NFL Hall of Fame/Amish Country

We've been in Millersburg Ohio a week today. We arrived last Monday and will be leaving tomorrow morning for Pennsylvania for a little more time in Amish country. We came to this area of Ohio to go to Canton Ohio to check out the NFL Hall of Fame. We didn't realize that this area in Ohio is also Amish country and we were pleasantly surprised as we really enjoy Amish country.

Several days the last week we've shopped around at all the little shops and flea markets in the area. And the Amish food is just terrific. We ate at Der Dutchman, Mrs. Yoder's Kitchen and the Duthman Restaurant. All were delicious homemade goodness and just excellent. Yum!

Friday we headed an hour east to Canton Ohio to see the NFL Hall of Fame. We were so close and Mark wanted to make a point of checking it out...and we had a really good time. We got to see the NFL from it's inception in the early 1900's up through today, including players, owners, coaches...you name it, it was there. After the 3 hour tour we made a pitt stop in the gift shop and Mark bought a 2010 NFL Hall of Fame Hat.

We've set outside most every night this week and enjoyed time around a campfire. It's just so relaxing and enjoyable. We've had a wonderful and relaxing week here in Ohio and we're looking forward to moving on to Pennsylvania Dutch country. We have a week planned near Lancaster Pennsylvania to enjoy the beautiful Amish farms, hills and mountains. Not much on the agenda other than enjoying the area and just relaxing...without a "To Do" list of things we'd like to see.

We've spent the last couple of weeks finalizing our last few weeks on the road before heading back home in late August. We're tentatively considering continuing east from Pennsylvania to Washington DC for a Christians United for Israel christian conference. We're not sure if we can make it or not...but it's on the radar. The only other place we're planning on spending a week this time out is Savannah, Georgia. There's so much history and things to see and do in the Savannah area that we're really looking forward to our visit there.

From Savannah, we'll head southwest towards Lafayette Louisiana to make a stop where we purchased our RV to get some miscellaneous warranty work completed. From there, a brief stop in Livingston, Texas for a visit with Chris & Love, get our mail from our mail forwarding service, etc., then...finally home. Some 4 1/2 months and 7,000 miles later!

Well that's a wrap for this update. We've had a wonderful time so far and can't wait to see what's in store for us next week! Until later~

Ford Museum/Dearborn Michigan

We arrived in Dearborn Michigan this last Tuesday. We decided to head south to Dearborn so we could check out the Henry Ford Museum. There are actually two very large museums...one inside and the other outside. The museums are so large we had to break them up into two separate trips.

So this last Thursday we headed to the Ford museum and spent the day checking out the Ford Museum located inside a large building, several acres in size. Wow, we were not disappointed! There were so many things to see it's difficult to know where to begin. These museums housed unique and exotic cars as well as the Model T and many old antiques. But, cars are only a miniscule part of the Ford Museum.

There were large exhibits of everything from the 1930's and 1960's hotels and what they typically looked like; to an enormous exhibit of airplanes, representing Lindberg (who was very good friends with Ford), to Amelia Earhardt, etc. etc. There were wagon exhibits from 1700 through the latest wagons created; Railroad exhibits; A unique 'Home of the Future' built in the early 1960's, a house built with airplane metal material that could be dismantled to be moved. Obviously that idea never took off.

There was an exceptionally fascinating exhibit of Presidential limousines. The one that enthralled us was Kennedy's...the one he was actually riding in when he was assasinated in 1963. There were 4 other presidential limousines on display as well, including Eisehower's; Nixon's; Johnson's and FDR's. Whew, our first day at the Ford Museum items located inside was just awesome! We couldn't wait to check out the outside museum.

We didn't manage to make it back to the Ford museum until today, Sunday July 4th. The external exhibit is comprised of 88 acres of amazing items and actual homes that had literally been dismantled, brick by brick...board by board, and relocated to Dearborn Michigan, in the Henry Ford Museum.

Actual homes from the 1800/1900's taken apart and put back together in the Ford Museum included Ford's childhood home...and Ford made sure that literally everything was identical. It took him 13 years to find the correct heater to place in the parlor. Same wallpaper, flooring, furtniture--everything. Ford was very good friends with Thomas Edison and Edison's boyhood home; Edison's actual labratories. Ford was also good friends with the Wright Brothers. Ford purchased the Wright Brother's childhood home and had it reassembled at the Ford Museum. The Wright Brother's Bike shop was also moved.

In addition to these homes and workshops, there were so many other homes, from 1800 school houses, to a shack of an hourly worker from the early 1920's, to Ford's favorite teacher, and on and on...so many it's impossibly to list them all. But my goodness, what a sight!

We entered a tavern that was built in the 1800's and cooled off a bit. While there, we checked out their menu, as also served food. The menu was full of items directly from cookbooks from the 1850's. We took one of the menus--items on the menu that you could sit down and order included: Beef Pie; "Dressed" Tomatoes; and even "Vinegar Pie"! The items were a tad too expensive, so we decided not to stop for a meal...but boy was Mark ready to give it a try! He's certainly the adventurous one when it comes to eating new and different things, that's for sure.

Whew! So that's a "brief" summary of what we've been up to during our 5 days in the Dearborn Michigan area. Where are we headed next? Well, we're only a couple of hours away from the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, so Mark wants to head that way so we can tour the Hall of Fame. So we leave early tomorrow morning for Canton, Ohio. We're planning on spending a few days there before continuing on to the Lancaster, Pennsylvanio area to spend a few days in Amish country.

That's a wrap for this update. Happy 4th everyone. Until later~

Shipwreck Museum

Initially this morning we had decided not to go anywhere today, but around noon we changed our mind and headed north 75 miles to Whitefish Point, Michigan to see the Shipwreck Museum. It turned out to be a perfect half day trip.

There were several buildings on the complex in addition to the shipwreck museum itself. We started by taking a tour of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum, which listed many of the ships that have sunk around the Great Lakes area in the last 150 years. There were lot's of relics from the various shipwrecks as well, which I found most fasinating. That's what I love most about thinks like this--it's the history, the people that were impacted, there lives and artifacts. Mark got lot's of pictures too.

We then moved on to the Whitefish Point Lighthouse. I enjoyed touring the lighthouse and the attached Lighthouse Keeper's home the most. The home is in the same shape and condition that it was when used up through 1932 when the lighthouse was shut down. Each room included information about how each was used, including pictures and personal items from the last keeper, and each member of his family. It even included manequins of each of the lighthouse keepers family, during their 30 years in the house.

We checked out the other buildings and walked down past the lighthouse to the beach, which is located on Lake Superior. We've now seen 3 of the Great Lakes, Lake Superior, Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. After spending a few minutes on the beach, we decided to head back. We made a stop in St. Ignace for lunch/dinner and got back home around 5:00. It was such a lovely day with high temps in the upper 60's that we headed down to the beach here in the RV Park with the lawnchairs and the dogs and chilled a bit watching the sun set.

We had a great day today. We still haven't made it to Mackinac Island, it rained pretty hard all day the day we had planned on going. We're hoping to make it tomorrow, but will have to see if the weather holds up. So, that's a wrap for this update. We had a wonderful day today and hope you did as well. Until later~

Touring Mackinaw City

We actually slept in this morning and didn't leave until around noon today, heading to the downtown Mackinaw City area. The first place we went was to the Old Mackinaw Lighthouse. We'd never toured a lighthouse before and I really enjoyed it. We toured the old lighthouse keeper's rooms, which included a living area, kitchen, bedroom and small dining area, including period pieces of how the lighthouse was furnished. We walked up to the top of the lighthouse, it was something like 72 steps, and obviously no overweight or larger folks must have ever lived in the lighthouse! I suspect anyone over 200 pounds would have a difficult time climbing the circular stairs and once to the top, the actual stairs to the lighthouse. Whew! But the view was worth it. Awesome.

We continued down the path to the Old Mackinaw Fort, which consists of 10 or so buildings. The primary purpose of this fort was for the fur trade. The French and Indians exchanged goods for furs beginning in the early 1700's. There were also several reenactments while we were there, including firing of one of the canons and the weekly trade and barter that occurred between the indians and french. All of the buildings in this fort were actually recreated as it was torn down by the British during the American Revolution and moved to Mackinac 'Island', where they felt much safer from Americans.

Afterwards, we headed to a local restaurant and Mark had the walleye fish platter and I had shrimp. We topped it off by sharing a piece of homemade bannana cream pie. Yum!! We got back home around 5:00 and called it a day. Our plans are to head to Mackinac Island tomorrow morning. We'll catch a ferry for a 30 minute boat ride across Lake Huron to Mackinac Island.

I've wanted to see Mackinac Island and the Grand Hotel ever since I first saw the movie 'Somewhere in Time', starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour. I still have that movie. There's lot's of things to see on the island and we're thinking about renting bicycles to check it out, as no cars are allowed on the island...only horses, horse drawn carriages and bicycles. So, we're really looking forward to our journey tomorrow.

We had a terrific day today and hope you did as well. Until later~

We're in Michigan

We left Minneapolis early Tuesday morning headed to the Mackinaw City, Michigan area to spend some time in the Great Lakes area. There's so much to see and check out and we're really looking forward to our time here. We arrived at a small town near Ecanaba Michigan yesterday as a half-way point and spent the night at a little RV park next to a casino.

With only a couple hundred miles to go today, we got a late start and since we moved into the Eastern time zone today, we really got a later start. But fortunately we still arrived at Mill Creek campground around 4:00 this afternoon and as soon as we got the RV set up we headed into town to try a Mackinaw pastie. They're kind of like meat pies. We'd heard about them and wanted to try them. They were ok...not sure I'd have another one, but I'm glad we tried them.

There's lot's of things we'd like to see while we're in the area. Initially we're only planning on staying at this particular campground until Monday morning. One of the first things I'd like to do is go to Mackinaw Island. You catch a ferry down the road from where we're at and they drive you over to the island. It's actually become some what 'famous'...Mackinaw Island is where the romantic/classic movie "Somewhere in Time" was filmed, a move with Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymoure.

