Headed for Minneapolis

This morning when we'd packed up the motorhome and made sure that we'd not forgotten to unplug stuff, we headed south on state route 81 for a short distance, then jumped on Interstate 90 east. Our intention was to head toward Minneapolis but we wanted to stick with secondary roads if we could. The first opportunity I found on the map was Highway 60 which, more or less, headed on a diagonal toward the twin cities area from the Interstate, though it became another highway before you had reached the halfway point. We hadn't made any specific plans to visit anything along the way. We just wanted to put some miles on the truck, plug in a good thriller on the CD player, and watch the fields full of feed corn and soy beans blow by.

For the past couple of days we've been listening to a Robert Crais mystery, though I wish I had tossed it out the window on the second disk. Robert is a native of my home county, Los Angeles, and I have read his works before. But after several days of listening to an absolutely exquisite thriller by my favorite author of such works, Hammond Innes, Robert Crais' effort was rather dismal by comparison. Thankfully, today's book is by Jack Higgins, another long-time favorite of mine and he is so far doing an admirable job. By the way, I gave the Robert Crais book to the camp host of our municipal camp tonight and won't have to look at it any more. Sorry Robert.

Anyway, we're headed northeast on Hwy 60 today, just minding our own business, when about mid-day we go sailing past a wide spot in the highway called Mountain Lake. Just out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of a large, white building with the words, "Telephone Museum" emblazoned on the side. My dear father worked for three decades for the Western Electric Company, a supplier of much equipment to the various telephone companies.

"Did you see that?" I said to Concetta.

"What?"

"The telephone museum sign."

"No," she said.

"Well, we haven't had our cultural stop for the day, you know."

"Go ahead and go back," she said, and braced herself for a radical U-turn.

It turns out the Mountain Lake folks hold an open house at their Heritage Village ONCE A YEAR and we just happened to stumble upon it on just the right day. These folks have pulled old historic buildings from around the area into one location encompassing about an acre or two in size and outfitted the buildings with appropriate furnishings. The restored structures range from a railroad station to a school house, from a general store to a blacksmith shop. In fact, just about every type of business you can think of is represented. On their one day a year open house they all dress up in costume, staff all the buildings, and serve up homemade food enough to satisfy everyone's tastes, both residents and visitors. We were just thrilled.

Concetta and I wandered throughout the grounds for about an hour taking in as much as we could absorb. All the docents were wonderfully friendly and outgoing and made our visit as enjoyable as we could hope for. We especially liked the ladies in the farmhouse who showed us their waffle makers designed to sit atop a wood-burning stove (photo above).

In the train station we looked up when a terrible racket began to emanate from a nearby room. I stuck my head in the door and caught the pictured conductor "playing" a terribly out-of-tune player piano, though the state of the tuning didn't appear to bother the old gent at all. I think he was hopeful that I'd come in and listen to he music, but I nevertheless beat a hasty retreat.

The Mountain Lake folks had a marvelously beautiful day for their festivities. We certainly thank them for their enthusiastic efforts and for their willingness, one and all, to make us feel welcome though they'd never laid eyes on us before.

The Mountain Lake Heritage festival was actually only one of two exciting adventures we had today. The second was -- are you ready for this -- washing the motor home. Lord, I never, ever tried to wash something so big. If you've been reading this blog you know that we have systematically been collecting six states worth of bugs, road grime, and campfire smoke on the ol' Tioga. It looked like a rolling science experiment.

But the general filthy condition of the coach wasn't the worst part. The worst part was that we drove it into one of those do-it-yourself car washes where you feed your quarters into the slot and then rush like hell to finish before your time runs out. Before I finished, I had fed in about a week's allowance worth of quarters and large bills and worked like the sorcerer's apprentice trying to scrub that massive thing with a brush, then rinse it off completely before the bell announced my time was up.

Meanwhile, the soapy brush was busily spewing out what seemed like acres of sudsy foam faster than I could actually deal with it. Even weirder, the foam came out in a wild kaleidoscope of colors that would have sent some of my former roommates from the sixties into never, never land. I had to brush furiously on every part of the coach I could reach or, if I had stood in one spot, the suds would have buried me. It reminded me of one of those old sitcoms, probably "I love Lucy," where the inexperienced housewife puts too much soap in the washing machine and it proceeds to fill the room with suds.

Once the coach was all covered with the kaleidoscope of suds, I then had to try and get off all that soap while I still had time on the machine. The result was a veritable blur of washing, rinsing, re-washing places I'd missed, and re-rinsing. Of course the coach is so big, thirty feet, that I couldn't reach the rear at all. The hoses were too short. In the end, the rig looks pretty good and I got most of the worst of the bug splatters off the front. I think the next time I need the darn thing washed I'm going to find one of those high school charity car washes and turn it over to the youngsters. They need the money.

We actually had one more adventure today before the sun dipped below the horizon: we tried to barbecue some vegetables and a couple of steaks. Now normally this would not have been a big deal. Most campgrounds have a barbecue pit or steel cage to make your barbecuing experience a pleasurable one. But here in Madelia, in the municipal park camp, they provide you with a large steal wheel, probably from some long defunct 18-wheeler,and call it good. I studied the wheel, at least I did after I stole one from a nearby empty camp since our camp had no such wheel. I could see where I could easily fill the cavity of the wheel with charcoal and make myself a nice little fire. But since there was no actual grilling surface to go over the wheel, I could not see how the steaks would be cooked. Hmmm.

Finally I decided that I'd just take some of the firewood that we've been carrying since Carson City and build myself a little square, log cabin style, inside the cavernous wheel. Into the square I'd dump my charcoal. And over the square I could put the little 12" diameter screen that we'd found in a grocery store somewhere in South Dakota. It all seemed very logical and easy.

Anyway, that's what I did. Only problem was that the wood was so dry that it instantly caught fire, even better than the charcoal. Now I had this roaring fire that could have cooked a whole buffalo and still nothing to cook on.

So, for my next trick I scrounged around the camp area for large rocks or rock-like items. I finally managed to collect an igneous rock about the size of a football and what could only be described as a concrete stepping stone about ten inches in diameter. Placing these things on either side of my fire (it had begun to die down a bit once I removed some of the wood -- at great danger to myself I might add), I propped two slender pieces of wood between the igneous rock and the stepping stone in a sort of A-frame configuration and then rested the 12" diameter screen on top of the sticks and then Concetta's foil-wrapped potatoes, onions, and carrots on the screen. At last, success.

Or that's what I thought. I sat down to have our vodka and cranberry cocktail and chat a moment with the park host who had motored by on her golf cart. Occasionally I'd glance over to check the progress of the food. Suddenly, I caught sight of the tin foil drop straight down into the fire. I leaped up and ran over and saw immediately that the two sticks that I had used to prop up the whole cooking arrangement had burned right through.

