Minnesota

We left Pipestone on Thursday morning under cloudy skies.  It had rained all night but stopped about the time we got up.  The first 60 miles were in dense fog and temps in the 40's.  Later it cleared up and we made it to the Fargo/Moorehead area.  We had actually found a campground in Barnesville, MN.  It was a city park  operated by the Lions Club, and, as you can see, very crowded.

The reason we stopped in this area is because we wanted to have coffee with some friends that we had met at our church back in Plano.  They (Roger and Joan Stenerson) live up here but come down to TX in the winter to visit her daughters and family.  Anyway, when we told them we were headed up this way into Canada, they wanted us to stop.  Which we did - had a nice time at their house and got better acquainted.

This is a picture of their house.  The building to the left is actually an indoor pool and he gets the water from a creek out back.  Takes about 4 days for the water to clear.

Thursday night it rained again all night, but by morning had quit again.  We left there around 9 AM and then drove north thru Detroit Lakes - beautiful scenery and "Resorts" signs at every intersection because, of course, this is the land of 10,000 lakes!!!

We found a Walmart to do some last minute shopping before we get into Canada.  

We purposely came this way rather than take the freeway because they said that, at the border, it may be busy with all the traffic/trucks/etc.  So, when we got to the border, no one was ahead of us.  Good.  

However, when the border patrol guy came out, he asked us all the usual questions - where are we from, where are we going, any liquor on board, any pesticides, bear spray, etc. But then we were asked several times if we had firearms on board (which we don't).  Unfortunately, I guess he didn't believe us (Texas plates) because he had us pull over!!  First he wanted the rv opened and slides out.  Then he wanted to know if we had a safe, which we do.  He wanted that opened and he looked thru the papers in it.  Judy has a small jewelry box in which she keeps a small lock of her hair from when she was about 6.  (I know, weird!!). He had to look at that.  Then he wanted to know if we had cash on board and how much.  I had to show him that.  Then we were told to stand out in front of the truck while he searched the rv.  Next he came up front and searched the truck.  

After about 30 minutes, he finished and said we could go on our way. Interestingly enough, he did not search any of the storage areas.  Go figure!

We have made it to Winnipeg - actually about 10 miles west in a KOA CG for the weekend. 

 We will be leaving here on Monday.

On The Road Again - 2014 Version

This year's travel has begun.

We left Plano on Monday, April 28th, and drove to Carthage, MO. (just east of Joplin).  The day was warm and we had the A/C on in the afternoon.  Wind was out of the NW so we only got about 9.5 MPG.

We spend the night at a nice CG called Big Red Barn CG.  Nice people there and good site.  However, a front came thru and by morning, the temp was in the 40's.  We drove from there to Council Bluffs, IA. against a stronger headwind and MPG went down to 8.5.

We stayed at a casino there for two nights so that we could visit with Judeen and Jim and their family - Alison and Eric, Katie and Tim, and, of course, Aliza, who is just 6 months old.  On Tuesday night we met them all at their favorite Mexican restaurant for good food and margaritas!!

On Wednesday we met Judeen at Katie and Tim's house to babysit Aliza  ("somebody had to do it!!") while Katie and Alison did a housecleaning job. 

Judeen and me:

Aliza (whose hips are not fully seated, so she has to wear this cast for 6 weeks).

Alison with Aliza:

Katie and Tim with Aliza:

Alison and Eric:

We had a great time and later we had dinner there as well.

Council Bluffs had some unique artwork at the exit to the casino and our CG.

No idea what it is, but it looked cool.

Thursday we drove to Pipestone, MN. and were up against the strongest headwind yet and MPG was well below 7.  Anyway, we made it and are now still here at the CG in Pipestone where we were camp hosts last year.

We've had guests each morning so far:

On Saturday we drove up to Minneapolis to visit with Pam and Steve.  We also attended a birthday party for Violet who is 4 years old.  Had good time seeing everyone.

On Sunday we went to church, ate pancakes after the service, and then went to a movie - "God's Not Dead."  Good movie.

We came back to Pipestone on Monday morning and noticed something unusual in our hitch:

An extremely well-made bird's nest!!

Unfortunately we had to move it over into the trees.  We were glad there weren't any eggs in it yet!!

Last night we went out for pizza with some of the relatives:

My cousin John and his wife, Gerri, and my uncle Harold (93 years old!) and his wife, Edith.

Today we have been getting ready to leave on Thursday for Canada.

More later...

Nashville, TN

Here it is April 15th, 2014, and I haven't finished our 2013 travels yet!!!!

Guess I 'd better get this updated so we can move on to 2014 (which is just around the corner!!!).

We did leave MA on  October 18th and after a few overnighters along the way made it to TN to visit with Belinda and Bailey in Franklin.  

Some scenery pictures along the way:

 Stayed at a Yogi Bear park in VA:

More scenery:

Made it to Sieverville, TN (Gatlinberg area) and lots of traffic:

River behind our CG:

We stored our trailer at Belinda’s friends (Denisa and Ben) house south of Nashville and stayed at Belinda’s for the week.  Had a lot of fun with them.

This train track runs under a bridge that is on the way to Bailey's school.
We did see a train passing underneath it one time.

The following weekend we moved the trailer to the Henry Horton State Park which is just outside Chapel Hill.  We have stayed here before and really like it a lot.  In fact, we got the same site that we previously had.  They have electric and water hookups but no dump at the site (have a dump station when you leave the park).

Friday night Belinda and Bailey joined us the CG.  We went out to supper at a nearby Cracker Barrel, picked up some bundles of firewood for the campfire, and spent the rest of the evening enjoying the peace and quiet of the CG.

On Saturday we got up, had breakfast outside on the picnic table, and then got the fire started.  The wood was wet from recent rains so I split the logs into smaller pieces and then it burned pretty well.  Bailey helped get it started by rolling up a lot of newspaper and getting the wood to start.

Our site is in the trees and has some rocks and craters right there so Bailey had a lot of fun sliding up and down.  We bought some pumpkins so she played with those as well.  We even scrounged the area for wood (smaller sticks) to keep the fire going.  We had supper on the grill and then retired for the night.

On Sunday we drove back to Franklin (left the trailer at the CG), had lunch at Barb-B-Cutie, and, in the afternoon, the girls went to a Girl Scout meeting that Bailey belongs to while I stayed at home and watched football.

On Monday Judy and I drove back to the CG, hooked up the trailer, dumped our tanks, and then headed home.  We spent that night in a nice little CG just outside Little Rock.  Barely got setup and the clouds opened up;  I think it rained all night.  Anyway, the next day as we were getting ready to pull out, we saw some people walking over to the bushes/tree line and taking pictures.  Turns out, it was a big tom turkey.  Apparently many people take his picture because he had no fear.  (Pictures are on my phone, and, unfortunately, I can't get my PC to recognize it.  So, no pictures.).

We did make it back to Plano that day, got into the same RV Park but different site.  Good to be back home for awhile.