There are lot's of state parks, a lighthouse and lot's of other cool stuff we're looking forward to doing while in the upper peninsula of Michigan. We're excited and looking forward to our time here on the Great Lakes. We had a wonderful day today and hope you did as well. Until later~

Catching Up - Minnesota/Tornadoes

Wow, I've gotten behind again. We arrived in Minneapolis last Thursday for a 4-night stay. We decided to go thru the area on our way to the Great Lakes area to spend a few weeks in Michigan. But, first things first.

Wow, were we in for a big surprise the day we arrived! Having spent our entire lives living in "tornado alley", we're not easily spooked or freaked out by thunderstorms...and even tornado activity. So when we received a knock on our door the afternoon we arrived in an RV Park in Minneapolis informing us of severe storms in the area, and informing us where the storm shelter was located, we were not originally overally concerned.....

With menacing clouds rapidly approaching our area and with no access to the local tv channels, I grabbed my laptop and went to the national weather service for reports. Then logged on to local weather stations and whew!!! We were surrounded by tons of tornadoes!!! Really.

Then, I started getting a little Freaked Out. There were confirmed F3 tornadoes (more than one) within 50 miles of our current location. Unfortunately, with all the news I received about the tornadoes, we didn't know the areas or towns where these tornadoes were hitting. Two of the towns we had driven through earlier in the day, both within 50 miles of our current location, had confirmed tornadoes from storm chasers.

The dogs were freaking out far worse than I had ever seen them...and they have meds for storms--so they were definitely picking up on something, as it hadn't even started raining yet and they were turning in circles, barking, panting and just basically freaking out. I thought we should probably go to the storm shelter but didn't appear anyone else was heading that way, and well, I wasn't really sure what to do--other than drug the dogs with their RX for storms that knocks 'em out for a few hours.

Whew! Boy did we dodge a bullet last Thursday!!! Turns out there were "37" Confirmed tornadoes in Minnesota that evening--the LARGEST NUMBER OF TORNADOES IN MINNESOTA HISTORY!!!!!! Sheesh!!! Murphy's Law huh? Can you believe here we were in Minnesota for only a couple of hours and we end up in the worst storm in their history.

What was really freaky for me, was the fact that Minnesota is a relatively SMALL state--compared to what we're used to in Texas, and to have 37 Tornadoes in such a tiny little state, you get a good idea of how close together each of these tornadoes were. Turns out the closest tornado was about 35 miles away, so we only had intense winds of 40-50 and heavy thunderstorms, but at least no tornadoes.

After surviving the worst storm in Minnesota history, the next day we just chilled and hung out around the park. The next day we took off for the Mall of America and spent the day checking out the largest mall in america. We had an awesome time. We spend 4-5 hours and I actually picked up a few blouses and a watch for myself. Mark needed a new wallet and we found one in a western store in the mall as well.

We just chilled our last couple of days in Minnesota, planning our next move and where we would be going and doing. That's a wrap for our Minnesota update. We'll never forget our time in Minnesota. Who'd 'thunk' that we'd have to leave tornado alley at home and travel to Minnesota to encounter the worst tornadic activity in our lives?

Until later~

Leaving South Dakota/Heading East

We wrapped up our time in the Rapid City, South Dakota area yesterday. We had previously went to see Mount Rushmore, Custer, Black Hills Forrest and several other attractions, which I previously blogged about. A couple of days ago we took a trip to Deadwood to check it out. It's primarily known as the place where Wild Bill Hickock was gunned down during a card game.

We spent the afternoon walking around the town of Deadwood. It's quite the 'tourist' attaction for sure, which lot's of casinos and souvenir shops. We were going to check out the cemetery where Wild Bill and Calamity Jane were buried...but didn't feel the need to "pay" $10.00 each to get in! That's just a bit much.

It's time to move on. We left Rapid City early this morning and decided to stop over in Mitchell, South Dakota, which is the halfway point of our next stop...Minneapolis, Minnesota. Huh? Yep, that's right...Minneapolis. Why? We're headed towards the Great Lakes for some travel and decided to cut through the Twin Cities area for a couple of days. There's a nice RV Park/Huge Casino complex near there and also only a few miles down the road from "Mall of America".

I'm hardly a big shopper, but since we were essentially driving through the area, I thought why not? So that's where we're headed tomorrow. Actually, I think it will be kind of interesting to see the largest mall in America. I doubt we'll see too much of it, as we'll probably only last 2-3 hours of walking. But sounds like fun.

Exactly 'where' are we headed when we leave the Twin Cities area? After all, the Great Lakes area consists of several states! Well....hmmmmmm, we're not really sure yet. I've been doing lot's of research and think we'll probably spend at least a couple of weeks in the Michigan area, or, at least that's the current plan as of tonight.

Whew! I'm embarassed to admit I'm tired this evening. We drove 300 miles today and went and grabbed a bite to eat after setting up, so when we got back home I just crashed on the bed. Wasn't sure I had the energy to type this update! I know, I know...pretty whiney excuse huh? I don't expect any sympathy!

Well, that's a wrap for this update. Hope you had a wonderful day today. Until later~

Little Bighorn/Mount Rushmore

I've gotten behind again. We finally left Yellowstone early Wednesday morning, and drove 300 miles to Garryowen, Montana to spend the night. We stopped at Garryowen because it's the location of the battle of Little Big Horn, where Custer and 270 of his men were killed by Crazy Horse and thousands of Lakota and Cheyenne indians.

We got to Garryowen by 1:00 and were set up and out the door by 1:30. We headed directly to the Little Big Horn National Park and were quite surprised how detailed it was. The battle actually occurred voer a 5 mile area, which is quite substantial when on horseback. The Park Service did an excellent job laying out the trails and outling the details. Small tombstones were erected where each US soldier and Cheyenne/Lakota indian were found. In addition, there were several monuments as well.

The tour took a couple of hours and afterwards, we headed to a neat little restaurant next to the Park and had Indian Tacos. Yum! It's like a sopapilla (mexican bread) with taco meat/beans, along with avocado, tomatoes, cheese. It was just delicious. I'm glad I ventured out (well, for me anyway)...and it was terrific!

We left Garryowen, Montana early yesterday morning heading to Rapid City, South Dakota to spend a few days at Mount Rushmore and the surrounding areas. By the time we arrived yesterday a huge thunderstorm was upon us and we weren't able to get the satellite dishes up before it hit. The dogs freaked out, I even had to pull out the old sedative and dose them up. Knocked Clyde out for hours, but not Duffy. He was still terrified. So we didn't get to check anything out yesterday.

We got a late start this morning and headed through Custer State Park and the Black Hills National Forest on our way to Mount Rushmore. You can actually see the monument of the Presidents as you drive through these tunnels dug out through the granite. We were really surprised with the Mount Rushmore monument. It has been continually built up for decades and now includes a large museum, couple of theatres, a large gift shop and lot's of other stuff. As you approach the monument, the first thing you see are all of the state flags as well. It was quite interesting.

When we left Mount Rushmore, we drove through Keystone, South Dakota, which is some what like Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Lot's of old fashioned stores, even an old saloon. We grabbed a bite to eat, walked around a bit and headed back home. We really had a great time today. Tomorrow we're planning on driving to Deadwood to check out the big gunfight Wild Bill Hickock had as well as the other 'touristy' type attractions. We also plan on seeing Crazy Horse too...we were going to today but just didn't have time.

We're not sure how long we'll be here. We're supposed to leave Monday, but really need to get the oil changed on the car, so the earliest we'll probably head out of here will be next Tuesday. Or...who knows, maybe we'll stay longer!

Until later~

Yellowstone & More Thoughts

We've spent multiple days here in West Yellowstone locked up in the RV because of continued downpours. It was very cold and rained pretty much continuously for 3 consecutive days...until today! Whew! We felt like a caged animal by this morning. We've thought back and seriously can never remember being in this much rain, for so many consecutive days, until our visit to Yellowstone last week.

We actually had a little bit of sunshine between the clouds today and felt blessed to just see that. Ok, enough complaining about the weather! We didn't get a very early start today but decided come what may, we were going back to Yellowstone today. We had not yet even gotten to see Old Faithful blow, and we've been here for 10 days. We finally got to see Old Faithful blow today and also pretty much drove the entire park today, doing both the lower and upper loops today.

We saw lot's of wildlife again. Tons of bison, lot's of elk, numerous birds, a few ducks and swans, a beaver and most importantly, we had an opportunity to see a momma bear with her '3' little cubs just pouncing around and playing near her. They were soooo sweet. We weren't close enough to get good pictures of the bears, but the little cubs were so cute tumbling on and over moma. All in all, we had a nice day at Yellowstone today and feel like we've pretty much covered it all, or at least what we wanted to see.

After so much cold and rainy weather we've elected to skip Glacier National Park and head southeast to South Dakota to see Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse and Custer State Park. We're not sure how long we'll be in the South Dakota area, but probably not too long as there really isn't really much more that we're interested in seeing other than the Mount Rushmore area.

On a very sad note, I received word this evening of the death of a childhood friend. We grew up together and he was a grade behind me in school. He lived his entire life in the same house, next door to me. Even though I had moved away from home by the age of 20, I still saw Phillip regularly through all these years, when I'd stop by the house to visit my parents, or during the time we moved into the house to help care for my mom in the early 2000's. He had been quite ill for a long time, but nothing that should have resulted in his surprising and untimely death at the young age of 52.

Most of the friends I grew up with in the neighborhood are all gone now as well, as well as my brother. It kind of makes my comments on the last blog update even more appropriate. It's just a really sad day today...the thought of touring anything seems a bit pointless right now.

Well, I hope you have a good evening. And don't forget how precious and short life really is. Ever since my cancer several years ago, the first thing I think every morning before crawling out of bed, is "Thank you heavenly Father for allowing me to have this day." Just seems to mean a bit more right now.

Reflections

While in St. George, Utah a few weeks ago I mentioned that we discovered the roof of our RV had a tear in it. Most fifth wheel RV roofs are made of rubber and you have to be careful to avoid hitting any trees or anything else that may tear the roof. We think out awning blew backwards in high winds and caused the tear...but regardless, we had a tear large enough to require 1/3 of the roof to be re-roofed in it's entirety resulting in more $$$ than we had hoped.