Fortunately I was able to rescue the packet with loss of only one potato wedge. In disgust I abandoned the whole thing and dragged out the camp stove. Note to self: next time bring a grill topper for those rare times when no such appliance is provided. Might take a bit of wire-brushing after each use before it could be stowed, but it sure would make life a lot simpler.

Crickets and stuff

Back home in Carson City I've notice that the crickets have been extra loud this summer. I've not done any real research on the subject to see why they might be cricketing extra loud, but Wikipedia says "there are four types of cricket songs: the calling song which attracts females and repels other males, and is fairly loud; the courting song which is used when a female cricket is near, and is a very quiet song; an aggressive song which is triggered by chemoreceptors (how about that for a cool word) on the antennae that detect the near presence of another male cricket; and a copulatory song that is produced for a brief period after a successful mating."

The reason I bring this up is because here in Salem, South Dakota, at the Campground America park near Interstate 90, the crickets are obviously planning to take over the world, aid a new wave of hijackers, or perhaps invade some ballistic missile site. The reason I think this is the sound that they are making in the canopy of trees over our heads is without a doubt the LOUDEST I've ever heard anywhere. The buggers have got to be pissed at something bigtime. I just hope it isn't me personally. The sound can only be compared to someone cutting a very hard piece of steal with a hacksaw. I even wandered around for a few minutes trying to spot them. I figured that any creature who could make that kind of racket ought to be at least as big as my fist and be perfectly visible to the naked eye. I didn't see them, but I'm not convinced they're not up there -- plotting. I hope the military is on high alert this next week after reading this blog.

Speaking of bugs, I know that people always joke about the quantity of bugs in the mid west. Having lived in Illinois and Tennessee for varying amounts of time I can attest to the fact that bugs seem to like the country's humid mid section the best. In the past I've watched scientific programs on TV that postulate that were man to disappear from the earth (and take their bug sprays, fly swatters, and electronic zappers with them) that the bugs would soon evolve into masters of the universe. Well, in my opinion, here in South Dakota the little fellows are trying to get a head start on that process. You literally can't do anything outside without troops of winged creatures zeroing in on you and making every effort to establish a beach head.

Tonight, the air was so perfect here in Salem that we naturally wanted to eat outside. The food and wine WERE extra good au naturale, but the multi-species invaders made it necessary to have my electronic "persuader" at the ready. Sorry to say that a good number of them will not be going home to feed the little ones tonight. Mom will just have to tell the kiddies that dad was off on his usual adventure and no doubt died they way he lived -- in someone's face.

Anyway, I was taking a look at the exterior of the RV this evening and came to the realization that there are probably entomologists out there who, if they were to see the Tioga, would immediately insist on quarantining the coach until they could study the 6,352 different samplings thereon. Ultimately, I don't think a mere wash is going to clean up this thing. I think I need a giant Brillo pad. Or maybe I'll just wait a tad longer and I'll be able to shovel the the whole group into a dumpster if one that size could be found.

I think I told you about my new bug zapper. I found it at the Raley's supermarket. It's a badminton racket-shaped, handheld, battery-operated device that, when the button is held down and the racket is placed over a fly or mosquito or some such, every other wire is activated with either a positive or negative charge. When the bothersome creature flies onto the grid of wires a small electric current passes from the negative wire to the positive wire and right through him. This renders him dead in a micro second. No frantic swings of the now obsolute swatter are required. Often the bugs like the bright yellow color so much they'll come investigate on their own. This makes your job so much easier.

Wish I'd have thought of this idea. I actually have a buddy who had a full fledged, 110 volt version of one of these near his horse coral. I saw it years ago, but never projected the idea into the portable realm as the inventor of my gadget probably did. I'm sure the inventor is even now sipping a cocktail on his deck overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Malibu, Hawaii or the Italian Amalfi Coast. Wish I had been born with a few of those entrepreneurial genius cells between my ears.

So, that's my rant on bugs this evening. I'm sure there's someone out there who is actively figuring a way that they can turn common bugs into household pets. Humans have done it with everything else on the planet. To them I suspect that I'm no better than a common murderer. To them I say, however fondly, "NUTS!"

Good night and good reading!

If it's Friday it must (still) be South Dakota

Dear reader. If you’ve been hanging on every word of this blog for the past week and a half you know that you had nothing to read this morning with your coffee. That’s because the camp last night had no internet and my mobile device, the infernal thing, continues to tell me that it can’t find a signal. Oh well. So, here we are in the “Camp America” RV park in the metropolis of Salem, South Dakota. It’s mid afternoon and we’ve decided to pack it in and do some laundry, take it easy, and bring the blog up to date. Guess which one of us got the laundry?

Anyway, we didn’t really get very far yesterday. From our camp on the fringe of the Bad Lands we traveled north and east to the capital of South Dakota, Pierre. Concetta and I say the name as if it were the surname of that infamous master of Le Gillotine, Robes Pierre. However, here in South Dakota they pronounce the name of their capital as if it was a wooden structure to which you tied your boat on the edge of a river.

Our plan yesterday morning was to drive north and east to Highway 14, through Pierre, and then on to the border of Minnesota and South Dakota. Well, we didn’t make it. Once in Pierre, we simply couldn’t pass up the chance to tour the state capitol building, which, if you’ve never seen it, is truly a magnificent edifice. Everyone we’ve met in South Dakota has been overboard friendly, including the Capitol policeman who invited us down to the Governor’s office to get a photograph of Concetta sitting in the Governor’s chair. Well, who could pass up that opportunity. Naturally, as we often do, we saw an advertisement for the state’s museum while touring the Capitol basement and just couldn’t leave town without seeing it, too.

So it was that it very soon got to be late afternoon and we not only hadn’t found our camp site for the day, we hadn’t even done the grocery shopping we had planned to do so we could actually cook something for dinner. Fortunately, the museum guard knew just where we could find the local Wally World and we jumped into the RV and headed over there. Once the shopping was done, we consulted the AAA guide to find the closest camp site. The sun hadn’t set yet so we thought we were home free. Au Contrar.

As it happens, since May South Dakota has been the victim of much flooding of the Missouri River with water broaching the river banks by several feet and flooding whatever happened to be in the way. The first camp site we sought out, which happened to be right in the middle of town, had been the unfortunate recipient of a bit more water than it was designed to handle. The waterline I saw on the main building in camp was about three feet over the foundation. Shucks! We knew immediately that we wouldn’t be staying there.

Fortunately, the Davis luck was running high and the very next camp site we found, only four or five miles out of town, had been flooded in some parts but other, higher parts were completely fine.

