"Yeah, let's twist again..."

Day 31 

Ridgedale, MO 

We woke to bucketing rain this morning, really the best weather for 18 holes of golf. 

Jon bemoaned the missed opportunity on Payne's Valley; I bemoaned that we'd organized the last two weeks of the trip around a round that would never happen. We considered a drive to Arkansas to visit their Hot Springs National Park but, given the similar forecast there, opted to stay. Ultimately, I persuaded him to call the pro shop and see about getting out at a later tee time which, through some miracle of timing, worked out. Happily, he called at 12:30pm to let me know he'd managed to race onto the course and would be squeezing in a round at last.

Given the general attitude towards Covid on the property, I mentally struck most of the activities as too much of a risk (as much as I wanted a massage at their delightful spa!). Instead, I took advantage of a break in the weather to walk the 5K loop around the property and take in some of the Ozark landscape.

All in all, not a bad trade. And, after over thirty days together, we both needed a little break.

Later that evening, restored from our days of relative solitude, we got ready to take the shuttle to the "Top of the Rock" for dinner at the property's fine dining establishment. As we both changed and prepared to leave, a new flash came across the television alerting us to possible severe weather later that night. I looked at the weather app on my phone and saw this.

"Do you think we should still go to dinner?" I wondered aloud. Jon assumed (and convinced me) that this type of thing was standard fare for this part of the country and there was no need to worry or alter our plans. 

When we arrived at the restaurant, we were seated at a prime table in front of floor-to-ceiling glass window looking out over the beautiful Ozark landscape. We could see the flags just a few yards away beginning to flap in the wind and the rain which, only minutes before had been a mere drizzle, become more steady. It seemed like just another storm blowing through, I thought, as I settled into my Old Fashioned.

Not even half an hour later, the wind had intensified and the flags were now fully blowing to the right. Rain bucketed down and some of the other diners looked a bit more agitated than when we'd been seated. Midway through my wedge salad, I noticed the flags aggressively and abruptly start blowing in the opposite direction. A group of guys a few tables away had noticed the same thing and, with a great sense of urgency, one of them alerted his buddies that "that's not good, we need to get out of here."

I relayed that information to Jon and suggested we do the same. As he began to push back on what he believed to be another instance of Elizabethan extremism, the host approached our table. His polite "how y'all doin' tonight?" was followed hard upon his asking us to follow him down into the wine cellar immediately. Simultaneously, every phone in the restaurant started to beep.

I quickly learned the difference between a "tornado watch" and a "tornado warning."

Along with the other diners and restaurant staff, we were herded down three flights of stairs until we reached the wine cellar. If our goal was to "experience America" on this trip, having to seek shelter underground during a possible tornado was pretty much as good as it gets. And, much to my chagrin, so was attending our first Covid "super-spreader" event. 

I wasn't sure if the greater risk to my life was the twister at ground level or having to share a small space with around one hundred people during a pandemic, only half of whom were wearing a mask. I'll let you know in ten to fourteen days.

After a while, we were given the "all clear" and returned to our tables. We found out that this was only the third time since 2015 that the restaurant had been ushered people to shelter because of a tornado and, further, it was with good reason that they did so tonight - just fifteen miles south of us there had been a siting of a funnel cloud. 

We've definitely gone to look for America on this trip.