While in Provo, Utah last week I mentioned that we had packed up early one morning and were ready to hop in the cars and head to Yellowstone. But, when we brought the slides in and stepped out to lock up the RV, the stairs literally 'fell' off. We had noticed they had been getting lower and lower to the ground over the last several months but just hadn't but 2 and 2 together so to speak, and unfortunately didn't address the problem before it became a big problem. You don't think of steps as being a big issue until you realize you can't get in or out of your 'home' without a 3-4 foot drop, making even trying to take the dogs out for a walk difficult. So we stayed in Provo and Mark went to an RV supply store found our 4-step stairs and installed them. Then, on to Yellowstone.

Which brings me to today. I was fixing a bit of lunch when there was a knock on our door. It was the man next door who asked if we were aware we had a flat tire on our trailer. Uh.....nope, didn't know that either. So, rather than run a few errands and buy some much needed groceries, Mark raised the trailer, removed the tire and took it to a tire store near Yellowstone to get it plugged and then brought the tire back and put it back on the trailer. We've put quite a few miles on this trailer in a short period and will have to replace them within the next year for sure, meaning quite a bit more $$$.

I mentioned last week that I had heard that things always seem to happen in "3's". Well, let's hope it stops at three anyway! In the last month we've had to have a 1) New Roof; 2) New Stairs and 3) Tire Repair. Actually, I realize that we are very blessed that this did not happen while driving 60 mph down the freeway...which could have caused serious damage to the trailer, and possibly injuring or killing us or someone else and that's the only thing that really matters isn't it? And what's more important than our health?

All in all, this journey we're on has indeed been life changing. We're getting to do and see things that we never thought we'd be able to do, certainly not until much later in life. Which brings me to one of the primary reasons we elected to take this journey now, rather than wait until we were 'officially' old enough to retire and it was age appropriate, say--maybe 62 - 65.

Had we waited until when we were "supposed" to retire, would we have been healthy enough to even do it at that time? If not, we would have had such regrets and disappointment, wondering what could've, would've been had we not waited. We've seen this happen to so many people. It's the Journey...not the Destination that counts. Our motto is Seize the Day! Carpe Diem!

We are by no means in a position where we'll be able to actually retire permanently at this point in our lives and we've known that from the beginning. Based on our life experiences, from the death of my immediately family within 5 years (father, mother and brother), to my cancer battle many years ago, we've discovered one thing for sure...Life is Short. Enjoy it. Embrace it. And most importantly Thank God for it. And never, ever take a single day of this precious life for granted.

And we're not.

New Pictures

I've gotten so far behind on loading our pictures since we were in LA/Hollywood through our first few days here in Yellowstone. But I spent most of the afternoon and night working on them and I've finally completed and downloaded our pictures into new slideshows. I've loaded new slideshows for:

1) Teton Nat'l Park/Jackson Hole
2) Yellowstone Nat'l Park - #1
3) Reagan Library (When we were in LA)
4) Warner Brothers Studio (Took a Tour while we were in LA)

I've added the 4 new slideshows and they can be found on the right hand side of the blog. Whew! What a chore. I'll never let our pictures get that far behind again, that's for sure! (I know, I know...pretty 'whiny' excuse for work huh?)

Enjoy!

Tetons National Park

What an unbelievable day. I know I say that too much, but I simply can't think of a better way to put it! We got a really early start today because we were going to take a long day trip from our location here in West Yellowstone, to Teton National Park. The only way to go is through a portion of Yellowstone, as the Tetons are actually an extension of Yellowstone that begins at the southern exit of Yellowstone.

We drove 275 miles today and though it was a busy day, we had such fun. We began our journey at 7:00 this morning by entering the West Yellowstone entrance and driving 70 miles from West Yellowstone to the Southern Yellowstone exit, then entering the Grand Tetons. Suffice to say the views of the Tetons did not disappoint.

In addition to the many glaciers that still exist within the park, there were also a couple of old homesteads from 125+ years ago that included original cabins and various other extended buildings including barns, wagons, etc. We got to walk through all the various areas and it really brings you back in time. Just standing in these areas I kept thinking that the people pictured lived and worked...in this very space, some 125 - 140 years ago. It kind of brings you back to that moment in time...it's one of the things I enjoy most about this lifestyle. I enjoy the wonderful views, scenery, and 'things to do' so to speak, but it's the actual history of each place that captivates me.

After driving through from the north to southern exit of the Tetons, we were in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. We parked the car and walked around for a couple of hours. It's a quaint, old town with the majority of buildings being National Historic Landmarks, filled will all kinds of quaint, wonderful little shops. Of course we had to get a picture of the elk horn terrace that are located in a few places within Jackson Hole. It's an actual arch of elk horns that Jackson Hole is known for.

We had to make a stop in Cadillac Bar, which I had seen on the Travel channel. The bar stools are actually saddles. Guess you just belly up to the bar and rather than plop down on a bar stool...just climb up on one of the saddles. Of course Mark had to get my picture doing just that. We shopped through the Jackson Hole local museum and saw lot's of memorabilia from the past. There were a couple of beautiful parks in the center of town, along with a stagecoach that would drive you around town for a mere $6.00 each, (but we passed on that).

By then it was close to 1:00 and we were starving. We had packed us a picnic lunch and drove back towards the Tetons at the entrance to Jackson Hole where there was a beautiful picnic area and stopped there for our picnic. After getting our bellies full, it was time to head back as we had a good 140 mile return and lot's of stuff to see heading south back through another section of the Tetons. We did see a coyote that had apparently snared a squirrel and he was snacking on him...we weren't able to get pictures in time though, darn it.

We had thought about possibly stopping by Old Faithful to see if we were close to the next anticipated geyser, but it was approaching 4:00 in the afternoon and we had left the dogs at home for such a long time that we decided to defer checking out Old Faithful as well as all the other Yellowstone geysers until Wednesday.

We've had Lot's of snow, sleet and freezing rain since we've been here. That's why we basically didn't do anything Saturday & Sunday...if it wasn't snowing, it was freezing sleet or freezing rain. The temperatures have been quite cold (well to us anyway)...the temps during the day have been in the low to mid 40's and in the upper 20's or low 30's at night. Brrrrrr!!

Based on tomorrow's forecast, we'll probably make a visit in town of the Grizzly Bear/Wolf sanctuary. Other than that, we'll probably just chill tomorrow. We've yet to really check out any of the Yellowstone geyers, springs and waterfalls. We hope to head to Yellowstone Wednesday for our first full day of tourism.

Well folks, that's a wrap for this update. We had a wonderfully blessed day today. We are very blessed to be able to take the time to see all the wonders God has created. Until next time~

Wildlife Galore

Yellowstone is proving to be as terrific and wonderful as I had hoped it would. Suffice to say it has not disappointed to date, and we have barely scratched the surface.

After taking a drive to Old Faithful for a quick look around the afternoon we arrived, we stayed home yesterday due to extensive rains and it's quite cold here. Well, I should say it's quite cold for 'Texans'. We stopped by the market this afternoon and were told temps drop to (-20) - (-40)...and that's not wind chill, but actually temperatures. They said that Yellowstone 'only' had about 5 Feet of snow this winter. Wow, I was freezing today with temps in the low 40's, rain and wind of 20+, the wind chills were off the chart for us.

But on to the important stuff--wildlife! To sum up today's wildlife in one word-- Awesome!! We decided to hold off checking out all the thermal activity and geyers today and take our babies (Clyde & Duffy) through the park and just look for wildlife. And we were certainly not disappointed.

Shortly after entering the West Entrance to Yellowstone we came across a couple of large Bull Moose. Their antlers were still covered in velvet and they were just beautiful to watch. On down a bit further we came across the first of many many Bison. One of the sweetest things I've ever witnessed was watching the new Bison calves being nursed, right next to us...within 10 foot of the car. Yellowstone is currently saturated with baby Bison calves right now.

On a couple of occassions, the Bison were within 2 feet of the car, so on one occassion I rolled down my window and lifted up Clyde so he could get "up close and personal" with them. It was hilarious!! Clyde acted like he Didn't See Anything!! What a hoot! This little chihuahua isn't dumb, that's for sure. Not a peep out of him...just acted like he was staring at the sky as the bison walked right by the car door and window, within 3 feet. Soooo cute.

We drove thru a part of the park called Norris, and on up to Mammoth Springs. It was there that we saw our first Bear. He was probably a juvenile and had silver hair. He was just taking a slow stroll from one side of the road, across to the other. There must have been 30 cars around along with a Park Ranger. So we pulled up behind a car parked on the road and Mark jumped out with the camera as the bear reached the middle of the street and just starts snapping pictures. Mark was probably within 10 - 12 feet from him and the bear wasn't the least bit fazed by the 40+ cameras snapping pictures of him. We watched him amble on up the hill on the other side until he was out of sight.

At the far northern end of Mammoth Springs as we began our drive south back towards West Yellowstone, we passed some of the most breath taking scenery we've ever seen. There's still lot's of snow at 8,000 feet and the views of the pristine snow with large pine trees look so tranquil and peaceful, like a picture on a Christmas card. The varied scenery during today's 120 mile drive in the park was just spectacular.

As we approached the end of our journey today we passed another blocked section of road with countless people off too one side. Mark made a quick u-turn and parked and we saw a rather large Grizzly bear on the other side of a stream. He slowly mingled and meandered his way along the river beds next to the water for a long time. We both got out and watched him for several minutes but the rain and cold weather finally forced us back to the warmth of the car.

We also saw Elk, Deer and numerous birds today and along with our Grizzly Bear, Black Bear and Bull Moose proved to be quite the wildlife outing. We were quite fortunate today as many visitors come to the Park and never see a bear. The only wildlife we've not yet seen are the wolves. But we still have 11 days here in Yellowstone, so you never know!

Tomorrow's forecast predicts highs in the 30's and low's in the lower 20's with 60% chance of precipitation, so we're planning on making some homemade soup and cornbread, and bundling up inside tomorrow and just watch tv and veg out. We stopped by the grocery store this afternoon and picked up a few groceries including stuff for a picnic on Monday.

