Truck Stops

It's been another hectic week for us. We left Dallas Monday afternoon, delivered in Arkansas Tuesday morning, picked up in Mississippi Tuesday afternoon, delivered in Virginia Wednesday morning, picked up in Virginia Wednesday afternoon, delivered in Alabama Thursday morning and ended up in Arkansas Thursday evening. We did enjoy a wonderful dinner at Applebee's in El Dorado, Ar. with my sister Lori and some friends of hers. We are now spending the weekend in North Little Rock. We do have a load ready for Monday so this will be a time to catch up on some much needed rest. We are staying at the Petro truck stop. We've been here a few times and like it. There are several chain truck stops all over the country along the major interstates. TA TravelCenters also own Petro. Most of these have full service restaurants as well as convenience stores. Pilot truckstops own Flying J. Pilot has fast food restaurants while Flying J has Denny's restaurants. Love's is a stand alone chain and has fast food services. They also have convenience stores. All of these chains have showers and laundry facilities, thus making life on the road a little bit more bearable. Some have driver's lounges with cable tv and others have actual movie theatres in them. And some offer Sunday church services along with during-the-week chapel. The way most of them work is: when we buy fuel we accumulate points and showers. When we acquire 1000 points we are allowed $10 free food in the restaurants. One shower point for the driver and the co-driver is free. If you have no shower points the charge is $10 per person. They're pretty nice and are cleaned after each shower. Thank goodness!! Laundry facilities are usually $2 per load--washer and dryer. It allows us to get through another week! The convenient stores carry anything you could possibly want (for a price). Everything from pop, coffee, milk to food, clothing, office supplies, small truck parts (light bulbs, fuses, plugs,antennas), electronics (tv's, radios, gps, cb's), dvds, cd's, coolers, appliances (12 volt). The TA and Petro truckstops also have 24 hr. garage service that can come in very handy if you have some sort of breakdown. All of them have car parking as well as truck parking. All of them except Pilot have RV parking and most allow us to use the rv parking since we are a straight truck. I love that because it's usually closer to the door and facilities. Most convenient for the occasional middle of the night stroll to the facilities! If you decide to take a trip on the road you might consider using the services of truck stops. Some are set in beautiful surroundings and most are around when a stop is in order. Whether it be for gas, restroom, food or store needs. Thanks for taking the time to join me on the road. Until next time. . . .