July 2010 Travels (3)

On Tuesday we got up early, drove to East St. Louis, IL and spent the night.  The next day we drove thru downtown St. Louis

on our way to Platte City, MO. (just north of KC) and then the next day drove to Sioux City, IA to spend the weekend with Judeen and Katie and Tim and Alison and Eric. Unfortunately, Alison was sick so they didn’t make it.
We got an even better site this year as can be seen here:

And this is the view from our site:

On Friday night Judeen arrived at the CG around 7 and Katie and Tim shortly after that. We sat by the river and had a couple of beers and watched the water go by (Missouri river).

On Saturday we got together for lunch at Katie and Tim’s and then went to a monument on a high hill overlooking the city called War Eagle Park. The Indian was made out of iron.  Even though his name was War Eagle, he was a peaceful man and helped settle Sioux City.  The scenery from here was beautiful.

(Look, Julie, no softball shirt!!!)

We also went to a place called Trinity Heights (used to be a boy's Catholic School) but was torn down and rebuilt as this.  Beautiful park with numerous sections.  This is a 30 ft statue of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
Queen of Peace:

And this is a 33 ft statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus:

They also have a section called the Circle of Life Memorial to the Unborn.  They have a museum where they have a life size Last Supper wood carving made from 2 X 4's and Elmer's Glue (really!). Here are some pictures of it:

Then we went to Palmers Candy Shop and picked up some candy that they make there. Later that day we went to Bev’s On The River and had a leisurely dinner on their patio overlooking the river.

Sunday found us back at Katie and Tim’s where we taught them the 3 -13 card game.

Later Judeen left for home and we went back to the CG. We took our chairs over to the river bank and read for about 3 hours, and watched the boats go by. It was a perfect weekend.

Monday morning we left Sioux City and drove to Pipestone for the week. Monday night we had dinner at Lange’s with Gary and Shiryl. We spent the week visiting relatives. This picture is of my Mom’s cousin, Barb (who is 90 years old) and her daughter, Claudia. 

Barb lives in Ft. Meyers, FL. but comes to MN for the summer.  Claudia lives on the farm where her Dad and Grandparents lived.  She works from home and edits medical journals.  We had dinner with them on Wednesday at the Calumet Hotel.

Saturday we left Pipestone and had a leisurely drive (105 miles) to Ortonville, MN and Big Stone Lake. On the way we passed thru Madison, MN which is known for:

Why, Madison, MN????

The campground that we are staying at this week is called the Lakeshore RV Park and is very nice. The pictures tell it all:

This will be my "fishing from shore" spot:

Mom thought these pictures were almost as good as Florida!

July 2010 Travels (2)

Well, I guess it’s time for another update.
Since Belinda and Bryan both had to work on Thursday and Friday, we had planned to go in on Saturday. But Belinda called on Friday afternoon and said that we should come then so we did and spent the long weekend with them. We had a great time. On Saturday morning, we went to the pool again. There weren’t many people there because it was cloudy. Bailey brought a paint brush with her – the kids like to “paint” the wall.

On Saturday night we went to the Nashville Sounds baseball game (AAA team affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers.  If you enlarge this, you can see that it is the scoreboard:

Some of us watched the game while others were busy eating!!!

 It was crowded because they had fireworks after the game which were very good.

On Sunday we went to the movie in the afternoon and saw Toy Story 3. It was Bailey’s first experience ever in a theatre and she really enjoyed it. That night we went to some friends of Bryans and they shot off their own fireworks. It was pretty neat because people all around us were shooting them off.

Sorry, no pics of fireworks!!

On Monday we got a call from Kathi Compton saying that she and Louie were in town for a Moose Lodge convention so we met them and went out for lunch and got caught up on everything.

In case you can't read Kathi's shirt, it says "I'm not a NAG, I am a motivational speaker."

Afterwards, Louie and I did a little fishing and had good luck in a short time:

On Monday evening Pete (our nephew – Carol’s son) and Mandy and the kids came to Belinda’s from Columbia, TN. which is about 40 minutes south of Franklin. Mandy is real nice and the kids are great too.

This is Luke who is about 5 months old:

This is Logan:

And this is Lileha:

The kids had a great time together as you can see.

Later that night we said our goodbyes and drove back to the CG for the night.

July 2010 Travels

Well, we are now officially back on the road. We left TX this morning and drove about 250 miles to the DeGrey Lake State Park in Arkansas.

Very nice park; lots of trees, and the camp sites are far apart and in trees so it’s almost like you are here alone. And because of the trees, there is very little breeze so it is quite warm. It was difficult to get backed into the site due to the trees but we made it OK. Here are a few pictures of our site and the surrounding area.

This is called a "Yurt" and you can rent them.  They are made of heavy vinyl and have windows on all sides that can be zipped open for air flow.  It even has a wooden door that locks.

On Monday we drove by Little Rock and then Memphis on into TN. We stayed at a TN State CG for the night. This one was old and but decent. Tuesday we drove to a Thousand Trails CG near Hohenwald, TN. We encountered one road obstacle about a mile before the CG:

Did not expect to see that!! It looked like it was at least a couple of feet lower to the left of the road so we tried it. We are 13 ft high.

Anyway, we made it and got to the CG. After checking in and getting some of their brochures, we found out that the bypass, which we took, was 13 ft. 6 in. high so we had 6 extra inches!!
At this CG we are about 65 miles from Belinda and Bryan’s unfortunately and it takes about an hour and 20 minutes to get there. Here are a couple of pics of the CG:

Had to stop while a "gaggle" of geese walked accross the road:

We drove in on Tuesday afternoon and spent the rest of the day with them. Belinda took Wednesday off so we went in early and were there the whole day. Went to the pool with Bailey and had a great time.

Thursday and Friday they both had to work so we stayed at the CG and hung out.

We plan to stay thru the 4th of July and then on the 5th we will head out toward Sioux City, IA to meet up with Judeen, Katie and Tim, and Alison and Eric (just like we did last year – should be fun). After that, we head to Pipestone for a few days and then on the 17th we go to Big Stone Lake near Ortonville, MN. Hope to get a little fishing in. From there we go to MPLS to see Pam and Steve and, later in the week, Nancy, Diane and Neil from CA. More later.