Looks like Monday is a perfect weather day to head back and we plan on getting an early start and spending the entire day checking out many of the geyers and Yellowstone Lake as well as some of the Falls and who knows, maybe lot's more wildlife opportunities. We took very few pictures today, primarly just of the bears we saw. We'll kick our picture taking into high gear when we head back on Monday and we're really looking forward to finding a nice quiet location with spectacular scenery (easy to find in Yellowstone) for a picnic.

Well, that's a wrap for now. We had a wonderful day today and can't wait for our next trip into Yellowstone. So, until later~

Provo to Yellowstone

We left Vegas early Monday morning and arrived in Provo Utah Monday afternoon. We went from 90 degree days in Vegas to 40 and heavy snow showers as we approached Provo, wow what a change in weather. We were up early the next morning, had the RV packed up, the cars packed and ready to go...but when we went to lock the RV door and push in the steps, the steps broke off--completely! Ugh! And we just had the roof repaired the previous week. When it rains it poors I guess--(not that you should feel 'sorry' for us under the circumstances!)

Well, it didn't take long before we realized that we pretty much had to stay in Provo and get the stair repaired, as it's a 4-5 foot drop off from the front door to the ground. So we set back up, unpacked everything and Mark started checking around RV supply stores and finds the correct stairs and by later afternoon, he had the new stairs in and we were ready to leave this morning.

We were packed up and heading out of Provo by 7:00 this morning. We made great time and arrived in Yellowstone National Park by 2:00 this afternoon. After getting settled in at Grizzly RV Park we headed to downtown West Yellowstone, which is a quaint little town that we're really looking forward to exploring over the next 2 weeks. But first things first--we were starving having missed lunch. We found a nice little restaurant in town and had a terrific meal.

After filling our bellies, we decided to locate an information center to get information on Yellowstone. We're only a few blocks from the entry to Yellowstone and before we knew it, we were inside the park on our way for a quick visit of Old Faithful--totally unplanned. We didn't even have a camera. But wow, we sure weren't disappointed. The drive to Old Faithful did not disappoint for sure. We saw so many bison and on a couple of occasions, there were actually herds of bison on the roads bringing all traffic to a stand still as they strolled down the middle of the road. This time of year there are lot's of baby calves as well and they were sooooo cute. The bison were only a couple of feet from our car on several occasions. Just amazing!

Ok, enough about today. We're so glad to finally be in Yellowstone, I've wanted to see this park for many years. We've decided to slow down the pace a bit and as I mentioned earlier, we'll be here for 2 whole weeks. We hope to see all areas of the park...but it is huge so more about that later. Well that's a wrap for now, I'll try to update more regularly while we're here. In the meantime, we had a wonderful day and hope you did as well. Until later~

Back in Vegas

We decided to leave LA a couple days earlier than originally planned. I had forgot to previously mention that the RV Park we were staying in, is without a doubt the worst park we've ever stayed in. Good grief it was just hideous...but there weren't really any other options within 40 miles of the park and we didn't realize how run down this park was until we arrived. Suffice to say the pictures and feedback we had read didn't do this park justice so to speak--it was far worse than anticipated.

So last night we discussed heading out a couple days earlier than we had originally planned, especially since we disliked the park we were in and the electric had went out our second day and Mark walked down to notify the office and they never came. Fortunately Mark found the reset switch on the electric company box but we just didn't feel comfortable leaving the dogs in the RV and going out, so we decided to go ahead and leave early this morning.

We got an early start hoping to miss the majority of the LA traffic and with it being early Saturday morning, we didn't run into any problems. We made great time and arrived back in Vegas, at the same RV Park and we were even able to get our same spot from last week. We're going to stay tomorrow as well and head north towards Salt Lake City early Monday morning.

We have a reservation in Yellowstone National Park beginning Wednesday, so we'll be traveling for 3 consecutive days this week...which I'm not really looking forward to, but hey--I've always said "It's the Destination--Not the Journey"!!! Well that's a wrap for now, we had a wonderful day and hope you did as well. Until later~

Busy Busy in LA

Wow, where has the time gone? We've been in Oxnard, a suburb of Los Angeles, since Monday. We've had a great time while we've been here, but quite honestly, we really couldn't handle living in LA on a long term basis. I'm not sure how these folks do it really. I thought Dallas traffic could be difficult...having driven to and from downtown Dallas for 30+ years I thought I was 'comfortable' in traffic--Not!!! But, let me back up a bit and fill you in on what we've been up to.

We got up early Tuesday morning and headed to Simi Valley to see the Reagan Library. Awesome!!! Without a doubt the best Presidential Library we've ever seen, hands down. It's very organized with multiple levels and things to see. The most amazing things were 1) Presidential plane used by Reagan; 2) His limousine, and motorcade of vehicles; 3) Reagan's burial site overlooking the unbelievable gorgeous mountains and 4) A miniature size identical model of the White House.

We were simply awestruck by the Presidential plane. It was a 707 and we were able to see everything from the actual cockpit seating, to the kitchenette, the Presidential Office, the First Lady's Office, Press Area, Key Staff member area, etc. They had some of Reagan's key trip detail laying out showing how the trips are detailed. It was just amazing.

I can't say enough about the miniature size White House. It is made to scale, exactly...one inch to one foot. It's been kept updated for 45 years by the same artisans. It's a literal working home. For example, identical chandeliers actually light up--the light bulbs are the size of a grain of rice! It's that detailed. You can look through the windows and see the private quarters and the tiny miniatures of the Obama's family portraits. It takes 1,000 hours to redo a single room when updated. It's constantly being updated. We were able to see the Blue Room; Red Room; Lincoln's Bedroom, etc. We were just amazed at the detail.

There were so many other things we enjoyed about this Library. An exact replica of the Oval Office when Reagan was in office was there as well. The views from the Library looking over Simi Valley leave you speechless. And of course, lastly we stopped by his gravesite, which overlooks the valley. It was just an all around wonderful day topped off by a stop at Jersey Mike's. It's a famous Deli we had seen on a Food Network show about top deli's around the country. Yum!! Mark had a Philly sandwich and said it was better than the original we had while in Philly last year. I had a ham/cheese with Mike's famous 'sauce' and loved it too.

Whew! We decided to "take off" yesterday and just chill with the dogs. But we were up very early today and headed off to Warner Brother's studio for a backlot tour of the studio. Oh my gosh...where to begin. This tour was the most highly recommended tour in Hollywood for several reasons--the tours are very small and detailed, only 8 at a time and you ride around the miles and miles of the studio in a large golf cart type vehicle.

We were first taken to the set of Two and A Half Men. We found out the shooting 'season' for television is from August thru April...so we just missed it. But we were given a behind the scene look at the set, how the live audience works and how the cameras are angled, etc. We were really surprised just how "small" the sets really are. They explained how the camera angles are designed to make the streets look larger. After a detailed tour of Two and A Half Men we moved on to the Props area. Wow!

There are literally acres and acres of buildings just to build the various sets and associated decoration. They took us through the saw mills; plaster mills; art department...you name it and we saw it. We were really impressed with the demonstration of "how someone is shot" and how they hook up the device to make it appear as real blood oozing down the shirt. They use miniature, tiny explosions that are attached to a plastic bag. When the miniature device is pressed it explodes, causing a hole in the clothing and with the bag above the explosion, it slowly oozes out. Just amazing.

We went on to the Hollywood backlots and saw countless sets that have been around for literally decades. Shows from Casablanca, to John Wayne moves, all of the Harry Potter movies, the Batman movies, and on and on. Then we were taken into the Warner Brothers museum...no cameras allowed and saw two floors of costumes and various movie props from Harry Potter, Batman, my goodness--so many movies from the last 50 years I can't begin to remember them all. Whew! What a tour! It was a very 'touristy' type thing to do and not something we would normally do--but well worth the time and money for sure.

Lastly, we were headed to a cemetery just a few miles down the road to check out the many famous actors who were buried there. Unfortunately, that turned out to be a Nightmare! It was apparently in downtown LA and we didn't realize it...not a good place to be during the week. I have never, ever seen traffic remotely that bad--even during huge traffic accidents over the years driving to/from downtown Dallas. There was no parking at the cemetary once we got there and it took us an hour just to get out of the downtown area. And the drive to get back to the Oxnard area was almost as bad. I cannot begin to describe the way people drive here. And there is NO need for blinkers in LA--they should just have the blinkers removed from ALL vehicles in LA because No One Ever Uses them!

I think we'd have been safer trying to scoot around the Daytona 500 during a race! Seriously. But, all in all--it was a terrific day. We've had a great time here in the LA area. Tomorrow we're driving up highway 1, which is right on the coast, up to Malibu and taking the dogs with us. We're hoping to get them out on the beach, they've never been on the beach and it'll be a hoot if we can.

We're tentatively leaving here Sunday morning for Yellowstone National Park. It's a 4 day drive, and now that I follow Mark in our Ford Escape, I'm not looking forward to that much driving, but I'm glad we went ahead and came back to California to see the Library and a little bit of Hollywood as well.

Our plans are to spend two weeks in Yellowstone. From there, we're not sure where we're headed as we're still undecided about the summer. So, stay tuned. Whew! Sorry for the long update--but we've been busy! I hope you had a wonderful day today...we sure did! Until later~

Winding Up Our Time in Vegas

Tomorrow is our last day in Vegas, but let's back up a few days. We took a short drive out to Hoover Dam a few days ago. We had seen Hoover Dam 7-8 years ago when we took a short trip to Vegas, but the weather was really soupy, so to speak and we couldn't really tell anything about it. Having spent the previous entire day on the Last Vegas strip we thought it would be a nice change of pace.

Construction of the Hoover Dam began in 1931 and was completed 4 years later in 1935. The dam was constructed because of frequent flooding of the Colorado river in the 1800 and 1900's. The water from the dam had to be equitably divided between seven states, including Mexico. In 1999 it was named the number five construction achievement of the 20th century. President Franklin D Roosevelt dedicated the dam on September 30, 1936.

