Little Rock replay

Much like Memphis, we were in Little Rock just about exactly a year ago – but it was in early July and the dreaded dual 99’s were on us – 99 degrees and 99% humidity. It actually may have been hotter than 99 – probably was – but I didn’t think you would buy dual 105’s!

 

So, late August/early September is soooooo much better. We could actually bike the trails on either side of the Arkansas River pretty much anytime we wanted. We even biked to the Big Dam Bridge again, only this time mid-day rather than making sure we were out before 5 AM – the Woman appreciated that a lot. But our rides left us wondering if spending the money to put up this sign really makes sense.

 

We did have a couple of discoveries that we enjoyed the visit beyond the biking. We got a riverside parking spot for Colectiva this time – enough advance warning helps – and they had the electrical and water hooks ups set such that we could nose her into the river so we could sit in the nice front reclining captain’s chairs and watch the illuminated bridges once the sun went down. Six bridges over the Arkansas River are visible from where we parked – only two of them are lit all night, but it is still quite a spectacle.

 

We got a reload on Gus’s famous spicy fried chicken – it turns out that Little Rock was one of the 10 locations they currently have. We sent this pick to our son Nick and he was quite jealous. I totally sympathize. It is nice that Gus’s is in River Market entertainment and shopping area right along the river, so we strolled a bit both before and after that unbelievably tasty chicken!
 

The other find that was there last year but was too hot to check out was the USS Razorback. The USS Razorback is a Baloa-class submarine launched on January 27, 1944 at the Portsmouth Naval Yard, which we have visited in the past. The interesting thing is that the Razorback was launched within a few hours of the Redfish, the Ronquil and the Scabbardfish, making January 27, 1944 the only day in Naval history that 4 submarines were launched in the same day from the same shipyard!

 

Our tour of the ship was different than many we have taken for a number of reasons. First, I had to shoehorn this hefty physique down a manhole. I thought I had perhaps toured a submarine before, but I would remember this if I had done it before – this must be a first! But the need for the shoehorn didn’t end there. There is actually not a whole lot more room once you get down in the sub – I can’t imagine what it would be like to be on a couple month deployment in one of these babies.
 

We had a really knowledgeable tour guide and learned lots of interesting stuff. While the razorback is the team mascot for the University of Arkansas, that is not why this sub is named the Razorback. Apparently the Razorback is a breed of whale, and its dorsal fins remind seamen of the dive planes on the front of a submarine. We learned that she was launched from the Portsmouth Naval Yard on January 27, 1944. Because of the heavy war effort going on, January 27, 1944 is the only day ever that 3 submarines were launched from a naval shipyard.

 

We learned that the Razorback is arguably the longest serving submarine existing in the world. After being decommissioned from the US Navy after 23 years of hard service, and sold to the Turkish Navy where she did another 30 years of service. We learned that only volunteers served on subs. You could be drafted into the Navy, but service on a Submarine, due to the harsh conditions, was solely voluntary, although both the pay and food were a fair bit better than anywhere else in the Navy. We learned that they only carried a medic onboard, not a full-fledged doctor. Because of that, seamen were careful not to get hurt and require medical attention.

Apparently there is documented evidence of on medic on a submarine performing a self-appendectomy when his appendix burst. We learned that there is a chronic medical condition that came along with being stationed on a submarine – lung cancer. Not because of anything inherent in the submarine, but because back in those days, a lot of sailors smoked, and in that tube with so little circulation and no fresh air, if your buddy smoked, well, you did too. It wasn’t until relatively recently that the Navy banned smoking on board ships.

 

We learned that on this class of submarine, the drive propellers were powered by electricity. The sub had two immense diesel engines on board to generate electricity to run the entire ship as well as the drive propellers – fascinating! We learned that all the torpedoes that they carried on board had to be hand loaded – hand loaded into their bunks when they came aboard, and then later trucked and loaded by hand before being fired. Today they have hydraulic equipment that handles all that, but not in the 1940’s.

 

The museum alongside the sub had really interesting articles from the time it was commissioned. Some of the articles included the ship’s bell, the film projected that they actually used for film nights, flags she carried and much more. My favorite was this elaborate communion set used by the ship’s pastor – non-denominational here. This was simply an outstanding tour.

 

When we parked Colectiva just across the river from the World Trade Center we spotted this German bus that had seats for sightseeing up front where they would normally be, and a stack of sleeping cocoons in the back – effective, but seemed claustrophobic. Well, in Little Rock we saw a new phenomenon – a fifth wheel condo! There were three of these and each one had 5 private (really small, but private) rooms with bed, small table and bathroom. I guess if you can think about it, somebody can make it.

But before we left Little Rock, we stumbled upon something on our bucket list while just tooling around the Arkansas River paths on our bikes. In my general travel reading I had learned about Peter Wolf Toth. Toth was a Hungarian-born (1947) sculpture who immigrated to the US during a brief time in 1956 when the borders were open and many escaped. In 1972 he carved an immense sculpture of a Native American, 6 feet from chin to forehead. Sadly the weather has reclaimed this sandstone tribute Toth created to honor Native Americans.

After this venture, he changed his material of choice to wood. He set out to create what he called the Trail of the Whispering Giants, and place at least one of his sculptures in every state in the US. He finally completed his life’s mission in 1958 with statue #58 in Hawaii. I now have an Excel spreadsheet with the general location of all his 74 known sculptures, #13 appearing in the Arkansas Arts Center in the River Market complex near downtown and the Arkansas River. He completed this 20 foot tall one piece Oak sculpture in April of 1975. I hadn’t been checking my list regularly as we traveled, but with this stumbled upon gift, I will try to remember. With at least one statue in every state, several in Canada and even one in Europe, I know we can check off a few more of these beauties.
 

 Talk to you soon!