Cody’s blog

Crossville / I-40 KOA Holiday
6575 US-70
Crossville, TN 38555

931-707-5349

August 11, 20

The Crossville/I-40 KOA was one of my favorite campgrounds of the trip, and not just because the weather was thunderstorm-y and significantly cooler (84 F) than it had been up to this point. The campground was lush and spacious, with lots of green grass and trees and ponds, and pleasant walking trails.

The drive to Crossville, Tennessee had been… interesting. My truck’s navigation was mostly very good, but it had its quirks — it had directed me to take a right out of the previous campground’s entrance, instead of left, which would have taken me back the way I came in and right onto the freeway. But it required backtracking maybe 300 feet, and in order to save me that tiny bit of going west instead of east, it took me six miles down a narrow, twisty country road that turned to gravel and had me seriously wondering how I was going to get out of there with my trailer if the road got any worse. But I finally came to the end of the road, where a sharp right turn took me back onto I-40. Whew!

Then, I had studied the map the night before and, in order to avoid driving through Nashville, I had decided to take one of the bypasses that went around the city. There were three: I-240, 440, and 840, and I wanted to take the widest one, 840. But my nav wouldn’t give me that as an option, only straight through on I-40 or the shortest bypass, I-240. I thought I had changed it to I-840, but when I got to the exit for 840 E and the nav didn’t tell me to take it, I thought, Well, Nav, after that little adventure up a gravel road, I think I’ll make my own choice, and exited. Then, instead of calculating a new route based on my choice of bypass, the nav kept telling me to take the next exit and go back! Frantic to get me back on its own choice of road. So I switched it off until after I’d gotten back on I-40.

I-840 was definitely the right choice, lovely scenic drive through fields and trees. Then I noticed in the side mirror that I hadn’t properly closed the little hatch over the electric cord storage on the trailer, and it was flapping loose. Also, it was getting pretty hot and I wanted to check on the cats, but there was no place to stop until near the end of 840. Pushed the electric cord back into its storage and closed the hatch tightly, and decided to bring the cats into the truck to get them out of the heat. I opened the flap on Mister’s carrier so he could get out if he wanted to. He spent most of the drive content in his carrier.

We arrived at the campground around 2 PM. There were some thunderstorms in the afternoon that settled into partly cloudy later. The sky was beautiful and the air felt clean and fresh. While setting up, I noticed that I’d lost one of the end caps at the end of the trailer’s rear bumper, where the sewer hose was stored. Fortunately, the hose didn’t fall out. I looked for my duct tape to tape up the open end but couldn’t find it, so I decided to check at the camp store to see if they had any bumper caps. They didn’t, so I grabbed a roll of duct tape and took it to the counter. The guy there said something like, “That doesn’t look good!” So I explained my missing bumper cap, and he said he would have someone come and put some tape on it for me.

And, just as I was getting back to my trailer from the camp store, a guy was pulling in on a golf cart. He quickly taped up the open end of my bumper and I was all set!