In order to get a detailed look, we decided to take a tour. We were taken down several floors underground and were shown the various aspects of the building followed by the visitor center and many artifacts. It was also a beautiful drive over there as well. All in all, we really enjoyed our visit to Hoover Dam and learned a lot as well.

We went back to the Vegas strip today and spent several hours. We went into many of the hotel casions and shopped around. Mark took lot's of pictures along the way as well. We gambled a couple of hours and only lost a small amount which was good--we never expect to come out ahead when gambling. We hoped to stay out long enough to get some pictures of the strip at night but 8 hours was about all we could handle...I guess getting 'old' takes a toll on your joints and aching feet after awhile! We're hardly big gamblers, so I doubt we'll do any more for at least a year.

As for our future plans, you may remember that last year we were headed to Simi Valley in California to see the Reagan Library when Clyde ruptured his ACL and we rushed home for his emergency surgery. We've decided that since we're only a day's drive away we'll head back to Simi Valley one more time to check ou the Library. We haven't decided if we'll head north from there, or turn around and head back east through Vegas towards Yellowstone.

We were recently contacted by our tentative workamper location in Glacier National Park and told that we would need to work a minimum of 40 hours weekly plus overtime as required for the park during the summer season of June-August, leaving us little time to enjoy the area...that really caught us offguard and we're not sure what we're going to do. If we wanted to work 40+ hours weekly right now, we'd just get fulltime jobs at home! We told her we'd get back with her and give her an answer later this week. Just wish she would have made that clear last March when we interviewed for the jobs. Oh well, that's life.

Well that's wrap for this update, hope everyone had a terrific week--we certainly did. Until later~

Gladys Kravitz

Remember the old 'Bewitched' series from the 1960's? If so, remember the first Mrs. Kravitz on the show? She was Samantha Stevens neighbor and was always spying on them and trying to find out as much as she could about them and what was going on inside their home. Well, guess what? We've got a Gladys Kravitz next to us here in this RV Park in Vegas!

Yep, that's right. Actually, at first it was kind of amusing for Mark and I but later, the more she talked it became quite evident that she's missing a few 'marbles', or something. We got a knock on our door around 9:30 a couple of nights ago and this lady appeared at our door explaining she was in the motorhome next to us. It was quite cool outside with high winds so I invited her in. Big mistake!

She's probably in her mid 60's and was probably trying to be neighborly, in her own way. She had brought over a piece of cake and some type of greeting cards. The first thing she wanted to know was "how to spell our name" Huh? Well, it got stranger from there. She wanted to know the "Year" our kids were born...hmmmmm, ok. We first thought maybe she was trying to sell the cards once she explained she had made them herself and handed them to me. But no, that wasn't the case either.

She went on to say that when she had knocked on our door she "hoped she could get in to get a look at our RV"...Huh? Wow, this was really getting strange. She talked for at least 45 minutes. She would be in the middle of a sentence and then start tapping her head really hard and forget what she was talking about and just changed subjects. She finally was leaving and then insisted that we come over and see a picture of a $16,000 purse she had taken on the Vegas strip?? I explained I couldn't I had to make an important call. Well, that didn't work...she was insistent, so we went next door for a few minutes.

Things continued to get stranger by the minute. She continued forgetting what she was talking about and changing subjects and hitting herself on the head. At one time she went from discussing cookies to telling Mark--"Hey, I have just the thing for you! Check this out and then showed Mark a special hearing aid device for listening to the TV. Huh? I tried really hard not to laugh...of course, Mark doesn't have a hearing problem. We finally got out of there. Whew!

Back home only a few minutes, a knock on the door. She wanted to give us a printed copy of a picture of this $16,000 purse. Ok...thanks I guess. She came back again knocking on the door for something else a couple more times--I can't even remember them all by that time. By 11:00 p.m. she had finally left. I told Mark to remind me not to be so neighborly in the future!

She was back first thing the following morning but Mark explained I wasn't feeling well (just couldn't handle her quite that early). Fortunately, appears she has new friends across the street now. Yipppeee! But seriously, it was quite evident something was wrong with her and we really felt sorry for her. It certainly didn't seem like dementia or Alzheimers, but there was something wrong. She was in a very expensive motor home and drove a nice Mercedes Benz. But bless her heart, she was a sweet lady but she obviously had some kind of problem.

P.S. I can say I now have a new found respect for Samantha Stevens on Bewitched.

Viva Las Vegas Baby

What a hectic couple of days we've had since arriving in Las Vegas. It's been exciting, fun, frustrating and a little bit 'scary'...yep, scary. First things first.

Frustrating - As we were pulling out of St. George yesterday we discovered we had a tear in our roof. Mark climbed up and after checking it out discovered that a relatively large piece of our rubber roof cover top had been torn. We're not exactly sure how it happened or how long it had been there. So as soon as we arrived in Las Vegas and got settled in we called for a local RV repairman to come out. The bad news is it's going to run around $600 for repair. Unfortunately, looks like our insurance won't kick in since we elected to have a higher deductible since we rarely seem to need insurance. Murphy's law I guess. They're supposed to be out early tomorrow morning and the front 1/3 of the roof will need to be replaced. It's supposed to take a couple of guys 5 hours for repair...a lot of work I guess. Oh well, 'stuff' happens huh?

Scary - As soon we got our roof situation handled after arriving we headed out for a bite to eat. Afterwards we decided to have our mail forwarded to us from our mail forwarding service as we needed to get our new car tags. After locating the Post Office in Vegas that handles 'General Delivery' mail, we headed down there to get the mailing address. Since it was on the far end of the Vegas strip (the side that is much much older and quite run down and well, 'seedy' you might say). There wasn't really any where for Mark to park so I hopped out to go in and get the Post Office mailing address. And...

Within 30 seconds of entering the Post Office all "HELL" broke loose! A young guy in line started screaming and cussing at a female attendant behind the counter. Instead of being afraid she starts screaming back at him and they were 'both' cussing each other out. Then the guy walks to the front of the counter saying "I have a gun in this pocket b#$@ch and I'm gonna kill you"!! He then proceeds to jump over the counter and a security guard comes out of no where and he starts yelling and pulling the guy off the counter and slamming him against the wall!!! The guy screams out "you don't have no f^^$%ng gun but I do to the guard". They're dialing 911 as this happens.

The young guy and security guard start wrestling around and pushing each other and he keeps telling everyone he has a gun and reaches in his pocket. I was so shocked I didn't do anything! Just stood there frozen like an idiot instead of running. Sheesh. Guess I'm not good in emergency situations huh? The security guard pulls the guy out the front door and you could still hear them both screaming at each other. Then I didn't know whether to leave or not and guess what another mail attendant said to me then? Welcome to downtown Vegas! Can you believe that? Even the female attendant didn't look scared and me? I'm thinking I've been in Vegas for 2 hours and I'm gonna get shot if not killed!

After getting the PO address I shot out of there where Mark was waiting in the car. After telling Mark what happened we realized that what happened was a federal offense, entering a Federal Building and saying you have a gun?? I don't know if the dude did or not...but I told Mark that from Now on--HE can go in these places, I'll wait in the car. I honestly haven't been that afraid since I was actually robbed when I was 16 years old working in a Pizza place. Whew, I won't forget this day that's for sure.

Fun & Exciting! Finally. After leaving the Post Office coming back down the strip I recognized the Pawn shop on TV. It's called Pawn Stars and I just had to go in and check it out. Awesome. I recognized several of the items from the TV show and we both enjoyed it. This morning, we were up early and on the strip by 9:30. We spent the entire day on the strip and went through many of the hotels including Paris Paris, New York New York, Monte Carlo, MGM, Caesars Palace, etc. We did a little gambling, not much. Seems like I always end up on the plus side and Mark on the negative. We figure our net loss for the day was around $15.00. Not bad for several hours of gambling huh?

Tomorrow our roof is being repaired and we need to stock up on groceries, etc., so we'll take the 'day off', so to speak. We're planning on taking a short trip to check out the Hoover Dam this week. We saw it many years ago, but it was so foggy we didn't get to see much. We also will go back to the strip for pictures...decided not to bring the camera today. We'll be here a week in order to get our mail delivery so we probably won't be heading out of here until next Monday.

We're considering a possible change in plans once we leave here. Stay tuned and once we make a decision, I'll update the blog. So, until later~

Zion National Park

We've been in St. George, Utah since last Wednesday and we leave tomorrow for Las Vegas. We've been some what surprised how warm it is here. But it is southern Utah and St. George is only a couple of hours from Las Vegas, which reaches 110+ in the summers. We've since discovered that St. George also reaches temps in the 100's in the summer.

Across the street from our current location is a large mobile home area. It's also part of the same park. It's actually quite nice...they're all attached and look much nicer than a typical mobile home type park. We discovered that St. George is a mecca for snow birders--folks who spend their winter in a warmer area. Having said that, we're ready to move on.

We were some what disappointed with Zion National Park. We've become some what spoiled with the natural beauty the last several weeks. Especially after Moab and Cortez. We got a late start yesterday and arrived at Zion National Park. You can only enter the Park via a shuttle bus. They pick you up near where you've parked and there are 7 different locations in the park that you can be dropped off or picked up.

We did hike the lower Emerald Pool. It's a little more than a mile and once again, I found that I have to stop every few minutes just to catch my breath. Gosh I had no idea how out of shape I was. When we do get back to Dallas, I'm joining 24 Hour fitness to try and get back in decent shape again. But I digress. We also took a break at Zion Lodge and grabbed a bite to eat. We spent a half day in the park and we got a few pictures. Certainly no where near as many as we have recently though.

Utah scenery in general is just breathtaking. We discovered that on our drive in to Moab from Cortez, Colorado. We found the views in Zion National Park to be like those on our way into Utah. Maybe we've seen such awesome scenery in places like Arches National Park in Utah, seeing Zion National Park is just a tad disappointing. But all in all, we enjoyed our time here in St. George, Utah.

We're really looking forward to a few days in Las Vegas. Being only a couple of hours away, we thought it would be nice to spend just a few days and check out the new additions to the strip since we were last in Vagas, 6 - 7 years ago. Neither of us are big gamblers for sure--but we really enjoy seeing the recreation of areas like Paris, France and Italy, etc. We'll probably do a tad of gambling, for a couple of hours. That's usually all we do before calling it quits.

