On December 18, 2008 Frank And Dudley ...

loaded up Dudleys red Dodge Ram pickup and took off for the panhandle of Texas. We stopped in Wichita Falls to eat at Scott's drive in and went by the two houses Dudley grew up in and took some photos for Dudleys main blog. On the way out of town, we spotted a Hastings bookstore and Frank pulled in and went in to see if they had a copy of the Highwayman cd. He found one and bought it for $6.00, what a deal. We had one and had forgotten to get it for this trip. We both really like the music. Dudley really likes the song "Red River Valley" I think it is track 6 on the cd. It tells the story of an old driller of oil wells and the song talks about the Green Frog Cafe in Jacksboro that we passed by on the way to Wichita Falls. Dudleys father spent his entire adult life working and exploring for oil and gas in the Red River Valley and the song brings back a lot of bitter sweet memories of growing up there decades ago. We headed out and went through Childress and on up into the panhandle. We crossed the Red River and about twenty miles south of Shamrock, we entered into a massive fog bank. We drove into Shamrock in the middle of the afternoon and the fog was so heavy you could not see more than a short distance off of the roadway. We saw the famous Conoco Gas Station which looked eerie in the fog. The fog was so heavy we were unable to see our motel sitting just a short distance off of the road. We had to turn around and saw a sign pointing us to it. We checked into the motel and it was a nice place. We unloaded our gear and called and spoke to the outfitter and he advised he would be driving up in the morning and he would pick us up before daylight. div