Time at the Beach - Indian Rocks Beach, that is!

The beach was great - sunny every day - no rain.

On Tuesday we drove up to Tarpon Springs which is about 20 miles north of Indian Rocks Beach.  This town is Greek and is known for its sponges.   About 70% of all sponges in the world come from the gulf outside Tarpon Springs.

We took a boat ride and saw how the sponges are retrieved from the water.

The diver is ready to go overboard here.  He has extra weights to take him to the bottom.

 At this point, he is under and searching for sponges.

 Coming back aboard the boat.

Actually, this is a representation of how they retrieve sponges,  In this case, the sponges have previously been planted in the water.  The real sponging happens out in the Gulf.

 After the boat ride, we walked thru the shops and ended up in the bakery for some sweets which were exceptionally good.  Emma had chocolate cake and Judy and I had baklava.

We also visited the John's Pass area (about 15 miles south) which has a lot of shops to browse thru.

And we did drive down to Pass a Grille which is a small town at the end of the St. Petersburg gulf.  Back in 1998-99 when we lived in Indian Rocks Beach, we would go down to Pass a Grille and look for shells.  The water was extremely clear and you could walk out a long way.  Then at some point they closed it to shelling for years, but this year it was back as a beach again - new sand and clear waters.  Unfortunately, we did not wear out suits so we couldn't go out very far at all.  We did find a few shells though.

On Friday, we had planned to take the majority of our stuff back to the RV so that we wouldn't have too much on Saturday when everyone wants to leave and there are no carts avaiable.  We got the truck all packed up only to find out that the truck wouldn't start.  Batteries are dead!!!  Call the road service and they come and start the truck - then I dirve over to the Ford dealer to get new batteries.  But we did finally get the stuff over to the RV and then went out for our last dinner at JD's (where else??).

On Saturday we checked out of the timeshare, got the RV hooked up and headed for home.  That night we stopped at  a nice campground near Chatahoochie, FL in the FL panhandle.  The next morning, Sunday, we headed out and got as far as Pensicola when one of the tires on the trailer blew out!

It was 98 degrees at the time!
Of course it took off part of the RV fender as well!

Called road service again and they came within a half hour and we got the spare on.  The spare was original (9 years old) and the RV tires were 4.5 years old and had been to Alaska twice.  So, the best option is to replace all 4 tires.  Now, to find a tire dealer open on Sunday, which we finally did.  Got 4 new Firestone tires and were on the road again in about 3 hours.

We actually made it to our planned campground for the night (after 6 PM) and got settled in.  On Monday we drove the rest of the way to Plano and are now home for a few weeks.

More later...

Time to Travel

This summer we plan to make trips each month, coming back to Plano at the end of each month.  Reason being:  I have something called CIDP which is basically neuropathy of the feet and legs.  It has been getting worse so my neurologist has recommended having treatments each month called IVIG.  IVIG is essentially a solution of antibodies that are administered intravenously.  Takes about 5 hours each time as an outpatient at the hospital.  I will have 5 more treatments, and ,so far, it seems to be helping.

Anyway, our June trip is in progress right now.  We left TX on June 2nd with our granddaughter, Emma (14), on this trip with us.  We traveled to Nashville (actually Henry Horton State Park in Chapel Hill, TN) and camped over the long weekend.  Had a trailer tire go flat on us on the way, but at the exit we pulled off, there was a tire shop.  The valve stem had gone bad; got it replaced were on our way in about an hour.
Belinda and Bailey came down on Friday and spent two night with us.  We tried some fishing in Duck Creek but didn't catch any fish.

Had a good time, though.  We also had a camp fire and cooked halibut and salmon on a grill.

Tuesday morning we left the state park for Florida, planning to visit Destin along the way and then to our timeshare in Indian Rocks Beach by Saturday.  Unfortunately, plans don't always work out!  We  got about 100 miles, just inside the Alabama border when a "wrench" light came on in the truck.  So we pulled off the interstate which just happened to have a Ford dealer down the street!!  They checked it out and determined that it was a defective oil cooler.  Major repair!  The mechanic said it might take a week to repair!!  WHAT??   We don't have time for that!!

So, we found a campground nearby, setup the trailer, took the truck back for repair, and rented a car.  The service manager thought they might have it done by Saturday.
This doesn't look like a minor repair job to me!

 So, the next day we drove back to Nashville to stay with Belinda and Bailey while they repaired the truck.

We took Bailey out t the pool on Thursday.

Such a good swimmer for being 8 years old!

On Thursday the service manager said it would be done on Friday and by noon it was ready to go.  We turned the car in, got the truck, hooked up the trailer and were on the road by 1PM.  We drove about 300 miles to southern Alabama, spent the night at a campground, and Saturday drove 400 miles to get to a campground in Largo, FL. which is about 3 miles from our timeshare.  Got the trailer parked at a campground about 3 miles from the timeshare.

And headed for the beach!!

Of course, our first stop after checking in is supper at JD's!!

We have this picture of Gehrig from back in 2008 so we updated it with Emma now!

And then the sunset later:

And a look at our timeshare from the beach:

 More later...

On the Road Again - Finally

Well. for those of you who are still checking the blog occasionally to see if any new posts are made, you are in luck - I am starting up again.

We spent the winter months (December - April) at the RV park in Plano.  We have watched Gehrig (#11) play basketball and Emma (also #11) play volleyball.

And have been involved with family and friends and church.

We flew to MA in December to celebrate granddaughter, Hannah's, 16th birthday and our 50th anniversary.

In December Julie had a 50th anniversary party for us after a church service.  The congregation was invited and we had cake and coffee.

Went on a cruise in January out of San Francisco to Cabo San Lucas, La Paz, Loreta, and Puerto Vallarta.   Great way to celebrate our anniversary.

Little did we know that the real party would be in March when all of the kids could be here. Larry, Jacky, and Hannah came from MA and Belinda came from TN.  Pam and Steve also came from MN.  Judy and I thought we were going out to dinner to celebrate Emma's birthday but when we showed up at Julie and Ken's, there were at least 50 people there. We were shocked, to say the least!!  We had a great time and really enjoyed the whole weekend with the family.

In April Judy and I attended a week long Hitchhiker rally (those people who own Hitchhiker trailers) just outside Kerrville, TX.  We had a great time and met a lot of people for the first time.

One of the highlights of the week was having a hamburger at a local restaurant 10 miles outside of Fredericksburg.

Then we attended WWII reenactment in Fredericksburg.

Of course, one cannot visit Fredericksburg without eating at a German restaurant (which we did!!).

Later in the week, we drove to Bandera, Tx and had dinner and refreshments at the 11th Street Cowboy Bar.  The place is only open on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays.  They have a country band and dancing.  The unique thing about this place is that you bring your own meat and grill on their charcoal grills.  They provide a salad, baked potato and roll for $6.  Great place to visit.

Now when we travel, we will be able to meet up with some of them again along the road. Also, we plan to attend another rally next year at the same campground.

More later...