Well that's about a wrap for now, we leave tomorrow morning for Vegas. We've not yet decided whether we will stay at an RV Park on the strip, or stay at Lake Mead, which is an hour away and just drive in and enjoy the lake as well. Guess we'll know by tomorrow night, huh? Lastly, Happy Mother's Day to everyone out there. If your fortunate enough to still have your mother around--know that you're blessed. I sure wish mine was still around to wish a Happy Mother's Day to. Until Later~

Glorious Arches National Park

Well, I'm a few days behind schedule on posting. We're now in St. George, Utah to spend a few days in Zion National park. But let's back up to our last day in Moab, Utah a couple of days ago.

We initially went to Arches National Park in Moab, Utah last Thursday but encountered a freakish unanticipated snow storm. That didn't deter us spending the day enjoying the Park but we elected to hold off taking pictures until there were sunny skies so you could better see the true magnificient of the sandstone formations. And boy were we not disappointed!

On our way to Arches we first stopped by a diner so I could get an ice cream fix...chocolate waffle cone--Yum! Once satiated with my chocolate fix, it was on to the Park. Once past the visitors center, it's a 34 mile drive from the entrance to the end of the park. However, there are several side roads off the main street and we went down each and every sidestreet to ensure we didn't miss anything.

Since we already had some 200+ pictures of the Moab mountains, including Canyonlands National Park, several scenic byways that included petroglyphs, we wanted to limit the pictures taken at Arches to only those we considered a must have. We still took 100+ pictures! It's that gorgeous. The rock formations are so unique it's difficult to describe them.

There are several huge arches in the park, along with various named rock formations including "The Three Gossips", and the "Garden of Eden". In addition, we took several pictures of the first rancher in the area, who resided in a small log home with thatch roofing. The house as well as his rudimentary corral is still standing. It's really fascinating to see structures like that...it's like going back in time 100 years. The original table and sparse furnishings were still in the home.

We also took a couple of small hikes up the mountains to get a better view of some of the formations. Well--I should clarify, I took on one of the hikes and only made half of that one and decided to just wait for Mark to complete the hike up for pictures. The second hike Mark took on his own...I decided there was no need to attempt the second hike, I was still trying to catch my breath from the first one! (After all, it was 7000 feet above sea level!)

I've posted some of the Arches park pictures in the most current slideshow on the left hand side of the blog. Our week in Moab wasn't enough to see all of the amazing scenery and parks, but it was time to move on.

We packed up this morning and continued our trek west to the Zion National Park area to spend a few days checking out the park. Unfortunately, we were going to see Bryce Canyon National Park as well but discovered we are too far away to visit right now. We had planned on staying in Kabab Utah, but after checking out the RV Parks in person, they just didn't live up to our expectations or as advertised, so we continued on another 80 miles to our current location in St. George, Utah.

We'll be in St. George, Utah through Saturday for sure and possibly a little longer. We're tentatively planning on heading to Las Vegas for a few days once we leave St. George. But we haven't given up on seeing Bryce Canyon National Park either. We'll be driving back through the Bryce Canyon area once we leave Las Vegas and plan on spending a couple of days in the area so we can visit the Park.

Well, that's the latest for now. We drove 400 miles today--way too many for me! That wasn't our initial plan, but once we decided to continue on to St. George, our travel day extended too long. Ok, enough 'blabbing'...it's late and I am exhausted. We had a great day today--and hope you did as well. Until later~

Canyonland National Park

We got a late start yesterday before leaving for Canyonlands National Park. We finally headed out around 11:00 and first planned on stopping by Dead Horse State Park, only to discover there wasn't much to see really. So we continued on another 17 miles to Canyonlands National Park. It was on our list of To Do's before leaving Moab. Wow! I can't believe anything can make the Grand Canyon look small--but Canyonlands certainly does.

Canyonlands is 35 miles west of Moab and is the largest national park in Utah. The various areas of the park staggers the imagination. It is divided into three districts by the Green and Colorado Rivers: 1) Island in the Sky; 2) The Needles and 3) The Maze. Only Island in the Sky can be seen without the use of 4x4 vehicles. Each was named for their most prominent geologic characteristics, these districts are quite varied in what they have to offer.

The Island in the Sky section that we visited sits atop a massive 1500 foot mesa, quite literally an Island in the Sky. Twenty miles of paved roads lead to many of the most spectacular views in southeastern Utah. From these lofty viewpoints, visitors can see nearly 150 miles in any given direction, resulting in panoramic views that encompass thousands of square miles of canyon country. There are many hiking trails.

We did hike one trail, the one mile round trip to the Mesa Arch. Wow, it was really difficult to hike into the Mesa Arch. It's 6500 foot above sea level so I had a difficult time just trying to catch my breath. In addition, it was a much steeper climb than the park brochures indicated. The hike was classified as easy, huh! If that was an easy hike, I'll eat my shoe! Needless to say we didn't do any more hikes during our time in Canyonlands.

We had a terrific time yesterday in Canyonlands National Park. We took today (Sunday) 'off' and plan on going back to Arches National Park tomorrow to take pictures. We were there last week but there was a snow storm, and we didn't get any pictures. Tomorrow's supposed to be a sunny, warmer day so tomorrow we're off to Arches. Hopefully we'll have lot's of good pictures of Arches.

Tuesday it's chores day, laundry and getting stuff ready and packed for our travel day this Wednesday. We leave Wednesday and are heading to a city near Zion National Park. We've not yet decided exactly where we'll be staying...guess we'll figure that out one way or another, by Wednesday afternoon for sure! Well, that's about a wrap from here. We had a terrific day and hope you did as well.

Until later~

Beautiful Moab

What a wonderful day. We got a later start since we spent a couple of hours this morning trying to come up with some kind of draft of where we're headed after leaving Moab, until our arrival at Glacier National Park on June 12th. That gives us about 6 weeks to get there and lot's of places we want to see, hence the need to at least draft our next several weeks.

Once we got that behind us we were out the door, heading to Arches National Park. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate and the first half of the day and the majority of our visit to Arches was spent in a snow storm. Yep, that's right a snow storm. Ironically, it was semi sunny an hour before. It actually began when we stopped for gas on our way to Arches. We were first hit with sleet pellets and by the time we arrived at Arches, the clouds were gathering.

So no good pictures of Arches today. We did take a few as we were leaving the park and plan to head back Monday to get some great shots. Once we left Arches, we headed for one of the scenic drives recommended in the travel brochures. We got lot's of good pictures from the scenic drive and combined with the few we were able to get at Arches, I've posted them to our blog. Check out the Moab Pictures slideshow on the left hand side. Just double click on the slideshow to enlarge the pictures.

We stopped by a local brewery on our way home and grabbed a burger. Mark had a couple of their homemade brews and we headed home, kicked back and chilled. Considering we were in an unexpected snowstorm earlier today, who would have thought this would turn about to be such a terrific day?

Well that's a wrap for this update...we had a wonderful day today, and hope you did as well. Until later...~

Short Travel Day to Moab, Utah

Since we moved into the Mountain Time Zone last week, we're slowly beginning to move our hours back in the direction they should be. I wasn't crawling out of bed until 9:00 - 10:00 on some mornings! Yikes, almost half of my workday was behind me by this time in my 'old' life. I've been setting the alarm the last week so we could get going on our site seeing adventures. Well, it's apparently worked. I woke up at 5:30 a.m. this morning without an alarm clock. Just like I used to do--it's like the brain knows what time to get up even when you're sound asleep.

Anyway, I was up very early this morning and grabbed some coffee and sit back to watch the news. Around 6:00 Mark got up and by 7:00 we had pretty much everything in the RV packed up and ready to head out. We were leaving Cortez, Colorado this morning, heading to Moab, Utah.

Before heading out this morning, we knew we would be cooking most days during our week in Moab, and since they don't have many grocery stores there we headed to the Walmart in Cortez this morning to buy our weekly groceries. We were back home and still had everything packed away and heading out by 9:00 a.m. this morning.

We only had a short 120 mile trip today from Cortez to Moab. The drive into Moab was absolutely, breathtaking. Mark and I were exchanging "OOHHHHHH and AWWWWW's" on our walkie talkies the last hour of the drive. Many many westerns, movies, and TV shows including Touched by an Angel were filmed in the southwest area of Utah. The scenery is not like anything either of us had ever seen. The stone formations were unlike anything we've ever seen. Just gorgeous.

We rarely make reservations because in this lifestyle you're really never sure exactly where you'll be on a given day, but we just squeaked by today. We almost left empty handed with no place to stay! Thank goodness we traveled on Wednesday. Had we arrived on the weekend or Mon/Fri we would not have had a place to stay. Countless RV Parks were full, but we finally found a place, got settled in and everything hooked up and then headed to the Utah Information Center to pick up lot's of brochures and info of Moab, Canyonlands and the surrounding areas.

Suffice to say we'll be quite busy this week. We plan on spending tomorrow at Arches National Park. The area is full of unique sandstone structures, on the Colorado River. We'll be spending several days checking out different areas of Canyonlands National Park. It's huge--makes the Grand Canyon look small. We also want to see Dear Horse State Park--several movies were filmed there and the scenery is just spectacular (notice I keep saying that? Can't think of a better adjective!)

Mark grilled a ribeye steak for himself and I had a hamburger pattie (don't care for steak believe it or not). It's Wednesday evening now and we've kicked back just chilling--anxiously waiting for tomorrow morning so we can go check out these places and take lot's of pictures. I'll post pictures tomorrow evening if I get a chance. Well, that's a wrap for us...we had a wonderful day and hope you did as well!~

Durango Silverton Train Ride

We got up very early this morning and were out the door at 7:00 a.m. We had a one hour drive from Cortez Colorado to Durango for our 1/2 day train ride to Cascade Canyon. During the winter season, the Durango Silverton train only runs a 52 mile round trip excursion. But it turned out to be just about right for us.

We had a wonderful time on the way down there. We sat the entire time in one of the outdoor observation rail cars and stood the entire two hour trip to Cascade Canyon. The views were obviously spectacular and the pictures uploaded via the slide-show to the right, simply can't do it justice.

