Oops!

First, has our jinx ended, not really, it has just slowed down. We arrived at our campground ready to ride, only to discover the Ford we tow had a completely dead battery. This has never happened before. Fortunately, Mike had previously figured out that the battery was stashed in the trunk, under the spare tire, under the floor and mat, under two heavy e-bikes. Getting into a totally dead vehicle with no working keypad was just the beginning. Once inside, we had no clue how to open the liftgate to get the bikes out and reach the battery to charge it. We own what is probably the only car in history that has NO owner’s manual. There is nothing in print, nothing online, no PDF, nothing. The only way to find information is through the car’s entertainment screen, which is, of course, dead when the battery’s dead. Brilliant.

I searched on the internet and it said “this model year has no owner’s manual”. Super helpful. Mike had to crawl into the backseat and try prying off a plastic cover we found on the liftgate, all this while twisted around the e-bikes that were jammed in. Remember, we’re not 20 anymore. Removing the plastic cover didn’t help at all. Eventually, he wrestled the bikes out through the passenger door, we got to the battery from inside the car, and managed to charge it. It would have been a whole lot easier if the battery was under the hood, or if the liftgate mechanism was accessible and not a mystery. Thank goodness Mike had scoped out the battery’s weird location ahead of time. I’d have never found it.

Then came laundry day when we managed to fill the grey water tank. Mike ran out to drain it, and came back in saying the phrase I now dread: “We have a problem.” The latch on the water access locker would not open. We tried every trick YouTube had to offer, including drilling holes into it. Remember we just had the outside paint touched up, drilling holes felt really good 🙃. Mike took apart another locker to figure out how the mechanism worked. Eventually, he just drilled bigger holes! He finally got the compartment open and swapped in the latch from the propane locker, which has no floor and which we rarely use. Mike can access the propane locker lock mechanism by lying on his back under the RV. Not ideal, but it works for now. A new lock is on the way.

So far we’ve had issues with the car, the RV, and then our cycling in Little Rock got cut short because our chosen routes were under water. We have just been told where the tornado shelter is at our new campground because more bad weather is predicted. Lovely.

So how about the good news. Little Rock was a pleasant surprise. Yes, the trails were flooded, but we stayed right downtown by the river and had a great time. The city’s done a super job with its waterfront, bike trails, various types of parks, outdoor theatres, and more.

We found statues all over town, bronze children, Asian art, and more. One called “Touch the Sky” really stood out for me. In the background of the photo you can see an old railway bridge that has been converted for pedestrians and cyclists. Great idea except the elevator looked like it had been closed for a long time. Another favorite was this one-ton turtle statue. The turtle signifies longevity. The eight turtles on the mother’s back signify strength of family and unity. Way better than yet another statue of a politician. It reminded me of Europe

After Little Rock, we moved north to Fayetteville and camped there. On arrival I didn’t impress the campground owner when I didn’t know which sport the local Razorbacks played. I first guessed football, then offered up basketball, and of course it had to be baseball. It is a big thing around here. (After writing this article, I discovered that ALL the sports teams at the University of Arkansas are called Razorbacks, so technically I was correct.)

We went to Fayetteville to cycle the Razorback Greenway Trail which starts near Fayetteville and continues through Bentonville, to Bella Vista.

Over the course of the week, Mike and I rode the Razorback Greenway twice, back and forth, for a total of 162 km (100 miles). The trail itself is 64 km (40 mi) end to end, but with having to double back and checking out some side routes, it took us162 km. We ride every second day or so, weather permitting. The trail includes tunnels under roads, and many of them have flashing lights to signal when someone is inside the tunnel, which I liked. Some signs at underpasses warning “Path Dangerous When Flooded” made us laugh. A bit of a waste of signage.

Originally, Mike and I had planned to ride the Natchez Trace Parkway which is very pretty, probably prettier than the Razorback but I am glad we moved on. The Razorback has so much more variety: towns, museums, parks, places to eat and drink and plenty of trailheads for parking along the way. It is really well done.

The New York Times called Bentonville “an epicenter of the biking world.” Bentonville calls themselves the Mountain Bike Capital of the World. I think that’s a stretch, but there’s definitely a biking culture here, thanks in part to large investments by the Walton family (Walmart HQ is here). Mike and I visited the Walmart Museum, which was more interesting than expected, lots of history, and yes, a few failures along the way.

Drivers here have been surprisingly courteous, stopping well in advance, giving wide space when passing, and not pushing their way around you. I have been told that this behaviour only exists near the large, well-known bike paths that we have been travelling. One camper, who doesn’t live too far away, told us that cars in his area would just as soon run over a cyclist. Maybe a slight exaggeration, but actually more of what I expected.

Earlier in this post is a picture that I took of a lovely dogwood tree on the side of the trail. My picture doesn’t do it justice. The tree is 29 feet tall with a 1500-square-foot canopy. Gorgeous.

I can’t get over the prices at McDonald’s, they are much higher than those at home (Toronto area). Overall prices in the US have been higher than we expected. Given the 40% exchange on the dollar I thought that items in the US would work out a lot less expensive. That hasn’t been the case. All sorts of things are either more expensive or very comparable, including vehicles, which was really unexpected. One item that is cheaper is fuel. For our last fill up, the price worked out to $1.01 Cdn / litre.

Mike and I got talked into visiting the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, started by Sam Walton’s daughter, Alice. Modern American art isn’t our usual thing, but the architecture and surrounding 120 acres of parkland were lovely. We didn’t see all the exhibits others raved about, but it was worth a visit. This weird picture is of me riding under a huge spider statue was on a path near the museum entrance

We stopped in this region to bike and then planned to head into the Ozarks, which, as it turns out, we were already in. The Ozarks cover almost 120,000 square kilometers (47,000 square miles). They contain two mountain ranges, highlands, plateaus, lakes, forests and more. Next stop is Table Rock Lake near Branson, Missouri. No idea yet if it’s bike-friendly, but I’ll report back.

Fingers crossed, the chaos subsides. We’re expecting a new locking mechanism for the RV and tire inserts for the bikes at our next campground because flat tires have been an ongoing issue.

It seems that we are still on track to get our new 2026 motorhome in June, tariff-free. We’ll see what happens.