Photo of my grandson with my wife just outside Ft Leonard Wood. They were given a pass for a few hours to spend with family. His first thought when outside the Fort was that it was a good place to eat, since the food they served during basic training is blah.
Our grandson, whom we raised, graduated from basic training. He is proudly serving our country.
His goal has always been to join the military and then, hopefully, find a job as a police officer with the Houston Police Department. I have two brothers who are retired HPD Officers and two nephews who are also police officers here in Houston, Texas.
We traveled by car; in the background is my 2025 Jeep Summit Reserve. We wound up using the four-wheel drives because the navigation system led us down a gravel road to what was supposedly the base’s entrance. It was at one time, according to a person, that we stopped to ask for directions; she told us the entrance had been closed since 9/11.
We travel through Arkansas, as I wanted to go through the Ozarks.
The Ozark Mountains’ history spans billions of years, from ancient volcanic cores (St. Francois Mountains) to Paleozoic marine deposits (limestone, sandstone), uplifted and then deeply eroded into today’s dissected plateau with rivers, caves, and springs, becoming home to Native Americans like the Osage before French exploration (giving the name “Aux Arc”) and later, waves of settlers seeking lead, timber, and land, leading to a unique culture shaped by isolation, subsistence farming, mining booms, and popular stereotypes reinforced by books like The Shepherd of the Hills, eventually evolving into a major tourism destination.
As a person born, raised, and having lived in areas so flat that you can see the horizon, with the only thing maybe obstructing that view being a mesquite tree, mountains are something I only read about when I was young. However, I have been in the Rocky Mountains numerous times and have crossed the Appalachian Mountains four times.
I have been to the Andes once, when I married my wife. She is from Medellin, Colombia.
Just one of several images that I took as we drove through there. It was getting late, and I did not want to stop to take photos I considered breathtaking. Most of the road through there was two-lane, with very steep climbs and descents, and nothing to stop a car from dropping down into the ravines.
I thought that driving back that way in the early morning while still dark was maybe tempting faith a little bit too much.
So on the way back, we came through Oklahoma.
Coming back, we drove straight through, stopping only to eat, stretch our legs, and fill up the car with gas.