We selected a nice, dry piece of ground beside a spreading forest of trees, hooked up our electric, and settled in for the night. The camp didn’t have water, sewer, or internet, but we had all the ambience of a tree-shaded paradise beside the mighty Missouri, a cheery lantern, and one of Concetta’s prize-winning fritatas for dinner. Best of all, the cost of the camp site was a very affordable six bucks. Wonderful.

To bring you up to date on another important subject, you may remember that yesterday, while in camp near the little town of “Interior,” South Dakota, I attempted a repair on the rooftop refrigerator coil shield that I had damaged by dragging it along a very, very large tree in Bozeman, Montana. My repair material of choice was the side walls of a gallon jug of spring water that I had picked out specifically for it’s resemblance to the contours of the part I had damaged. After spending an hour applying a product called “Goop” and attempting to make cut-out portions of the water bottle stick to the rubber-like material of the broken shield, I was somewhat disgusted with the result. I really didn’t think it was sticking worth a damn, still I decided that I would let it cure, then drive the motor home for a whole day. If the patches were still in place by the end of the day then I’d use some silicone sealant that I had brought along and fill in whatever parts of the patch hadn’t stuck well to make it water tight. Well, I have to tell you that my makeshift patches held for the day and have now been thoroughly sealed. I have high hopes that they will last the remainder of our voyage. They don’t look pretty, but they certainly do work.

Today, we had hopes of finding a reliable old Mickey Ds to post this blog, but after miles of nothing but corn, soy beans, and sun flowers we finally gave up that idea. So here we are in Salem, which is a tiny town just west of Sioux City, South Dakota. Yes, I know we had hoped to be in Minnesota tonight but the fates had other ideas. Our only diversion today was stumbling into Laura Ingalls Wilder’s home town and we stopped to check it out. The little old ladies tried to get us to go on an hour-long tour of everything Laura ever touched in town, but we begged off citing an important appointment down the road. We settled for shooting a pix or three of her school house and the surrounding gardens then we were back on the road.

I guess we were lucky that we stopped early today because there’s been a constant succession of Rvs coming in after us. The park is filling up fast. They only have two washing machines in the laundry area and we were first on the scene. Let that be a lesson to us. This place also has the added benefit of having an impromptu antiques and book store in one half of the office. Now what more in life could you want? I’ve already checked it out but so far have resisted buying anything.

Tomorrow? Well, we haven’t decided on tomorrow. I don’t know wether we’ll head back north before we head east (we had to drop south to the interstate to find this park) or whether we’ll just head toward Sioux City and decide from there. As you might guess the RV parks are more numerous on the interstates, but so too are the travelers. Last night was really nice because we had the half-filled park, the Missouri River, and us. No noise or other distractions. Just lots of quiet and cool breezes. So, until we rack up a few more adventures, I bid you adieu.

P.S. I’m thinking the Prairie museum north of here sounds pretty interesting.

On the trail of ancient mammoths

Last night we camped south of the Mount Rushmore area near the wonderfully picturesque town of Hot Springs, South Dakota. Our camp, identified simply as the "Hot Springs KOA," was not as scenically situated as some of our previous choices. And truck drivers decelerating out on the main road did so using their "Jake Brakes" instead of their wheel brakes, which meant a lot of racket from time to time. But the owner, a tall slender man named John, was one of the nicest camp hosts we've yet encountered. When I was unable to figure out the intricacies of his WiFi last night after trying for a good hour, John came to the RV and personally fixed the problem. I would, therefore, consider camping their again and unhesitatingly recommend this camp for other travelers coming John's way.

Today, our major goal was to navigate our way to a local museum and archaeological site known simply as, "The Mammoth Site." Short name; very impressive museum. The reason for the museum's existence can be traced to a chap intent on bulldozing off several acres of land in Hot Springs to build a tract of houses. But after several cuts into the hillside, the giant blade began to uncover bones -- very large bones. Fortunately, the builder not only halted his dozer driver, but agreed to turn the property over to a private non-profit that had been hurriedly formed to purchase the property. The builder magnanimously agreed to sell the property for his original purchase price.

This all took place back in, if I remember right, 1974. Working at first out in the open, then under the protection of a simple shed roof, volunteers began to unearth a vast cache of Mammoth bones, even some complete skeletons. Over the years, with lots of donations of time and money, the non-profit group has been able to erect a complete museum over the bone site, a piece of ground approximately 85 feet by 150 feet. Only 2% of the bone bed was not covered by the museum.

The reason for the bone bed is really fascinating. Tens of thousands of years ago a strata of ground, composed mostly of limestone, was covered by many feet of a much harder substance. At some point the limestone started to melt away as water was introduced from below. This formed a large cave. Later, when the size of the cave grew beyond the ability of the surface material to support it's own weight, the surface material fell into the cave. Once this happened and the ground water rose to near the surface, the old cave became a lake. Because the water in the old cave/new lake was warm, much vegetation grew up around the new watering hole.

This water and vegetation proved irresistible to animals, especially mammoths. Unfortunately, since the surface material that overlay the limestone was especially slick in nature the mammoths would put one foot on it and slide uncontrollably into the lake. Since these huge creatures couldn't climb out again they simply sank to the bottom and became part of the buildup of sediment that eventually filled the entire lake over a period of thirty thousand years or so. Because the contents of the lake contained gypsum and other "cement-like" substances, the filled lake turned out to be much harder than the surrounding terrain. This caused it to erode much slower, which then caused the one-time lake to become a hill in modern times.

Now, since the entire lake contents, which descend to a depth of some 65 feet, is under the protecting cover of the museum roof, archaeology professionals and students can excavate at their leisure. The result is a "dig" that is nothing short of outstanding. I hope the photos do it some justice.

Tonight we're holed up in the "Bad Lands" (photo right) of South Dakota in a KOA near, of all places, the village of "Interior," population 77. I tried for the first hour after we parked to glue some patches over the roof cover that I massacred back in Bozeman. I have some glue that guarantees to glue anything to anything, but I had mixed results. I used hunks of plastic water bottle which seemed to have the proper curves in the proper places to seal the corners of the lid that were especially hard hit by the giant tree I inadvertently kissed up against. We'll see in the morning. Maybe I can seal whatever didn't glue with silicone roof sealant. Who knows? I'd just like to keep most of the rain out if possible.

Tomorrow we plan on heading toward the Capital of South Dakota in Pierre. Not only would we like to see it, but it lies north of I90 and will allow us to drive secondary roads all the way to Minnesota. For those of you wondering if we visited Wall's Drug in Wall, South Dakota, we did. Not only did I want to see the business founded in 1931 since I'd seen it on TV on more than one occasion, but I wanted to find a good American pocket knife that I could hang on my key chain. Well, we accomplished the first part of the quest, but the second part of the quest proved virtually impossible. Why? Because all the knives, no matter what price range, were made in China. Heavy sigh!

