PicturesJan'03-Feb'03
They
have a very unique place. They live in a MH on the property, have a large metal
building for working in and no electricity. John parked us in a field in the
back so our generator would not bother anyone. There were others there also and
we all chipped in for pizza and ate in the big building. Some of the people had
work done that day and were staying to leave in the AM. Some were there for work
to be done the next day.
John
has a bank of batteries, runs a generator daily and has an inverter for his
power tools. He and Linda are super nice people. Everybody is treated like
family. And John does quality work. Sometimes that is something hard to find. If
we are in that area again and happen to need some work done we will call them.
Then
on to Tallahassee to visit Mary (Kay's sis) & Lee. Their dad was there also.
Did the normal family get together things. Also we had been invited to a
surprise 60th birthday party on Jan 18th for my brother. It was being held in
Champaign, Il. We watched the weather closely but the cold & snow kept
hanging around and more storms predicted so we decided not to go. Hard to find
an RV park at that time of year. Once we knew we were not heading north we
headed south to Old Town, Fl. I read about a new RV park there and it is close
to Fanning Springs where we visited with Ron & Judy
Benton. They were only there for the weekend but it was fun.
The
Suwannee River Hideaway Campground was all
that I had read about and more. This place is so new they aren't listed in the
campground books. They have a 1500' boardwalk to the
Suwannee River that ends at a deck that overlooks
the river. Beautiful. The owners, Gerry & Walt are super people. For
instance, there was nowhere nearby to buy my daily fix--the USA TODAY newspaper,
so Walt would pick one up for me daily when he was in Gainesville. Also we
needed a puter part and was scheduled to arrive on sun & mon was a holiday,
so they made arrangements with the PO so we could pick it up on sun. That is
going the extra mile for their guests. If you want a nice quiet place to stay I
highly recommend the SUWANNEE
RIVER HIDEAWAY. I mention the name again because almost every
campground in the area has 'Suwannee River' in their name. Easy to get mixed up.
From
there we went to Homosassa to visit Chuck & Carole
Keller. I went to high school with Chuck and connected up with him again 2
years ago in Tx. Then they moved to Fl. They were so close we didn't want to
miss seeing them again. We stayed at the 'Camp 'n' Water' campground. It is a
'snowbird' destination. Kinda off the beaten trail but it was a nice park. That
was Super Bowl weekend and while I was setting up a guy came by with a pool for
the game. I picked 5 blocks. next morning he came by again with another board
and caught Kay and she got 5 blocks. We spent the day watching the game at
Keller's house. Got back to the MH and the guy with the boards came by and we
had won on both boards. On one we won with the score at the end of the first
quarter, the other was the final score. Nice surprise. While at that park, Kay
found out about a casino boat about 45 min away. Off she went--twice. No big
winnings but came back ahead.
Next
was Dover, FL to visit Chuck Hunt who lives in Plant
City. I first met Chuck in the late 60's when we both belonged to the same
Corvette Club. Kinda lost touch when we moved to Ca. but connected with him last
year for an hour and vowed we would be back again this year for a longer stay.
Got to Citrus Hills RV Park in Dover. They had just done an expansion and had
room for us. Rest of park was full with snowbirds. We were near another
bingo/casino so Kay would go there in the evenings (she won) and Chuck & I
went out to eat and BS. One evening he had tickets to a big ELK's wild game
feed. We went and then went to a b'day party for the dad of a guy that works for
Chuck. Nice bunch of people. Oh yeah, they had a keg there also. He also took us
over to Bob's (his son) house. I haven't seen him since he was a little kid. He
is a nice guy & has a nice family. Good to see him again. I didn't take a
pic of them and I had the camera with me. I'm getting better about that but
still forget sometimes. Another day he took us to the place where his daughter
boards 2 of her horses. One (Coco Puff) is a dwarf
miniature & the other (Silver Ghost) is a
miniature. Beautiful horses. They were in the process of shedding their winter
coat but they still looked good. Coco Puff is a rare horse. Not many dwarf
miniatures around. He is about as big as your average dog. After a few days it
was time to hit the road again.
