Arkansas- Eclipse

Welcome back, we are making our way cross country to meet up with our friends to watch the eclipse. It took us a few back to back long drives to get from Phoenix to Mammoth Springs, Arkansas. When we arrived we were welcomed by all our friends, it was so worth the long drives. We stayed on our new friend’s property who have a cute bus named Dorothy. Our friends with the North Star journey bus were there as well as Tom and Delmara and a few other bus friends we met while there.

It was so refreshing being back with our nomad friends. After getting settled in we made shirts to wear for the eclipse. Shyla printed out circular stickers to place in the center and we could paint over to make it look like the eclipse. She had lots of color options so our shirts turned out great. After shirts we continued with more crafting before ending the evening with a community pot luck.

Juliette and I befriended another teenager named Eliana, so the three of us hung out all day. We went into Ramona to make rings, drink kombucha and put tooth gems on. In the evening we had a community bonfire and roasted marshmallows. Eliana’s parents had a stock tank that had copper piping running to the fire that heats the water up like a hot tub. The three of us sat in the hot tub under the stars chatting until 2am. We were finally getting tired so we got out and had a sleepover in Eliana’s jeep.

The Eclipse was finally here so we drove about three minutes to a place that had 100% vitality. We set up chairs, took photos of our group in our shirts while we waited for the eclipse to start. We had to wear ridiculous glasses, so me, Juliette and Eliana took funny pictures in them. When the eclipse started it started to get dark, you could see squiggly lines all over the ground, the bugs came out and it looked liked a 360 degree sunset. There isn’t really a way to explain it and the feeling you get but what I think it looked like was an over exposed moon with rays of light coming out of it. The craziest part to me was that a few of us started feeling nauseous and dizzy until the sun came back out. Over all it was a cool experience that you should definitely try and do in your life. Afterward, we were all sleepy and had a relaxing day before celebrating our friends moms 40th birthday. We surprised her with decorations and had a huge potluck. After, the little kids all went to bed while the older kids went to hangout in Ramona and the adult played games and had adult time.

Out last day there we celebrated Noah’s birthday. Delmara planned lots of fun games and activities. We tied balloons to our ankles and had to try and pop each others balloons, whoever had the last balloon won. Then we had to race with our feet tied to our partner, Juliette and I won because we were strategic and planned to step with the same foot at the same time. The last one was freeze dance that turned into a dance competition. It was a blast and Delmara had prizes for all the winners. After activities we ended up doing yet another potluck and had burgers since that’s what the birthday boy requested. We ended the night with cake and ice cream.

We had so much fun spending 5 days with our nomad community. It was the best way to celebrate getting back on the road after two months of hustle and bustle back in Phoenix. See you soon in my next blog about our time in Missouri.