he’s definitely okay with it.😂. Actually, Google tells me there was a Sam Peck that ran a hotel in Little Rock that was a popular spot for journalists and dignitaries, and he is credited with bringing fine dining to Little Rock in the 1940s, so he could possibly be the source of the room name as well.

Feliz Cinco de Mayo! Bob and I spent the day exploring more of Fayetteville, Arkansas. With a population of over 100,000, Fayetteville is the second largest city in the state. It is located in the Ozark Mountains and is home to the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas.

Our goal for the day was to explore the university campus, but we saw some other highlights as well. The main “drag” to campus is called Dickson Street. It had a mix of bars, restaurants, retail, cultural structures. As we have found Fayetteville in general, it was definitely cleaner than many other campus areas we have visited.

Established in 1871, the U of A is the oldest publicly funded institution in the state. It has a student population of over 33,500 from all 50 states and over 120 countries. It has 10 colleges and schools that offer nearly 200 academic programs. We were impressed with the attractive campus, beginning from our first steps on the sidewalk leading to the Old Main Building.

From the university, we walked back to the Fayetteville Public Library that was closed when we saw it on Sunday to check out the inside of the building. It was bright and spacious, but I am hesitant to take photos inside libraries since getting scolded by a librarian in England. The library did have a great terrace though that we went out on.

Tomorrow we drive a short 3 hours to get reacquainted with Little Rock, Arkansas, for one afternoon/night. That was the plan anyway. There are storms forecasted for the next couple of days on our route of travel that we hope to avoid while driving but which may keep us inside when we get there.

This portion of our journey to Destin was to be based in Bentonville, Arkansas, instead of Fayetteville, but the hotel prices in Bentonville are pricier, so we opted to stay in Fayetteville and do a day trip to Bentonville. This way we are seeing a bit of both cities and getting another notch in our Graduate Hotel list.

Both cities have so far really impressed us with their natural beauty (rolling hills and lots of trees) and also with the cleanliness and attractiveness of their downtown areas.

One might say that Bentonville is the city that Sam Walton built. While the founder of Walmart didn’t physically build any buildings, his first self-named store is located there, the first Walmart store was located in the nearby Rogers, Arkansas, and the Walmart dollars continue to fund a lot of cultural activities in the area. We took advantage of some of these today.

At some point in his reading, Bob had learned about the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, which is supported by Walmart so that there is no entry fee. It sits on a beautiful wooded 134 acre campus near a creek that also houses the Heartland Whole Health Institute, the Alice Walton School of Medicine, and lots of walking and art trails throughout the grounds. The art museum was our goal for the day, but in planning our visit we also learned that there was a Frank Lloyd Wright designed building near the museum, so we started there this morning with a $12 per person guided tour. Self-guided tours are free.

We learned that the home was built for the Bachmans from designs by Frank Lloyd Wright, and the home was originally located in New Jersey. The house had four owners after being built, the last of which looked to have the house moved to save it as it had gone through several floods and two hurricanes. It was taken apart (without the extra rooms that had been added) and moved to a site near the museum and rebuilt 10 years ago to match Wright’s original design.

After the tour, we walked back to the Crystal Bridges Art Museum to look at the art. The art is impressive, but we loved the architecture of the building almost as much.

A few samples of some of the American art on display—

After we had looked through the museum and walked some of the trails, we drove into downtown Bentonville to the Walmart Museum which is located in the former Walton’s store.

The museum provided a good general overview of Sam Walton’s life and career. He was born in Kingfisher, Oklahoma in 1918, and at 13, he became the youngest Eagle Scout in Missouri. He met his wife Helen in Claremore, Oklahoma, where he was waiting to be called up for service. Another fun fact for us was that he started his retail career in Des Moines, Iowa, as a management trainee with J. C. Penney.

The store that the museum is located in was their second store, but the first one with their name, Walton. In this store he began using the new self-service method of retail which allowed customers to peruse aisles of goods instead of having to ask clerks for what they wanted.

He opened the first Walmart in 1962; however, he opened 17 variety stores before focusing exclusively on Walmart.

After a free breakfast at the Cyrus Hotel in Topeka this morning, Bob and I walked a couple of blocks to get a photo of the capitol of Kansas.

After our short walk in downtown Topeka, we headed out for a 4:25 hour drive to Fayetteville, Arkansas. It was an easy drive in good weather.

We did a walkabout near the hotel after we arrived.

Bob and I will spend 3 nights in Fayetteville.

