Natchez Trace Parkway

Imagine a two lane road, with gentle curves and only minor hills, with mown grass on either side (beyond which is forest or farmland), where the speed limit is 50 miles per hour (80 KM/hr), where commercial traffic is not allowed, that stretches for 444 miles from Natchez Mississipi , through Alabama to Nashville Tennessee. I drove the first half of this from Natchez to Tupelo. It was relaxing driving (so much so that I twice stopped for a refreshment break and a nap) with very little traffic - a few RVs, some motorcyclists and a very few bicyclists. The weather continued hot 33C so that one turned on the generator and the a/c when stopping.  There was a big thunderstorm downpour just before getting to Tupelo.

It was established as a unit of the National Park service in 1938 and officially completed in 2005.  However the actual road construction on the part that I drove must have been in the 1950s judging by trees beside the road. Maybe it was part of the Eisenhower era where the US constructed much of its Interstate highways. 

The history of the Trace goes back to the First Nations - the Natchez, Chickasaw and Choctaw. As the  US expanded westwards in the 1700s and early 1800s growing numbers of travellers tramped the rough trail into a clearly marked path. Where the ground was relatively soft, walkers, riders, and wagons wore down the “sunken” sections on perceives to-day. In 1801 President Thomas Jefferson designated the Trace a national post road for mail delivery between Nashville and Natchez.

In the early 1800s through the mid-1820s, “Kaintucks” from the Ohio River Valley floated cash crops, livestock, and other materials down the Mississippi River on wooden flatboats. At Natchez or New Orleans, they sold their goods, sold their boats for lumber, and walked or rode on horseback via the Old Trace.

It was used to move slaves to market and also extensively for armies to march down during the Civil War.