Chapter Three

Our first stop was Muskingum River State Park, a six hour drive from Lewiston and an hour east of Columbus (just in case we wanted to visit the Bud brewery). We had a beautiful campsite on the river’s bank. We celebrated our exciting Day One with beers and a meal prepared on John’s propane camp stove. We were finally on our way.

We had arrived late in the afternoon and day quickly turned to night. We had just blazed up a joint when a thick flock of birds suddenly appeared in the moonlight, swooping en masse over the water. We could hear them squeaking and chirping in the tree branches above us. Hundreds of them. Darting hither and thither.

Wait. Those weren’t birds.

They were bats!

Welcome to the Great Outdoors.

While more interested in mosquitos than humans, we still preferred to drink our beer and enjoy our buzz in the truck.

Louisville was about half a day away from our Ohio campsite. We met up with Dr. Neal Traven, a former roommate and college buddy of Bob’s from Dartmouth. He kindly provided us with comfortable beds, a roof over our heads, and a very thorough Nickle Tour of the city. I could sense he was somewhat envious of our trip. He was nearly 30, just finishing up his residency. His cross-country tripping days were in the rearview mirror.

I recall Louisville to be a town that embraced its past, full of beautifully preserved historic old homes and buildings with a thriving center city. He drove us out to Louisville’s most famous landmark, Churchill Downs. Which was cool. But it was the row of factories further down the road that definitely caught our interest. One manufactured Phillip Morris cigarettes. Another, the Brown Foreman distillery, made Early Times bourbon whiskey.

We toured both factories the next day before making the three-hour hop to Nashville. On the way, we made a stop at Abraham Lincoln’s Birthplace National Historic Park in Hodgenville, Kentucky. There’s a replica of his family’s log cabin inside a large stone building that resembled a mausoleum. We took a few photos but didn’t linger.

After a few slow passes through Music Row and getting a peek at the original Grand Ol’ Opry, we headed out to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers “campground” on the outskirts of town that John had found during his research. It was a huge open field, about ten acres, next to a lake. It was free. And aside from some cows grazing in an adjacent field behind some barbed wire fencing, we were all alone out there.

Until sundown.

We watched as an endless stream of headlights bounced along the dirt access road, heading toward us. We were soon surrounded by a hundred pickups full of yoo-hooing redneck teenagers getting their party on.

Friday night in Nashville.

I was jolted awake the next morning by a thud. Then the truck started rocking. I was convinced someone was trying to break in.

I shoved John, then crawled out of my sleeping bag, pulled aside the curtains and peered out the back window.

“What is it?” John mumbled. “What’s wrong?”

“Someone is trying to get in!” I replied with an urgent whisper.

“Who is…why?”

We flipped up the back hatch of the cap to confront the intruder: A lovely brown cow. She had wandered over from next door and was using the rear brake light to scratch an itch.

Before leaving town, we toured a “real” Music City recording studio. They claimed to have produced hits for some major stars, but I didn’t recognize any of their names. In 1978, I was listening to Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers. Country music wasn’t really on my radar. Yet.