While
internet surfing my RV BB's I read where one of them--RV.NET--was having a get
together in Kerrville, Tx. which is on our way west. I got the info, signed up
and we made plans (gasp--not plans!) to stop there. One of the BB members (LD)
that I contacted told me about an Indian casino just north of Kinder, La that
had an RV park and was nice. Naturally that was put on our route. We spent 6
days at the casino and Kay, again, did Ok. A few bucks ahead, food comped,
campground comped.
Arrived
at Kerrville, Tx (Buckhorn Lakes RV Park) a couple of days before most of the
others. They had a wireless internet system in the park so we signed up for
it---WOW it is fast! This is a nice
park but out of our normal budget. They did give the rally people a discount so
it came down to the top of our range. A couple of other early birds were there
also. Thur a few more arrived & fri the rest arrived. Met a lot of new
people and came away with new friends. If it's like the rally we went to in
Harlingen, Tx 3 years ago, we will run into some of these people again in our
travels. We planned on leaving tue after our mail caught up with us on mon but
didn't realize that mon was a holiday. Ended up leaving on wed.
Arrived
in Midland, Tx got set up and called Wallace Graig. I
met him 2 years ago at the Ia Drang banquet and we hit it off. Same sense of
humor as me. We met him for eats then went over to his house and met Tres--his
dog. BSed a lot and then his girlfriend Julie Bell came over. She is a very nice
lady, lots of fun. Really enjoyed the evening. Getting my pics in order for this
update I realized I don't have any pics of her. (On edit--I now have a pic of
Julie) Next day Wallace took me to the COMMEMORATIVE
AIR FORCE MUSEUM formerly known
as the CONFEDERATE AIR FORCE MUSEUM . They had to change the name to
remain ‘Politically Correct’. In
my opinion that is BS. Whatever happened to tradition? We are not going to
please everyone in our country or the world so why bow down to this petty
stuff—a real waste of time. While I am on a rant---I WILL fly my US FLAG
wherever I want in this country. If someone is offended by that----tough! GO
HOME if you don’t like it. Sorry about that, I try to keep politics and that
sort of stuff off this site but it has been on my mind.
Back
on track now. I thoroughly enjoyed the museum. That probably goes back to being
an Air Force brat. The 3 displays that really impressed me were: a plane that
had counter-rotating props, FATMAN
& LITTLE BOY—the 2 atom bombs and the 'nose
art'. When the planes the art came from were to be destroyed, one of the
workers took an axe and chopped out the artwork and made a fence out of it.
Later the museum acquired them. Wallace is an officer at the museum so he was
able to give me a lot of extra info on all the planes. That helps add to the
experience.
That
evening we met Wallace for dinner and afterwards went over to a house where
Julie was at a wine tasting. We don’t drink wine (prefer the hearty, robust
flavor & zesty aroma of a brewski) but the people made us very comfortable
and were a lot of fun to be around. After awhile we said our goodbyes &
Wallace, Kay & I went to his house to watch a short clip on CNN that
featured Joe Galloway. Then we headed to the MH.
On to Sierra Vista, Az with an overnight stop in Las Cruces, NM. Arrived at Tombstone Territories RV Park, set up and called my cousin Pete. The park is about 20 miles from his place. Met them (Pete & Carolyn) for lunch the next day and then on to their house for a visit. Next day we went to Patagonia Lakes State Park to see Bob & Donna. They have been Workcamping there for 4 months. This is a beautiful park and can see why they enjoyed working there, but they were ready to get on the road again. It was very windy during our time in the area so we didn’t get out a lot. One day it rained on & off and then a beautiful rainbow appeared. Of course Kay went to Ft. Huachuca for bingo about 4 times. We went to a middle school basketball game in which Pete & Carolyn’s grandson was playing. Really got a kick out of that. On Monday we head to Tucson to meet up with Bob & Donna and continue west. But we’ll get into that next month.