We are our history

The most important lesson I've learned on this trip was brought home to me even more powerfully today. It's this: you're never more certain of what it means to be American than when you're immersed in its history. In my life I've walked the grassy fields of Valley Forge, explored the narrow passages beneath Boulder Dam, trod the deck of a whaling ship in Connecticut, threaded my way up the spiral steps of the Statue of Liberty, gazed out the lofty windows of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, even sat on the banks of the mighty Mississippi in Tennessee and watched a thunderstorm roll toward me like a speeding passenger train. I'm not sure at the time I truly grasped the significance of any of those experiences.

But on this trip, as we learned about General Custer and his violent end on a grassy piece of prairie known as the Little Big Horn, or today, as we learned about the hardship and dedication that went into constructing one of American's premier historic landmarks, Mount Rushmore, I can honestly say that I get it. I really get it.

Later, as we visited our second landmark of the day, the Crazy Horse memorial where a man named Korczak Ziółkowski, a Boston-born sculptor of Polish descent, almost single-handedly took on the task of carving that famous native American out of a living mountain, our emotions were just swept away. As Concetta and sat in the darkened auditorium and listened to what the Korczak went through to accomplish his task (Crazy Horse is still in progress after over fifty years) both of us came away with tears in our eyes and a new appreciation for the sacrifice that many ordinary Americans have made in order to make this country great.

If you have not seen the Custer battlefield, or Mount Rushmore, or the Crazy Horse memorial, I suggest you put these places on your itinerary for next time. While you're at it, all those other places I mentioned are pretty darn memorable, too.

Concetta cooked us up a passel of sausage, red beans, and rice for dinner tonight. Since I'd been working on the blog and photographs while she cooked (and did the laundry) I proposed a toast when she sat down at our diminutive dining table to eat. "A toast," I said, "to one of the best days on the road we've had yet." She just stared at me. "Not counting the laundry," I said, and she grimaced at me but raised her glass.

I recount this story to illustrate that being on the road isn't all cocktails and cheese platters by the park pool. Not by a long shot. Yesterday, as I explained (briefly) last night, we couldn't get internet access at all. In their infinite wisdom the RV folks had situated us just fifty feet or so BEYOND the outer limits of their WiFi access point. Tonight, try as I might, I could not get on line. My computer would happily connect to the RV park router but would not get to the outside world. They had parked me, at my insistence, right next to the access point. In desperation, I had to get the park owner over to explain to me why I could ping his router but not get out. This is where I learned just how my old customers felt when I would respond to their IT problems. The owner sat down at my laptop showing the big red X where the connection should be, changed access points (which I had already done without success) and immediately connected. Oh, well. I've looked like an idiot before and trust that it won't be the last time.

On this road trip I swear I've been gouged, sliced, banged, burned, and have generally lost more skin than when I was building the garden shed last summer. We've been beset by yellow jackets, plagued by flies, and showered with swarms of grasshoppers. You never know from mile to mile just which one of God's creatures is going to take a liking to you and try to move in. I've already recounted dropping the passenger-side wheels into an unseen hole while trying to park on a city street and trashing the protective cover of my refrigerator coils. I'm still trying to get used to just how high, wide and handsome (well, at least the first two) the machine is. Yesterday I easily zapped a carefully-placed highway sign (thank goodness a small one) as we drove through one town. Today, I just caught myself before I turned too quickly and unceremoniously removed the overhead lighting to a gas pump island.

The photo at right is at the Crazy Horse memorial. I'm standing inside the museum and shooting the memorial's horse head model, the whole memorial likeness is just outside the window, and in the distance you can see the mountain where the family of Korczak Ziółkowski carries on his work. Korczak died in 1982, but his wife and most of his children (He had five boys and five girls) carry on his work to this day. This afternoon, as we made for the exit, we actually saw the wife and one of the daughters walk right up to us. We were so stunned to see her (right out of the movie we'd just watched), but Concetta was able to compliment her on the job they were doing as well as the outstanding quality of the visitor center. The whole of the project, by the way, has no government money of any kind. It's funded through proceeds from the visitor center and from outside private donations.

Here's the specifications for the memorial from Wikipedia: The monument is being carved out of Thunderhead Mountain on land considered sacred by some Oglala Lakota, between Custer and Hill City, South Dakota, roughly 17 miles from Mount Rushmore. The sculpture's final dimensions are planned to be 641 feet (195 m) wide and 563 feet (172 m) high. The head of Crazy Horse will be 87 feet (27 m) high; by comparison, the heads of the four U.S. Presidents at Mount Rushmore are each 60 feet (18 m) high.

The photo at left is of our trusty Ford ensconced beneath the lofty Ponderosa Pines on the Rafter J Bar RV ranch near Mill City, South Dakota. Even though the internet service was lacking, the setting was to die for. They gave us the end site on the edge of a broad meadow surrounded by these wonderful old pines. This morning, as the sun came up, I lifted the bedroom blind and was blessed with a panoramic view of the full sweep of Mother Nature's handiwork. It was magnificent.

This evening we're enjoying the hospitality of the KOA in Hot Springs, South Dakota, a place I (and probably you) have never heard of. But in this little burg, population 3711 as of the latest census, we intend to, as the brochure puts it, "Experience an Ice Age museum filled with huge fossils displayed just as they were found." Now I have my doubts that the museum has been around since the ice age, I'll forgive them that piece of grammatical tomfoolery, but the brochure goes on to say that they have no less than 58 "Columbian and wooly mammoths." This we've got to see. AND, as an added touch, the folks here at the KOA have told us in confidence that the museum staff have recently discovered a couple more of the long-extinct creatures bringing their total to sixty! Obviously, tomorrow promises to be every bit as exciting as today.

Mount Rushmore

At the present time I'm sitting atop a high voltage box in our RV park, using the laptop, because the signal back at our motor home is so weak it keeps cutting out. Not sure why I continue to have so much luck with internet connection. My mobile connection device seems to care little for where we are. It says, "connecting" for an eternity and never does actually connect. Appears to be largely useless to me. Anyway, I'll try and bring you more information when I don't have to blaze a trail on foot into the forest to find an internet connection. Sitting on this high voltage thingy is making my fillings hum so, for now, I'll say goodbye and be back with you soon.

Walking in the footsteps of history

Today I got to do something I've wanted to do for at least the last fifty years: visit the Little Big Horn battlefield. Unlike most normal humans, I've been totally addicted to American history from my earliest elementary school days. I never pass up an opportunity to read about historic events, visit historic places, or put my hands on historic things. Today, I got to do all three and I was in heaven. Fortunately, I married a woman who is equally fascinated with history. Though she is far less likely to haul historic items home the way I do, Concetta is always game for being dragged to yet another historic site. Lucky for me.