Bob and I left Des Moines, Iowa, yesterday about mid-day to start our slow drive to Destin, Florida, for a family gathering and then a housesit. We were headed yesterday to Plattsmouth, Nebraska, just outside of Omaha to stay with Bob’s sister Shelli and her husband John. We drove I-80 out of Des Moines and started seeing signs for the Danish Windmill in Elk Horn, Iowa. We decided to take the short 6-mile detour off the interstate to check it out. It did not disappoint.

The information at the windmill talked about the efforts the community of 750 people made to raise $100,000 from 1975-77 to locate, purchase, move, and rebuild an authentic Danish windmill.

As a side note, Bob and I did a housesit in Pella, Iowa, a couple of years ago, which is home to a Dutch windmill.

Elk Horn is also home to a Danish museum and genealogy center. We had a lovely visit in the gift shop with a very personable clerk, and we bought some goodies to take to Bob’s sister and brother-in-law.

We had a great dinner and visit with Shelli and John. We did a load of laundry, and we caught up on their recent and upcoming travels as well as what their kids are up to. After dinner, we went to a nearby event space that just opened for some drinks and to listen to music. It was lovely.

This morning we had coffee and a light breakfast at Shelli and John’s before leaving to head towards Nebraska City and then on to Topeka. After almost having left my phone, which John found, and a bag of Bob’s, which John also found, they still had to call us back after a few minutes on the road, as Bob had left his coat there.

The second departure was successful, and we headed 30 minutes down the road to Nebraska City, Nebraska, to visit the Arbor Mansion. This is the home of Julius Sterling Morton, his wife, and his four sons, all of whom contributed a great deal to Nebraska and the country. Julius Sterling Morton (1832-1902) was a Nebraska newspaper editor and politician who served as the Secretary of Agriculture under President Grover Cleveland. He is credited with founding Arbor Day in 1872.

Each of the four sons were successful in business and/or railroads, but the most famous for most Americans might be Joy, the eldest, who founded the Morton Salt company, with the famous dark blue container with the logo of a little girl pouring salt under an umbrella as it rains.

The home and grounds are now part of a 72 acre park that includes the mansion, carriage house, gift shop and wine tasting room, tree adventure area, tree nursery, and a hotel and convention center.

After our walk through the mansion, carriage house, and gift shop, we headed on to Topeka, where we will spend the night. We arrived about 3:00 pm and were able to check in. Bob was thrilled to see his impressive status duly noted on the board behind the check-in desk of the Marriott Cyrus Hotel in downtown Topeka (haha).

Since it was early we decided to walk about 15-20 minutes to the Brown vs Board of Education museum.

Brown vs the Board of Education is a landmark Supreme Court decision in 1955 that mandated the desegregation of public schools in the United States. It was a combination of five separate lawsuits challenging segregation in states around the country. The museum is in Monroe School, the Topeka school challenging segregation. Other schools included in the lawsuit were from Delaware, the District of Columbia, South Carolina, and X.

One thing we read that we hadn’t thought about before as that Black teachers were against the lawsuit as they knew it would likely mean the loss of their jobs.

Today was our last day at our Rockridge housesit in Oakland, CA. It has been a lovely, relaxing housesit in a beautiful neighborhood in Oakland, which has allowed Bob’s new hip to “settle in.” We have also enjoyed our second sit for the loveable and oh so cute Spot, Rubie, and Kimchi.

We left the Rockridge housesit at 4:00 pm. We walked to the BART station to catch the 55 minute stress free ride to the San Francisco Airport. Once we were at the airport we caught the airport’s Air Train to the Grand Hyatt hotel at the airport to facilitate us catching an 8:00 am flight to Des Moines via Denver tomorrow.

We will be in Des Moines from Tuesday evening through midday Friday when we will start a leisurely drive to Destin, Florida.

It was another BART day for the Pecks. Today we rode the train 3 stops into Oakland ($2.55 each way) to walk to the Oakland Museum of California, which we had read about and was recommended to us by our homeowners. The museum tells the story of California in three parts — history, art, and natural sciences. Since there was a school group going through the natural sciences section, Bob and I spent our time in the first two parts.

The history exhibit started with a section called “Before the Other People Came,” which detailed the lives of the Native Anericans indigenous to California. It then went into the 1540s with the arrival of explorers, the rule of California by Spain and then Mexico, the population explosion in CA with the gold rush and the westward expansion of the US and the railroads, immigration (both us against natives and later us against newer immigrants), and, of course, the role of tourism, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley, as well how California was impacted by natural events like earthquakes as well as national and world crises. It was comprehensive but not overwhelming.

Immigrant issues version 1 — Immigrants against the Native Peoples. With a growing community greedy for land, vigilantes and the state militia mounted a violent campaign against Native Californians. They carried out massacres, captured people as slaves, and removed tribes from their lands.

