Spring Break road trip: Day 2

Day 2: Texarkana to Little Rock to Memphis

After breakfast at the hotel, we packed up the car and set out for Little Rock.  We had hoped for nice weather to spend a couple of hours at Crater of Diamonds National Park en route to Little Rock, but it was so cold that we figured it wouldn't be as fun and with the added 1 hour of travel time, we figured it wasn't worth it if we weren't going to spend much time there.  I hope we can go back another time instead though.  It's close to Hot Springs, Arkansas, which we'd also like to explore.

I had found a great restaurant in Little Rock called All Aboard that I wanted to surprise the kids with.  The food is delivered by trains to the tables, and it was super cute and very fun!  The owner was incredibly friendly and the food was good, too!  If you sign up on their website for a loyalty card, you can pick it up when you arrive and get $5 off your first meal.

I took a video of our food coming on the train, but it's too long and too big to upload here!  But I can share this video of us getting back into the car - when the kids saw SNOWFLAKES!  The tiniest ones ever, but still snowflakes!  There was a lot of excitement!  And notice Riley in her flip flops - us southern Texans aren't used to frigid temperatures!!

I had wanted to see something of historical importance in Little Rock that we could explain to the kids, so we went to the State Capitol to see the bronze statues of the Little Rock Nine.

While we were there, we went inside since the kids were so fascinated with the State Capitol when we went in Austin a couple years ago.  When we were heading in, a man outside suggested we take them to the Treasury, and once inside, the woman at the information desk suggested it as well.  They were correct that it was a great place to take kids!  And adults!  That day they had over $500K (some days they have WAY less) that we were able to hold and get photographed with (and I just remembered that we never did go to their website to download the photos they took .... but I took some with my phone).  They also gave the kids some (fake) coins and sent us to another office (maybe the District Attorney??) who gave them coloring books, a bag of pretty rocks from the state, a pencil and pen, and stickers.

Our next stop was the Clinton Library.  Riley was free!  We got to see one of his first limos, a replica of his Oval Office, a replica of the Cabinet Room, all the gifts he was given on state visits, and all sorts of interesting information.  Roy, Leighton, and I really enjoyed all the reading and facts, but Riley wasn't so interested!  It was a beautiful building and very well done.  There is a large outdoor space and some marsh/wetlands areas by the water, but we didn't have time to explore it all.

On the way back to the car, we saw the Anne Frank Tree.

And then it was time for the last bit of driving to get to Memphis.  Along the way, we saw more snowflakes.  SO exciting for our kids!

We got to Memphis and checked into our hotel (had booked the Westin Memphis Beale Street on Hotwire).  And then it was time to head out for dinner.  Our hotel was right behind Beale Street, so we wandered up and then over a few blocks to the restaurant.

I had found the Kooky Canuck and couldn't wait to have some Canadian food, namely poutine!!  I had also seen on the menu that they had make your own s'mores at the table, so we secretly ordered them as a surprise for the kids.  Leighton was also sporting his Canada t-shirt, hoodie (that is getting too small but he won't give it up!), and mittens that night!!