We scheduled virtually nothing for today but visiting the scene of Custer's last stand, located in the rolling hills of southeastern Montana and only 35 miles or so from last night's camp in Billings. Though I had some trepidation that sufficient room would exist for us to park our thirty-foot motor home at the site, it turned out that there was more than enough room for a dozen such vehicles. The price was nominal and the route well marked and soon we were headed for my long sought after goal.

The first thing we did was take a seat in an outdoor patio to listen to a park service employee give a thirty-minute detailed account of the events leading up to the 7th Calvary's last battle. Let me just tell you that the guy was so knowledgeable and so enthusiastic about his subject that he easily surpassed any of the history professors I ever had for shear "listen-ability." By the time the speaker had finished the entire audience was chaffing at the bit to get out on the hilltops and into the various coulees to try and locate each and every one of the graves of the various troopers who met their end June 26, 1876. He was just that good.

One of the things that stuck with me about George Custer was, despite the fact that many people consider him a failure for the demise of a hefty portion of the 7th Calvary, he was a darn talented military commander. During the Civil War he was one of the youngest generals in the Union Army at age 23. You don't get to be a General at age 23 by being unimpressive as a soldier.

I always assumed that one would have to stand on the summit of Last Stand Hill and look out over the low hills and grassy valleys surrounding the Little Big Horn to have any chance of grasping the significance of the battle. In that I was dead on. Between the spirited descriptions of park employees and the physical effects of standing on the wind-swept summit of Last Stand imagining yourself trying to hold off thousands of native Americans with a single-shot rifle you become totally immersed in the drama. Wow! I just loved it.

After a brief break for lunch, Concetta and I signed up for a guided tour of the entire battle area, including those positions occupied by Reno and Benteen's men five miles off to the east. Our guide, a native American, gave us some of the "rest of the story" filling us in on her ancestor's movements on the day of the battle as well as acquainted us with stories told after the battle by surviving Native American warriors. It was powerful, very powerful.

So it was that the clock read 4:00 p.m. by the time we finally loaded up for the trip to our evening camp site. Not wanting to spend the afternoon on the interstate, we chose instead highway 212 that headed, more or less, straight east out of the Little Big Horn area. Triple A said that there was only one small camp in that direction, in the town of Broadus, which I know you've never heard of. We never had, either. But though we sailed right by the camp located two miles west of town and had to ask at the local gas station where we'd missed it, we easily found it on the second try located just off the highway in a stand of trees. I didn't hold out much hope of being impressed with the "Wayside Mobile RV park," and its sixteen spaces, but I was pleasantly surprised when they had full hookups, a 30 amp electric, individual sewer connections, AND Wifi!! Man, you just never know. The price was just half of what the folks in Billings charged us for a site wedged between two other RVs. Here, I could barely hit our neighbor RV with a tossed stone.

Bozeman to Billings under the Big Sky

Well, it's day six of our life on the road and I have to say that I have quietly put aside all my fears about living in a container the size of my hobby room. RVing is simply a ton of fun and not to be missed, though it's not without it's minor -- and sometimes major -- problems and inconveniences.

Like last night in Bozeman, Montana, where the RV park was achingly beautiful, our individual space wonderful and level, and the laundry room totally vacant and waiting for our load of towels. Absolutely everything about our experience there was great except their WiFi was on the fritz due, not to their equipment (I could connect to their router) but due to the local phone company's faux pas. We had fun anyway, especially when we got to tour the owner's greenhouse where they were growing absolutely prize-winning tomatoes.

We've found the some things just don't go your way no matter how prepared you are. Like today when I attempted to park on a quiet city street in Bozeman so I could dash around the corner and buy a circular polarizer filter for my SLR. Little did I know that the pool of water next to the curb hid a park bench-sized hole that, when the motor home's tires to dropped into it a good six inches, the coach tilted crazily and brought the refrigerator's rooftop evaporative cooling coil's plastic housing in fatal contact with a century old tree planted in the parkway. The result was one largely destroyed cover. That kind of fun stuff.

On the other side of the coin, the things you get to see and the people you get to meet make you quickly forget the pain and suffering and make you realize that things just don't get much better in life than when you can cruise the highways of America searching for adventure and literally find it around every corner.

Today Concetta and I make an absolutely amazing find in Bozeman in the form of an attraction called, "The Museum of the Rockies." Wow! What a place! We wandered the halls for at least a couple of hours looking at everything from Dinosaur skeletons to plains Indian crafts, from horse-drawn wagons to natural history exhibits. It was all so well done that we just hated to leave. When lunch time came and our stomachs told us we needed nourishment we headed for the RV to have lunch. But before we'd gone far we discovered that next door to the museum they were hosting a full-fledged Chautauqua surrounding a nineteenth century farmhouse. There were exhibits on period gardening, vintage firearms, weaving, kitchen chores, music and singing, antique machinery, and, well, you name it. It was all so colorful and exiting looking, we determined to go have lunch and then come back and take in the fun. All this meant that we didn't hit the road until 2:30 in the afternoon. Still, we made our next port of call, Billings, Montana. From here I think it's a short jaunt to the Custer Battlefield park.

Just a word on Bozeman itself. It is one of the nicest, cleanest, most historic looking towns we've seen in many years, certainly the most attractive place we've seen on this trip. Since we were intent on both finding a photo store for the purchase of my filter and finding the Museum of the Rockies that had been advertised on the freeway, we did a considerable amount of roving around. Here can be found block after block of vintage homes, all well kept, and a main street which boasts several blocks of well tended commercial buildings. I know there must be the inevitable ugly parts somewhere, but we never saw them. Santa Fe, New Mexico used to be my favorite "other place" I might see myself living if I had to leave Carson City, but I think I'm going to move Bozeman, Montana into the front-runner spot for future re-location. It's just that charming. Concetta, for her part, liked my buddy Charley seims' neighborhood near Portland, Oregon. Granted, Portland is mighty pretty owing to the fact that everything is so green. Unfortunately it gets that way because the rain falls steadily for months at a time. Everything turns green -- your lawn, your foliage, your roof, the cover on your boat. You get the picture.

Our route this trip involved us driving north from Carson City, Nevada, as far as Washington State just south of Seattle. At that point we started East with an intended destination of somewhere on the east coast -- Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, or somewhere further south. Along the way we intend to visit a couple of days in Connie's girlhood state of Ohio. Other than Ohio, the only places that we wanted to make sure we saw were The Custer Battlefield and Mount Rushmore. Now, with our arrival in Billings, we are close to the site of General Custer's defeat and we hope to be able to take that in tomorrow.