I had wanted to go on this train for many years and was really glad we finally had the chance to do so. Having gotten up so early (5:00 is early for us these days!), combined with the rolling movement of the train on our return, I found myself dozing off a few times. But since we had a chance to see everything on our trip down, I didn't miss anything. (But I did do my usual "bobbing" of my head when I get sleepy that *Billy/Julie and Mark make fun of me doing!!) Fortunately, we had put the camera away and Mark didn't get any pictures of the bobbing this time!

To top off a wonderful day with terrific weather and sunshine, when we got back to the train station we stopped next door for an ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery. Yum!! Wow, we had never had an ice cream from this place before and boy were they terrific! I had a chocolate cone and Mark had a vanilla one. Suffice to say they probably had a gazillion calories, but it was our 'dinner' as we were too full to eat anything else once we got home.

We've really enjoyed our short stay here in Cortez, Colorado, but it's time to move on. We leave tomorrow morning for Moab, Utah. We're tentatively planning on staying a week in the area and spend a day at Arches National Park and a couple of days checking out Canyonland National Park, which is huge.

Well, that's about a wrap for us...we had a wonderful day today and hope you did as well! Until later...~

Mesa Verde Nat'l Park

We arrived in Cortez, Colorado yesterday, Satruday April 24th. We're staying at the Cortez KOA campgrounds. We got up early this morning and headed to Mesa Verde National Park, which is only a few miles down the road from where we're staying. The backdrop and views from our campground are phenominal as well. We can also see the Rocky Mountains, still snow-capped as well.

Mesa Verde National Park was a wonderful experience. We saw lot's of wildlife, deer, countless birds and surprisingly, a herd of wild horses. They're apparently all quite used to humans as none of them run off when they see you. We have several pictures of the wild mustangs and deer included in our slide of the Park, on the blog for you to check out.

Now, as for a few details about Mesa Verde National Park. The park is considered America's premier archaeological wonder. National Geographic Traveler even named Mesa Verde as one of the top 50 things in the world that one "must see" in a lifetime.

The beauty and complexity of the homes and villages speak eloquently of the ancient peoples who built them. Walk into any of these spectacular cliff dwellings and hear the wind whispering through the shadowed rooms. The walls radiate noise and you can hear distant voices from other areas of the ruins. I don't think anyone visiting the park could not come away untouched by the experience.

Until recently, these ancient people were called Anasazi. Today, they're referred to as Ancestral Puebloans, forefathers of the people who now live along the Rio Grande River and the high mesas in New Mexico and Arizona. The Park comprises 52,000acres of amazing canyons, and home to falcons, eagles, deer, coyotes, bobcats, bear, mountain lions and wild stallions.

As for our journey today, in order to actually enter any of these cliff dwellings, you must join one of the National Park ranger led tours. We initially decided to go to both the "Cliff Dwelling Palace" and "Balcony House". After checking out the surrounding areas and Pitt-rooms some 2,000+ years old, we arrived for our Cliff Dwelling ranger-led tour. Wow! What an experience.

The Park Rangers indicated the tours were 'somewhat strenuous'...especially since we were at 7,000+ feet above sea level. Whew! For awhile there, I thought I may end up spending the night there, it was sooooo difficult getting out! Initially, you work your way down several levels of stairs, all uneven and hand-made. I thought, sheesh--piece of cake, getting down. I got this thing covered! Well, uhhhh...that was until the End of the tour and we had to CLIMB out.

The ranger led tour was wonderfully help, quite interesting and we really thoroughly enjoyed it. However, I had no idea just how difficult it would be climbing out of that sucker. We had to climb up 4-5 sets of wooden ladders and additional stone stairs for a total of probably 10+ flights of stairs, to get out. The steps between were quite high as well. Throw in the fact that we were at 7,000+ feet elevation, and it's a wonder I ever got out of there.

Of course, Mark patiently walked behind me...not even appearing winded--at all! I on the other hand, was Gasping for air. I had to stop several times on the way out to try and suck in a little air. I actually thought I might have a heart attack before I got out of there. Whew! That's without a doubt the most strenous thing I've done in 10+ years. Really.

We had tickets for a follow up tour of "Balcony House". However, we were informed it was much more strenuous than the Cliff Dwelling Palace. So did we go to the second tour? Uhhhhhh....hmmmmmm, let me think a minute here--Not!! At that point, it was after 3:00 and I was exhausted, very tired and hungry. So we called it a day and left. We stopped for a bite to eat and then came back 'home' to our RV and I crashed on the bed with our babies for a few hours of rest.

Overall--we had a wonderful time at Mesa Verde National Park. We're really glad we did it--another item crossed off our "bucket list"! Tomorrow, we're planning on driving an hour from our current location in Cortez, to Durango and riding the Durango Silverton train. It's an entire day trip up there and back with lunch included.

We should have more updates tomorrow or the next day. Be sure and click on the Mesa Verde Nat'l Park link on the left side of the blog to look at all the pictures we took. **Oh yea, BE sure and check out the picture of someone's "rear-end"!! That unfortunate individual is me. Yep, Mark had the audacity to take a picture of me trying to climb up one of the many ladders getting out. I told him I couldn't believe he did that--that was down right cruel...so I decided to include it so you could see for yourself! Suffice to say it's a terrible picture--but my wonderful husband took it. (See what I have to put up with...??)

Well that's a wrap for today. We hope you had a wonderful day today--we certainly did!!~

Lubbock to Albuquerque

We left Lubbock this morning heading to Albuquerque for the night. Not long after entering New Mexico, the winds really kicked up and temperature started dropping. I quickly remembered why I do Not like New Mexico weather! Last year we spent a couple weeks in New Mexico, and the winds continually blew 40 - 50+ mph constantly.

The winds were so bad last time that the toppers on our slide-outs were ripped out (it's kind of like a material awning above the slide outs of the RV)...well, guess what? Yep, that's right--it happened again. Ugh!!!! Within an hour of entering New Mexico, one of the toppers blew out again, so we'll have to get it repaired some where along the way once again.

In addition, the temperatures continued to drop from the mid-60's in Lubbock, to the low 40's by the time we made it to Albuquerque. About an hour outside Albuquerque we hit I guess what you'd call a 'blizzard'. Really, a blizzard. The flakes were so small at first I thought I was driving into a mass swarm of small insects. I actually called Mark on our walkie-talkies to ask him what it was! The mountains in the distance were almost white in color. Imagine snow blowing at 50 mpg. You couldn't see the mountains it was so white.

Well we successfully maneuvered through New Mexico, the wind not withstanding, and arrived at an RV Park just outside of Albuquerque and will spend the night here. We'll be leaving here early tomorrow morning, heading to Cortez, Colorado to spend a few days. We're tentatively planning on spending some time in Mesa Verde National Park and driving to Durango, Colorado to check out the area and possibly take the Durango Silverton train.

We've spent five of the last six days traveling, so we're looking forward to spending a few nights in one location. Both our babies (Clyde & Duffy) travel really well. Both sleep in their little doggie bed in the front seat, though Clyde does ride on my lap some as well (did I tell you Clyde is one really spoiled "and loved" little Chihuahua??) Well, that's about it for today. I hope you had a terrific day--we did. Until later~

We're Finally On Our Way!

We finally began our journey north today. We made it to Lubbock this afternoon with no unexpected surprises this time. It was a rather uneventful trip, which was great. We had planned on stopping over in Snyder, Texas for a visit with family. Unfortunately, all RV Park in the area were booked for some kind of pipe fitters activity, so we pulled over and made an 'executive' decision on what to do next.

One of the wonderful things about this lifestyle is that changes like this aren't a big deal any longer. I told Mark yesterday that we were fortunate that we weren't on a schedule vacation, like the old days when I was with Ma Bell...we lost a day, no major problem--just make a new plan.

We decided to continue on to Lubbock this afternoon and drive an hour or so back to Snyder tomorrow for a visit with my aunt. We're not sure if we'll be here more than a couple of days--that will depend on how my aunt is doing. She's having a very difficult time with her memory these days, so we'll just play it by ear and see how it goes. From here, we head to Cortez, Colorado to visit Mesa Verde National Park and the Durango, Colorado areas.

We also made some adjustments to our upcoming travel plans as well. We've added a few more stops along the way in our trip to St. Mary's, Montana. We're tentatively going to see Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park and a short stop in Las Vegas to check out the new attractions since we were last in Vegas several years ago.

Well, that's about it for now. As always, our plans are in 'jello'--(one of my favorite parts of this entire journey for sure). Hope everyone had a wonderful day, we sure did. Until later...~

A "Lucky" Breakdown?

Ever heard of a "Lucky" Breakdown? We had one. Yep, that's right--we were lucky. How's that possible? We were on our way back from Lake Livingston and a vist with Chris. We were headed to West Texas for a short visit with family...and about halfway, the truck engine overheated and started an automatic power-down. I was following Mark in the Ford Escape as he limped off the freeway, and Guess what was directly across from us as we moved on to the service road?

A Ford dealership! Yep, that's right. What are the statistical chances of having an engine failure, with only enough time to pull off the highway and the very exit you must take--has your vehicle's dealership (in our case Ford) right in front of you! Is that awesome or what? I mean, if you're gonna have a breakdown on the road, it couldn't possibly go any better huh?

As we pulled into the dealership the service manager comes out and immediately explains that his diesel mechanics are back up thru Friday, with a 3 day backlog! Ouch! Mark explained our situation and asked if they could tell us if it were at least safe to drive some 100 miles back to Dallas. The dealership manager was present and told us they'd work us in that day, due to our circumstances.

It took the dealership 4 hours to make the repair, and fortunately we had just purchased our Ford Escape, so......rather than having to wait outside the dealership in hot weather with both dogs (Ugh!) we had our other vehicle and went to grab a bite to eat. At least we were comfortable in our airconditioned car!

We made it back to Forney late Tuesday afternoon, got set up and were relaxing by 7:00 that evening. Whew! What a "great" day, huh?