In 1910, pioneer director D.W. Griffith arrived in CA with a film crew and actors. He made a 17 minute drama called “In Old California.” It was the first film made in Hollywood. Less than 10 years later, movies were one of the leading industries of CA.

Immigration issues version 2 — The US government has been less and then more and now again less welcoming to immigrants.

The art portion of the museum focused on land, people, and creativity. We stumbled on a big head for Bob (not literally, or that could have been pricey).

There was a multi picture exhibit for the Oakland artist Hung Liu (1948-2021). The museum noted that they had worked with her for many years after they acquired their first painting of hers in 1998.

Another part of CA history (and US history) was the internment of Japanese in camps during WWII. One of the 10 prison camps for these individuals was at the eastern base of the Sierra Mountains in Manzanar, CA. Some photographs taken by the photographer Dorothea Lange were exhibited in the art section of the museum.

After we finished perusing the art exhibits, we wandered out to the terrace for more art and good views of downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt. A sign on the terrace noted that when the terraced gardens opened in 1969 they were among the first rooftop gardens at a museum.

The past couple of days have been rainy here, so we have spent time with the pets, talking and texting with family, and finalizing some travel and housesitting plans for the next few months. We now have scheduled pretty much settled through the start of September. We confirmed 2 sits in the past couple of days, one for cats in Florida at the end of May and one for an older dog in Pennsylvania in June.

Today is bright and about as warm as it’s been for a while, so we headed north (away from downtown Oakland and San Francisco) two stops on the BART yellow line to the lovely community of Lafayette. It is a suburban city of about 25,000 on the other side of the Berkeley Hills from Oakland. We spent a good couple of hours or so exploring its pretty downtown and walking around the Lafayette Reservoir.

Mount Diablo Road is the main thoroughfare through Lafayette, where most of the retail and restaurants are located. The following are some pics from along this road. Within a few blocks, they have the options to get groceries at Safeway, Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and a local high-end store called Diablo Foods.

While Bob was looking around town, especially the grocery stores, I walked about 25 minutes to the Lafayette Reservoir and then walked the lovely, paved, almost 3 mile trail around the reservoir. It was a popular spot for walkers, dog walkers, and moms pushing strollers.

The reservoir is maintained as a domestic water supply, so swimming and wading are prohibited, but visitors can rent boats, fish (with a permit), and enjoy scenic views of Mount Diablo.

Some pics from the walk —

As we move around, we travel with tech for communicating with family, keeping up with the news, taking and storing photos, and doing the blog. We each have a phone. We share an iPad, although I mostly just use it for the blog, and I have a computer, as I used to do online work. Bob noticed the other day that the iPad was starting to have issues due to lack of available space, and since it has been a number of years (We can’t remember how many.) since we have purchased a new iPad and we have added additional memory a few times already, Bob decided it was time for a new one.

The closest Apple Store to the current house was in Berkeley, about 5 miles away — a 30 minute bus ride or almost a 2 hour walk. We decided to ride the bus to the store. On the way, we went down busy College Avenue that runs from the University of California campus all the way through downtown Rockridge. It is a mix of retail, restaurants, and culture.

At our bus stop, Bob went to the Apple Store to buy the new iPad, get the data transferred, etc., and then would catch the bus back. I got off the bus and immediately began the long walk back to the house, as I just can’t deal with tech stores and pricey purchases. My walk only took a little over 90 minutes, and I beat Bob back. The walk was mostly through residential areas, but I found a few things that caught my eye.

This morning I headed off to Panoramic Hill in Claremont Canyon to see the views and then check out some of the local book stores on College Avenue as I walked back to Rockridge through Berkeley. Bob went to Trader Joe’s to pick up some groceries for dinner tonight, but more on that later.

Claremont Canyon is 208 acres of preserved land above Berkeley, land that once served as an important communication and transportation route. In 1858 part of a transcontinental telegraph line was strung through the canyon, and in the early 1860s, Pony Express riders carried mail along this route. In the early 20th century, the canyon was used for cattle grazing, dairy farming, and minor quarrying. Today, the land is set aside for hiking and horseback riding with views west to San Francisco Bay.

A few pics from my walk up to the top of Panoramic Hill and then back down into Berkeley.

Every Friday, our homeowners are the neighborhood delivery site for Sea Forager, a sustainable fish delivery service. The seafood is delivered about 3:00 pm into a cooler at the top of the driveway, and subscribers have until 8:00 pm to pick up their order. About 9:00 pm, the homeowners (us while we’re here), remove any packages of fish that weren’t picked up. The homeowners (us) can either eat it themselves or offer it to other neighbors.

Yesterday there was one package that was not picked up. It was enough shrimp for a meal for two, so Bob is making us shrimp pasta tonight. Not a bad perk!