Of course there are lots and lots of other places we'd like to see, especially a couple of Civil War battlefields such as Gettysburg and or Antietam, some nautical areas such as Mystic Seaport or New Bedford, and some great New England covered bridges and century farms. We're pretty much winging this whole trip based on what looks interesting on the map. Yes, I know we're missing tons of interesting things which will have to wait for another trip, but we prefer not to plan so tightly that no time is left for stumbling over something interesting like we did today in Bozeman.

One of the things we've been doing is listening to books on tape as we travel the more mundane stretches of interstate. Naturally, we try and avoid the interstates as much as possible. But, as we experienced in Helena yesterday, sometimes you can't get here from there unless you include a bit of divided highway. There ARE roads from Helena to Billings that don't involve interstate driving but had we taken those particular roads I'd still be driving instead of sitting here typing.

Anyway, our book on tape for the last several days is really THREE books on tape by Bill Bryson. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about Bill: "William McGuire 'Bill' Bryson, OBE, (born December 8, 1951) is a best-selling American author of humorous books on travel, as well as books on the English language and on science. Born an American, he was a resident of North Yorkshire for most of his professional life before moving back to the US in 1995. In 2003 Bryson moved back to Britain, living in the old rectory of Wramplingham, Norfolk, and was appointed Chancellor of Durham University

Bill is just the wittiest, most marvelously well spoken writer I've come across in a long, long time. I've read many of his books, most recently "A Walk in the Woods," which I thought was wonderful. Bill has a way of stringing together the same old words we all use in such new and inventive ways that he has me pounding the steering wheel with laughter every time we listen. Give Bill a try. I think you'll like him.

Well, Concetta just poked her head out of the bedroom and asked if I planned to come to bed sometime soon. I guess that means it's getting late. Actually, I'd like to get a little reading in before lights out, so for now I'll say, Ciao.

Moving in on Missoula

Today we traveled from Spokane, Washington, to Missoula, Montana -- just not right away. The first thing we had to do was track down a new gas cap for the motor home. Yesterday, realizing that sometimes it becomes necessary to share the wealth, I decided to be magnanimous and leave my gas cap atop the pump in the Shell station in Ellensburg, Washington. I'm sure it was found soon after by someone who desperately needed just that design of cap. I felt good about it all day. But before we could hit the road this morning we had to track down an RV center (they had no caps) and then an auto parts store so that we wouldn't be strewing gasoline down the interstate and maybe get pulled over for polluting. Once that chore was complete, we were able to gas up and be off. My new cap is a locking one so that I can leave the keys in the cap and thus be reminded to return it to its natural place.

Our next goal, once we ventured out of Washington and into Idaho was to find my long lost buddy, Pete Blackmore, who, along with his wife of many years, had left the over-crowded confines of Carson City back in the nineties and moved up to the pristine environs of lake Couer d' Alene in Idaho. Specifically, he was living in the tiny (population 200+) town of Harrison just south of Couer d' Alene itself. Man, what a wonderfully beautiful place!!! You leave the interstate and wind your way slowly slowly for miles around the lake on a tiny two-lane road. It's a little hair raising in a thirty-foot motor home but the scenery is definitely worth it.

Pete, a native of Thetford, England, had worked with me at a printing establishment for all of my nine years in the business. In fact, Pete and I had at one time been offered ownership of the business when the owner retired. But along came an offer of a state government position and away I went, never to hang around with Pete again. I've been sending him Christmas cards for years but all I had was a post office box. Still, I thought that since the town was so small more than one person would be able to tell me where to find him.

As fate would have it, Concetta and I stopped in an ice cream parlor and asked to see their phone book. I easily picked out Pete's number and dialed the phone. Unfortunately, only his son, Simon, was home and I soon learned that Pete and his wife were off to Couer d' Alene to do the weekly shopping. Much disappointed, we headed back to the motor home parked right on the main street. As we approached we passed a woman putting the finishing touches on her sidewalk sign advertising her Wine-tasting shop. As we lingered there next to the motor home the woman stood, and came toward us. I recognized her instantly as Pete's daughter, Julie, whom I hadn't seen since she was a young girl but whom I instinctively recognized. "Are you Julie," I asked as she came abreast of us.

She got a big smile on her face and said, "Yes. Do I know you?"

I proceeded to tell her about my association with her dad and we soon fell into a lively conversation about Carson City and what her family had been up to all these years. During the course of the conversation Julie invited us up to her wine shop and we spent a lovely half hour sampling her supply of "fruit" wines, not derived from grapes. The wine was wonderful, had about 14% alcohol, and we selected a couple of different flavors (pear and Italian plum) and thanked Julie for a very nice experience.

The town had a very nice picnic area just up slope from the lake and we spent an additional half hour eating lunch before we packed up and headed back toward the interstate and our intended route to Montana. We arrived in camp here in Missoula about 5:00 p.m. and Concetta immediately set about fixing some lovely trout given to me by my buddy, Jeff, from Public Safety, some chard from our garden back home, salad, and a bottle of Menage a Trois. For dessert, we had more blackberries carefully (and painfully) picked by the roadside in Oregon.

The motor home is behaving very well and I'm getting quite comfortable handling it. I even had to back it into the camp spot tonight which went off without a hitch. My only complaint is that in order to make our rendezvous in Ohio sometime after the 12th I'm having to bypass a lot of stuff I'd really like to stop and see. Of course the downside is that there would be days that I wouldn't get anywhere at all. The route we're taking is truly beautiful. We've never spent any time in the Pacific northwest and the area obviously deserves a lot more attention in the future. I'm not exactly sure where we're going tomorrow except to say I'm headed toward the Custer battlefield national park in Montana and Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. Beyond that, who knows. I do have a date to visit George (Legislature workmate) Aldrich's mother in Wisconsin, so we'll be heading generally in that direction.

I've tried numerous times to upload photos for this segment of the blog, but the WiFi connection here at the Missoula RV park refuses to let me for some reason. So, until next time, I bid you ciao and great traveling.

Singing in the Rain

Day 4 – Yakima to Spokane

Yesterday we traveled from Yakima to Spokane in the beautiful state of Washington. Much of the terrain looks like our home, the Carson Valley, with vast fields of green carpeting the valleys and sage-covered rolling hills ringing the fields. In other valleys, ones where cover crops like wheat (or maybe hay) had been grown this past summer, a short-cropped golden carpet flowed away to the horizon interrupted only by the lazy patterns carved by a myriad of farm machinery wheels in the stubble making it look as if someone had been more interested in art than in farming. Quite a beautiful sight. To heighten our experience, the sky as we headed eastward, billowed with rain clouds and bristled with the occasional lightening strike; an awesome and magnificent vista. Only later, as we neared the end of our drive, did the skies open up with their long-promised rain and envelop the landscape.

