Winds, Winds, Go Away

I always thought that Chicago was the Windy City, but I didn't know that the title is also claimed by the city of Abilene,TX. 

Anyhow, we woke up to wind blowing across the Walmart lot this morning and Bea's research of the regional weather conditions confirmed that wind would be our problem today. But we took off from Walmart going east on the I-20. The strong wind came out of the south, which would be a crosswind for us going east. And sure enough, the trailer started a wild dance behind the van. We decided we would go to a state park south of Abilene. The road there was long and winding , and when we got there we were told "Sorry, but we are full. SPRING BREAK!  Darn, what now? We drove out to the Interstate again. When a rest area came up, we pulled in there. It was very narrow and we couldn't move the slides fully out. It was incredibly busy as well and of course, extremely loud. Not a place to stay. But the winds got worse by the minute - still blewing from the south with gusts reaching 80km/h (50miles)

Every time a terrible gust shook the trailer, Dixie got up and started around with a bewildered look in the face. We held out until 5:30pm. By then the wind had turned to west, which would give us a tailwind. 

The city of Eastland a, few miles to the east, has a Walmart, and that's where we went. 

While parked there, we learned that several wild fires had sprung up south of Abilene, and one was close to the Abilene State Park, where we had tried to pull in, in the morning. But more fires had started other places, and it got so bad that dark smoke clouds had begun to show up in the sky. 

I wonder whether it would ever be possible to cross Texas without encountering strong winds.

We hope for calmer conditions tomorrow!