Mississippi - Day 13 - Jackson

Springridge Mobile Estates
Monday, 13 January 2020

today's route

I'd have come to Jackson anyway, since it's the state capital, but the main reason I was here right now was for Lily's monthly appointment to get her nails trimmed and her flea medicine applied.  I always do this on the first of the month, so we were 2 weeks behind and I didn't want to put it off any longer.  Her appointment was on the completely opposite side of town but wasn't until 1:30 today, so I spent the morning taking a scenic tour of Jackson and doing a few errands.

Post Office
I'd given David the address of a US Post Office substation to send my mail General Delivery.  In the past, I've always called the post offices to confirm that they'll accept General Delivery (which they don't all), but this time I tried to call several times and let it ring more than 20 times each, and nobody ever answered.  So I took a chance.  That was almost, but not quite, a mistake.

First, I couldn't find it, Google - both street route and aerial photo - having lied to me.  I finally stopped at a little shop and asked for directions, and the very nice young woman came outside to show me where the turnoff is and explained how I needed to go to find it. 

It turned out to be down an unmarked street to a dead end, and the building was barely marked as a post office.  Very weird.  And when I went inside, they told me they didn't accept General Delivery and it was supposed to have been returned to sender last week.  But I looked so distressed that one woman went back to check and came back with the news that it hadn't been returned because there wasn't any return address on it.  I knew good and well my brother had put a return address on it and said so, and she said nonetheless they couldn't find one so it was supposed to be sent today to the dead letter office.

But then she went back in the back again and somehow found that it hadn't yet gone downtown, so I have my mail.  That woman spent the whole time I was in the post office scolding me, like them not answering the phone and me not having any way of knowing the rules was my fault - though I didn't bother to defend myself because I wanted my mail.  The other woman was very nice and encouraging.  All very strange.

So the lesson I learned is always always always call ahead of time before using a particular post office for General Delivery.  And always always always ask questions before giving up something as hopeless.  Very useful incident.

Jackson landmarks
From there I drove downtown.  My plan was to do a sort of reconnaissance today to look for locations and parking so I can go visit tomorrow.

I drove into downtown on Capitol St. and it looked like a capitol building dead ahead of me, though my directions said it was actually off to the left.  When I got closer I discovered that the building that looked like a capitol was, in fact, the Old Capitol Building.

state capitol 1839-1903 (internet photo)

It's now a museum.

The building that's been the state capitol since then was farther into town.

design reminiscent of the US Capitol (internet photo)

The eagle on top of the dome is 8' tall with a 15' wingspan; it's made of solid copper and gilded with gold.

From 1983 to 1990, John Grisham served in the state House of Representatives, during which he wrote A Time to Kill and The Firm.  More productive use of his time than many state legislators can say.

A few blocks away is the Mississippi State Fairgrounds, across the street from the MS Department of Archives and History (the state history museum) and the MS Civil Rights Museum, the 2 museums being connected by a walkway.  All those are about halfway between the old and new capitol buildings.

Google's directions to the Old Capitol Building would have had me plow through the base of an elevated roadway; it was nearly impossible for me to turn around so I made the only alternate move, which was to turn into a parking lot.  Fortunately, the parking lot ended up near the street that Google had promised I'd run into before, I just took a rather roundabout route to get there.

But the lesson I learned from playing around in that parking lot is that I had little chance of finding a parking place if I came back to go to the museum in the Old Capitol, which I'd intended to do.  I can go a lot of places in this RV, but there are limits, and that was one.

Driving north from downtown I passed Millsaps College, a very small (less than 1000 students) Methodist school that claims Johnny Carson as an alumnus, among others.

I saw a lot of Art Deco style buildings in Jackson.

Flowood shopping centers
Flowood is a suburb on the exact opposite side of Jackson from Clinton.  I'm sure it's a regular town with houses and things, but all I saw was a highway lined with shopping centers.

I went to one that had both a Target, where I got some supplies, and a PetsMart, that included a Banfield.  I got Lily taken care of without any more than the usual hassle and walked the dogs a couple of times, so it was a productive interlude.

Back on the road
Although only on the road back to the campground.  I passed LeFleur State Park, which is halfway between Flowood and Jackson, meaning it's in an urban area.  I'd been told by some campers I met in Alabama that it was a good park to stay in, and I'd tried to make a reservation, but the park's page kept saying it was closed indefinitely due to flooding.  Odd, really, because it's on much higher ground than much of the town, but there it is.

It's across the road from the MS Agricultural Museum, which I'd also thought about visiting.

So it was a productive day (mail, Lily, shopping, sightseeing) and I mostly enjoyed the town.