Mammoth Springs to Gainesville (99km)

Mammoth Spring is home of the second biggests freshwater spring of he US, just next to our hotel. Of course we went to have a look and indeed, there was a pond where 9 Million gallons of water per minute come out of the ground. Very impressiv! The story behind it is, that during a severe drought, the indians living in that area were desperatly looking for water. They did not find water and the son of the chief died while looking for iwater. When he was buried, on the site where they started to dig the hole, water began to flow, which was this very spring. 

The spring made Mammoth Springs a very busy town in 1820 - 1920, industries settled there, which were driven first by the water power directly, later through the electricity generated by it. The town was once as important as Memphis! But now all is gone, the old industrial buildings disappeared, even the generator for electricity is not used anymore, which is difficult to understand, seeing the amount of water! A sign was posted, that 1981 an evaluation was made an based on that, it was considered not economical to renovate the power generation.  Energy generation with coal is probably still cheaper and that counts here today!

The rest of the day was magic driving through the Ozarks again, it just couldn´t be more beautiful! But, the mountains are a tough callenge, constantly up and down.   

In the evening we arrived very exhausted at our hotel in Gainesville. But we got such a friendly welcome, the manager even called the local newspaper and then made a little interview with us, she thought it is a interesting story for he local newspaper.