First impressions don't always count, we got off the Greyhound and the look on Kelly's face said it all, almost a pleading look of "I hope this isn't it!" and "can we get back on and keep going". We were directed to an un-marked road to wait for a taxi in a fairly dodgy side of town (as seems to be the case for all Greyhound bus stations).
We waited around looking sufficiently lost and sure enough 5 mins passed and a taxi pulled in. We rode the taxi across one of the 5 bridges of Little Rock and fairly quickly were in a better part of town, more tourist friendly and taken to our hotel.
After settling into our room we decided it was a sunny looking day, so for the first time in about 3 weeks or so we dressed down in shorts and suitable sunny apparel. We then took the free shuttle bus from the hotel into town to go get our grub on. Turning our noses up at the proffered Bosco's (no Boss Hogg in sight) for being too swanky and up itself. We headed across the road to a more bar food oriented place called Sticky Fingers and proceeded to order some sticky finger foods yum! Still wearing shorts and summery clothes, we then came out to a temperature of about minus 5. I called our shuttle bus and was promptly forgotten by the driver for 45mins due to some emergency he had?? Anyway we defrosted when he finally turned up and gave him suitable chastisement or at least Kelly laid an "it's not ok" on him. That aside we ended the night on a chilly note making sure not to dress like that when there was still snow on the ground....
The next day was a glorious sunny day and valentines day, so we did nothing much. We had a stroll in the sunshine by the river, ate over-rich pizza at a place that ignored us for a good while but then accidentally under charged us. Hahaha! We then went and watched the march of the Peabody ducks. (Arkansas Little Rock branch), saw the actual Little Rock (or part of it) and had a really romantic meal at the hotel "all you can eat for $10 buffet" (circa £6). It was basically a Sunday dinner offering mashed potatoes, salad, veg, beef and pork. And lemon cake and cookies! And nothing that had ventured near a deep fat fryer. Great!
Our final day we visited the Little Rock High School visitor centre that was famous for the Little Rock Nine (in the 1950s the high school was told to end segregation but the president of the US had to intervene with Federal Troops to enable 9 African American students to attend this previously all white school amidst mob frenzy, riots and media attention from the world). The place looks exactly the same. It was very quiet - difficult to imagine the violence and mass hysteria that occurred there. Finally we headed back to the hotel and was killing time until the Greyhound that night. Another meal at the hotel, again excellent and we waited until late to take the shuttle to the station. At the allotted time we went and got to a closed station in a bad area of town with only addicts and homeless people hanging about the place. Figuring it didn't look too good the shuttle bus driver brought us back to the hotel and promised to return us to the station when the bus was due over an hour later. Upon reflection we opted to stay a further night and travel during the day, one for safety and the other as we were both just knackered!! Next stop Texas, Mike and Kelly