Travel Plans

We've made our tentative plans for our journey to Glacier National Park for the summer. We're supposed to be at our workamping summer job in mid-June. That gives us 7-8 weeks to get there and more importantly, time for a little site seeing along the way. We've mapped out our tentative travel plans for the next several weeks as follows:

1) Snyder, Texas - Visit with relatives
2) Cortez, Colorado - Mesa Verde National Park
3) Durango, Colorado - Durango Area and Train
4) Monument Valley, Utah - Monument Valley, where many western films were made
5) Moab, Utah - Arches National Park;
Badlands National Park
6) Jackson, Wyoming - Grand Tetons National Park
7) West Yellowstone, Montana - Yellowstone National Park
8) St. Mary, Montana - Glacier National Park
St. Marys RV Park - Workamping Location

Of course, there will be changes along the way...but at least we have a draft as we begin our journey. As always, more to come--stay tuned~

On The Road Again

Finally! We ended up staying home in the Dallas area much longer than anticipated, but between all the "To Do's" we needed to accomplish in selling the parent's home, getting both our boys moved and settled in different cities, getting our must keep stuff into storage--along with all the things necessary to help Mark's parents over the last several months, and tons of other things, we feel good about getting out of town as quickly as we did!

Last Wednesday was our 33rd wedding anniversary. Happy anniversary Mark!! We left Thursday morning for an RV Park on Lake Livingston, in Livingston Texas. It's very peaceful and quiet here...we're really enjoying this park. Mark spent today fishing, not sure he had any bites, but he really enjoyed fishing...says it's relaxing. (As for me, my idea of relaxing doesn't involve sitting in the hot sun, staring at a pole, and reeling in those slimey little guys!) We do enjoy sitting out in the evenings just before dark and spending a couple of hours just enjoying the silence and stars. What a life, huh?

We drove to Brenham yesterday to spend the day with Chris and Love and took them for an early dinner before heading back home to our spot on Lake Livingston. One of the reasons for staying in Livingston is so we could drop by Escapees, which is an RV organization that also has a mail forwarding service that we just started using a few weeks ago. We dropped by today to pick up our mail not realizing they were closed on Saturdays. Not to worry...our schedule is always flexible! So we'll probably hang around here one day longer than anticipated to pick up our mail before heading out. We'll most likely leave here Tuesday morning for Snyder Texas, to visit with my aunt and cousin.

We plan on staying in Snyder for a few days to help my aunt with various things and once we leave, we'll be heading to Utah. More to come on our travel plans in a future update. Oh yea, I followed Mark to Lake Livingston Thursday, he was towing our fifth wheel, and I followed in our new Ford Escape with both our 'babies'. It drove just great and the gas mileage was almost 30 mpg! We're really happy with the new 'addition' to the family (knock on wood!). Well, that's a wrap for this update. Stay tuned...~

New Purchase/Plans

We've had a problem with our transportation needs since we moved into this lifestyle in February 2009. We sold Mark's small truck and returned my car when the lease was up, leaving us with only the Ford F450 tow vehicle for the last 14 months. That works out great on actual travel days when we're moving our 'home' on wheels to another location, as we travel around the country. However, we've come to realize that it's a Big problem when we're not traveling.

We've been back 'home' in the Dallas area for 5 months now, (far longer than anticipated) and have accomplished lot's and lot's of things. But we've had to do it with only one vehicle on most occasions. We were fortunate enough to have Mark's dads car for use and with us for a couple of months while here. But it's become clear that we can no longer go on with only one vehicle. To make matters worse, we've piled on way too many miles on our tow vehicle, just running errands, getting groceries, etc. So, we finally came to the realization last week that we simply had to buy another vehicle so that our tow vehicle was used only for towing purposes.

So, we finally 'bit the bullet' so to speak. We just purchased a 2008 Ford Escape. It's a small SUV and a 4 cylinder and we'll get really great gas mileage and we got a great deal. The only bad part for us is that I'll have to drive the vehicle behind Mark as he pulls the trailer. I really enjoyed travel days and enjoying the scenery while we crossed the country (when not nodding off...!) On travel days, we'll split the babies--Clyde will ride with me and Duffy will ride with Mark. Once we've reached our new location, the truck is parked and never driven, unless absolutely necessary. We hope this will significantly prolong the life of our tow vehicle and it should ultimately save us money, since the truck only gets 8-9 miles a gallon!

Last but not least, it will be a Much more comfortable ride around town too! Well it's Sunday night, and we're planning on finally heading out Thursday morning. We'll be going to Lake Livingston for a few days and visit with Chris and Love. From there, we'll head north to spend a few days with my aunt in Snyder, Texas. From there...we're heading north. We'd like to check out a few places in Colorado, see the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone, ultimately ending up at Glacier National Park in Montana in mid-June.

Of course we'll keep the family posted as we roam this summer, so stay tuned!!

Plans and Analysis

Though we've known for sometime that we will be working for a small RV Park at the entrance to Glacier National Park, in St. Mary Montana this summer, we've not actually set down to begin working out travel plans. I spent several hours this evening beginning an outline of where we'll be going and what we're interested in seeing in our journey north. And Mark and I spent some time tonight reviewing the draft.

We've not yet even clarified exactly when we'll be leaving the Dallas area. Of course, part of the joy of this lifestyle is the flexibility it allows. Even when we move to full-time jobs, it's quite possible our jobs will not be in Texas. Having spent our entire lives in Texas, outside of the occassional vacation, we're interested in spending time in areas outside of the state. We've discovered that plans in this lifestyle are frequently in 'jello'...they can and do change frequently.

We hope to have our final activities here at home finished around the 10th of April and head out around that time. Our tentative plans at this time are to first head south to spend a few days on Lake Livingston, Texas, giving us a chance to see our older son Chris and his wife. We've also set up our mail forwarding service with Escapees, which is headquartered in Livingston, Texas, so we'll have a chance to get our mail and packages before heading north.

From Livingston, Texas we'll be heading north to Snyder, Texas to spend a few days with one of my aunts. I was quite close to her growing up--she pretty much clothed me until I was in the 8th grade, as my dad drove a truck and we had little money. She was almost like a second mother to me. She's in her early 80's now and needs more help than I believe she realizes right now. So Mark and I hope to help her and her son out, (and he's in a wheelchair), with various things they need done around her home. From there, we begin our real trek north.

I spoke to our boss for the upcoming summer the other day and she indicates that the roads to the entrance to Glacier National Park are currently being targeted to be opened on June 12th. Unless more snow occurs, we should be able to access the RV Park, Johnsons of St. Mary, where we'll be working, around June 10th. So we should have 6-7 weeks northward to enjoy during our trip to St. Mary's.

We definitely want to spend a week in the Creede/Durango Colorado area, checking out the area and things to see. We'll continue north to Bozeman for a few days. The only other definite at this point, is that we really hope to spend a couple of weeks in Yellowstone National Park. Of course, during early May there will be lot's of snow left, but we don't have time to wait for warmer weather before going, since we need to be in Montana in early June. We've heard that some of the best times to see wildlife, with bears, wolves, moose, etc. coming right into the RV campground. (And fear not...our little chihuahua Clyde is with us. No bear or wolf will dare tread near our RV...you can bet on that!! lol)

We'll do lot's of research of places to go and things to do and see along the way. We're really looking forward to moving on. We've spent 5 months back in the Dallas area--much longer than anticipated, but we accomplished much, including the sale of my parent's home, moving both our sons to different locations, helping with elderly parents, etc. We've also had a chance to spend time with family, as once we leave here, we won't be able to head back home for several months--we checked today and it's 2700+ miles from Dallas to our summer job in Montana.

Our workamping job is thru September 15th, so we'll tentatively begin our trek southward in mid-September. We're excited and looking forward to the adventure. The great thing about our job this summer is that it provides us with a free campsite and electric, along with an hourly salary and a free meal each day too! The good news is this will really help our budget, as we'll have little expense this summer, since our 'rent' and food are covered, along with an hourly salary--allowing us to put a bit away as well.

We weren't really sure if we would enjoy this lifestyle when we began, but we've discovered it is indeed much cheaper and enjoyable (for us) than living in a home. Even if your home is paid for, you still have all the taxes on your home, along with insurance, gas, electric, etc. Heating/cooling our 360 foot cocoon, isn't very expensive. Considering neither of us had ever been in an RV, much less slept in one...we really did take a 'flying leap' of faith when we did this didn't we? February 16th was our one year anniversary in the RV, and we can say that we absolutely made the right choice, for us. In fact, it was one of the best decisions we've made in a long, long time.

Of course, this lifestyle isn't for everyone, but it has really worked out well for us. There was a huge weight lifted off our shoulders after doing this, and we weren't expecting that. Paying off every credit card, vehicles, the RV, truck, etc., and getting rid of most of our 'stuff', was quite 'freeing' and gave us much more control on how much we must spend each month. The only mandatory expenses being campground fees (if not workamping), food, insurance and cell service.

The current economic state of this country would have made it impossible for us to have continued living in our old home, with our big mortgage, new vehicles, credit card bills, cable, phone, electric, gas, cell, etc. etc. Everyone in my organization with AT&T was laid-off by the end of April, 2009. They shut down the entire organization. Mark was laid-off in January of 2009. We would have lost our home, cars, and everything else since we would have been unable to make any where near enough money as required to keep our head above water.

With the current economic times, our combined salary would have been far less than half of what we required--once again, making our decision a wonderful and timely one. With the hideous new Healthcare Bill (i.e., Obamacare), it appears the healthcare that I and so many other retirees "earned" after working more than 30 years, will be whacked out from under us...thank you Mr. President. AT&T announced last Friday that they are "reviewing" retiree healthcare and that changes are anticipated. Looks like AT&T will be dumping retirees into the federal system. I get soooooo ticked off thinking of the direction of our new 'socialist' country...but, that's for another blog entry, so I won't get on a tirade here. Suffice to say I'm a christian/conservative--I know that's no longer the 'popular' thing to say--but I don't give a flip. And YES this country was founded as a Christian Nation...I don't care what our president says. "Nuff said".

As for our decisions--No regrets. We're very blessed, quite fortunate and looking forward to what God has planned for us as our future unfolds. Stay tuned...~