Concetta had navigated us to a KOA in Spokane that we truly hoped would have some vacant spots since it was the only one that the AAA guide had recommended. When we at last arrived and discovered that the camp did indeed have a number of open spaces, the check-in clerk asked me what sort of space I’d like. “One where it’s not raining,” I said, for by then it was raining like mother nature had to get a month’s supply on the ground so she could go on vacation. Fortunately, I was able to get the electric and water hooked up and get myself back inside before I needed to be rung out like a sponge.

The day started out with us looking for two things: one, the Yakima Trolley museum; and two, a Ford dealer so I could discuss my “Check Engine” warning on the dash. We wandered around for some time finding neither when I suggested to Concetta that we feed a fictitious address into the GPS for the trolley museum since the guidebook was kind enough to offer none. Miraculously, the fictitious address turned out to be almost exactly correct and we were soon at the front door – only to discover that it was closed. Sigh. Oh well, on to the Ford dealer which I assumed would be on the main street of town just like the Chevrolet dealer we had already seen. Unfortunately, locating the dealer was not to be and before long we found ourselves back in the vicinity of the freeway on-ramp that we needed for our journey north. Promising to check the next town for the sought-after dealer, we headed for the town of Ellensburg hoping to have better luck.

Ellensburg was where we stopped for coffee yesterday morning to post the previous blog. McDonalds has easy-to-use WiFi and surprisingly good coffee. I usually have the blog roughed out in Word Perfect (yes I own Microsoft Word, but consider it to be an inferior product) and just have to upload to the web. As you may or may not know, I bought a remote uplink device for this trip sponsored by Virgin Mobile/AT&T. But as yet I have not been able to connect with it. The device will talk happily with the mother ship at Virgin. I even downloaded the manual in PDF format this evening. But when I try to get to Google or AOL it simply tells me that it has timed out. No other explanation. Not sure how to outwit it, but for now McDonalds is my savior.

Anyway, after blogging and drinking our coffee we headed for the neighborhood Ford dealer using instructions offered by the girl serving our coffee. And her directions turned out to be spot on. Moments later we were pulling up in front of the service entrance to Ford and serendipitously caught two service employees smoking outside on the sidewalk. I jumped out and approached them with my problem. “Do you want me to pull it into the service area?” I asked.

“Nah,” the older of the two said. “We can check it out right where it sits.”

And that’s just what they did. Ten seconds later one of the chaps emerged from the building with a tester of some sort. Maybe a minute after that he’d hooked the device up to some place under the dash, run the test, and ambled over to tell me that his tester indicated the problem was with the emissions system. “Probably just a leaking vacuum hose. Plastic you know,” he said. “You probably don’t need to worry about it and can just track it down when you get back home.”

Now how is that for fortuitousness? I thanked them, hopped back in the truck, and was on my way in less time than it took to type this blog entry. I was stoked to say the least.

For most of the trip from Ellensburg to Spokane we shunned the interstate and traveled the back roads of America, just like the American Pickers. I didn’t dare suggest to Concetta that I while away the afternoon rummaging through any of the two dozen antique shops we passed, but it was fun to think about it. We don’t really have any room to bring antiques along with us anyway. Still, I’m going to pick one out one of these fine afternoons on some little-traveled country road and bring home some treasure. I promise.

Taking to the mountains

Day 3 – Portland to Yakima

If you payed attention to my previous blog entry you know that around noon yesterday we had decided to head for the Pacific Ocean west of Kelso, Washington. As fate would have it, we decided quite on the fly not to head West but East to Yakima via Highway 12. There was no deep thought involved. The highway just looked like it transected some pretty exciting and scenic country, running as it does between Mount Rainier to the north and Mount St. Helens to the south.

Indeed the country has been as beautiful and sparsely populated as you could ask for. Route 12 is just a two-laner, and as such attracts far less traffic than the interstate. Dismissing the occasional speeding lumber truck cruising just scant feet from our rear bumper, our sojourn up Route 12 was a dream.

Enter the subject of road construction. Now I have to admit that we were forewarned that road construction on Route 12 would cause as much as ninety minute delays. But as I often do, I chose to disregard that warning, assuming that ninety minutes was probably the longest we could expect and the actual wait would turn out to be a far smaller chunk of time. So it was that we rounded a corner and encountered a road block complete with a very friendly female roadblock attendant who duly informed us that we could indeed expect one 45 minute delay just beyond where she had stopped us as well as an additional 90 minute delay further up the mountain.

“Of course, you could go that way,” she informed us, pointing off to her right. I looked over to where she was pointing and saw a two lane road even narrower than the one we were on. “That way leads to break-a-heart pass,” she said, or something like that. “Not really recommended for motor homes, but you could give it a try. Adds 22 miles to your trip.”

With images of Desi Arnez and Lucille Ball trying to bend their long, long trailer around tiny hairpin curves high in the mountains and barely keeping the whole rig from tumbling into the yawning chasm, I said, “No thanks, we’re not in that big a hurry.”

And that’s how I came to have time to work on this blog entry. The typing table was a little tipped since we were sitting on perhaps a 15 degree upslope angle. But at least the computer kept sliding toward me and not away. I thought about getting out the wheel chocks that I had paid big money for back in Carson City’s Wally World, but then I thought, hey, the 18-wheeler behind us would have to slide backwards first before I could.

In the end I was caught figuratively with my pants down as before I had gotten firmly into the third paragraph of the blog I heard a shout and Concetta said, “better get the truck started they’re pulling out.” I didn’t get to shut down the computer, stow my glasses, or much else and had to dive into the driver’s seat, start the truck and be off before the aforementioned 18-wheeler ran over the top of us.

Fortunately, we never ran into the second road block. I think that dinner time had inevitably called away the asphalt workers and they just went home and left us to continue our journey in peace. Ultimately I had been right from the beginning. Our total wait had been about thirty minutes.

Once over the mountain we coasted down into Yakima and headed for the RV park that Concetta had found in the AAA guide book. We were feeling pretty good. The wait had been shorter than we expected, the sun was shining on us, and it looked like we’d be in camp with plenty of daylight left. We went on thinking just like that right up until the moment we rolled in the driveway of the RV park and up to the office. There, displayed for all to see, was a sign that said, “Sorry, full for the night.”

“Oh, NO! we chorused. But after a moment of feeling sorry for ourselves, we set off in search of the only other AAA sanctioned RV park in Yakima. But when Concetta fed in the address, the little GPS came back and said, “Sorry, no such place,” or words to that effect.

By this time I didn’t really even know where in the city of Yakima I had landed. So, we did the only sensible thing in such an eventuality, we parked the coach and tried to call the second RV place, which was a state-owned and run park. On the first try I got a fax line. Ooops! We tried a different number. But this time no one answered at all. Okay, there was an 800 number listed, too. So, I tried calling that. This time I thought someone answered. Only problem was I had reached a recording, and the man who narrated the message must have been eating a peanut-butter sandwich while the tape was rolling. He sounded completely unintelligible and just a tad dim-witted to boot.

So, we decided to do the only other sensible thing we could in such a situation, stop and ask someone who was sure to know: a motel desk clerk for instance. I pulled the RV across the street from a handy motel and started for the door. But who should pull up in front just at that moment but a cab driver. Even better, I thought.

The cab driver proved our salvation. She knew right where the park was located and inside of fifteen minutes we were rolling in the front gate. Of course both of us were holding our breaths as we waited to see if this new park would be filled to the brim also. But no, the place looked completely empty. Once we got to the rear of the park where the RV folks were directed we did find a couple of dozen rigs in attendance, but we easily found a nice spot for the night.

So, serendipity had triumphed again. Yesterday morning we didn’t even know precisely where we were headed except to say generally north and east. By yesterday evening we had found a park, got a fire going, had barbecued chicken, roasted corn, salad with cucumbers from our garden, and, for dessert, blackberries that we had picked beside a country road yesterday. Everything turned out just fine even though we’d been a tad uncertain at times. Today, I have no good idea where we’re going except to say we hope to visit the Yakima trolley museum before we leave town. Otherwise, well, we’re headed generally east until we reach the Atlantic Ocean. I hope that every day is filled with as much serendipity as possible.

Stay tuned.

On the Road Again -- this time in the U.S.

Day 1 – Carson City to McCloud

Sunday we slept in until about 6:00 a.m. and then went about getting ready to leave on our much anticipated cross-country adventure. We had spent the previous two days intensively finishing up the loading phase of our thirty-foot Tioga motorhome. I had spent several weeks figuring out just what should be brought along in the basement area of the coach. Things like wooden blocks to aid in the leveling at camp sites, tools for (hopefully) any occasion, and water and sewer hoses and attendant fittings, as well as more mundane things like folding chairs and a table, firewood, and a ladder to aid in extending the awning. For the two days before our departure, we had concentrated on a bit more cleaning and then packing our clothes and all the needed groceries and other supplies that would allow us to survive on the road.

It has been at least two decades since Concetta and I have been camping and, for me, well over forty-five years since I had been RVing. When I was teenager, my parents had begun traveling the west in a Ford pickup and a small, borrowed, aluminum travel trailer. I think it could not have been more than twenty feet long and was perhaps even shorter. I remember it as a sort of aquamarine and white, in stark contrast to Dad’s 1963 red and white Ford Pickup.

Because stretch cab pickups had not been invented yet, Dad had fashioned an aluminum canopy over the pickup bed and, for seating, acquired an old brown and cream-colored Studebaker front seat where brother Cliff and I would ride as we wandering the byways of the six or seven western states. Here Cliff would sleep and I would be studying each and every passing rustic town, farmstead, and roadside attraction. At that time I was absolutely addicted to western Americana. Dad seldom stopped but I took in as much as I could from the bed of the pickup. Actually, I didn't mind being out in the open air at all. I got to see more, I think, than I would have in the cab. Cliff and I even slept under the canopy at night.

Our current adventure finally began just after 10:00 a.m. as we headed north on Hwy 395 through Reno and on toward Susanville, California. The drive was through mile after mile of farm and ranch lands, punctuated only occasionally by civilization. The truck ran as smooth as glass and despite that fact that we had loaded it with every possible thing we might need, in every possible situation, it still pulled the hills with ease at 55 to 60MPH. We never tried to do more that about 65 miles per hour so as to afford us easy stopping should trouble crop up. By around 4:30 p.m. we reached McCloud and Concetta directed to the campsite she had picked out for us, a wonderful park-like facility with spaces for nearly a hundred RVs. Our camping experience was about to begin in earnest.

Concetta eased us into the evening with some vodka and cranberry juice cocktails, some cheese, salami and crackers, and a couple of comfortable chairs beneath a spreading Ash Tree. It has been a long, long haul getting to this vacation and as we sat there and clinked our (plastic) wine goblets we toasted our success. Both of us had been hired for the legislative session which mandated us starting work back in late 2010 and, for me, working through June. Concetta worked even longer, right up to last Thursday, so the coming of the road trip was especially long-awaited for her.

Dinner that first night turned out to be steak, though the RV park we chose in McCloud did not have barbecue grills so the steaks had to be cooked in the RV.
After dinner and dishes Concetta insisted that I produce the Scrabble game so we could have our usual contest played in the glow of the Coleman lantern. Miraculously, we weren’t bothered by any bugs though during our steak dinner about a dozen yellow jackets came calling. This didn’t prove to be a problem since I had purchased a bug and fly zapper that looks sort of like a badminton racket. The device runs on a couple AA batteries and actually electrocutes any flying pests if they touch it. Most of them were not inclined to touch my murder machine but after some coaxing they were quickly dispatched and dinner proceeded as before.

After the Scrabble game it was back to the RV for some much needed showers and then to bed. This was the first time, of course, that we had tried out the shower and to our relief it works fine. We had intended all along to take the RV out on a dry run for a day or two to make sure everything worked, but alas, there simply wasn’t time.

The Tioga has turned out to be quite comfortable. I’m so glad that I held out for a unit with the built-in banquette seating. Since we’re not traveling with a group of people we can leave the table set up for the banquette.

The following day, Monday, we once again got rolling around 10:00 as we made our way up I5 toward Portland and a rendezvous with my long-time hiking and traveling buddy, Charles Seims. Charles has a cute little bungalow filled with antique electric trains and other antiques and a garage full of antique autos. He and I have known each other since we were kids together in Altadena and enjoy many of the same interests.

It was kind of a long haul to Portland since we started so late so we didn't really stop for any site-seeing. We rolled up to Charles' door about dusk and then walked down the street to his favorite local restaurant for some truly wonderful Italian food and a glass of wine. After dinner, Charles and I reminisced until late over bottles of Corona and then, thanks to the wine and the beer, I had a wonderful nights sleep. This morning, after a short tour of the neighborhood in Charles' 1964 poppy-red Mustang, we hit the road once more. I think that this is the point that our adventure really begins because now we don't really have anywhere we have to be at any specific time. We just rolled off the freeway here in Washington State and once I update this blog we're headed west to the Pacific. We're going to try and stick to the secondary roads and I'll be including photographs on a regular basis. The remote connection device that I purchased to provide me with the Internet seems to connect but won't allow me on line -- at least yet. Not sure what's wrong, but I'm typing this in McDonalds over a crispy chicken sandwich and a pretty darn nice cup of coffee. So, until later, I'll say ciao.