I didn’t forget the Blog its just that we haven’t done too much lately. The weather in Ocala was a little on the cold side and we had a lot of rain. We moved to Bonita Springs, which is just north of Naples and will be here until Jan 25^th. Hopefully between football games we will have some nice weather and get out and do a few thing. Hope everyone had a nice Christmas and have a safe New Year.

Just another boring day

M*A*S*H
The reunion that everybody has been waiting for Radar and Hot Lips together again, or at least Gary Burghoff and Cathy. Since Gary (Radar) lives in Citrus County they gave him an honorary day at a little park near where he lives so we decided to go say hi. We got there about an hour early and were sitting in the car listening to the Michigan – Ohio game; there were about 30 people already in line when he came walking up. He walked up and got in the end of the line behind a 75 year old lady, after a few seconds he asked her “what time is that guy suppose to get her” she turned around and said at 1:00 o’clock then she turned her back on him. After about 3 seconds it must of dawned on her because she let out a little scream and said “you’re him”, it was a great way to make an entrance. We were probably 40th in line and it took us about an hour and a half before we got up to him, he didn’t rush anybody, he posed for pictures signed whatever you brought with you and answered any questions that you had. He told a few stories about being on the set of M*A*S*H, and was really very funny. When we left there were probably another 80 to 100 more people in line.
Oh, by the way Michigan lost it in the 4th quarter.
more later

The Mighty Eighth

We spent the better part of the day walking through the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum. If you ever saw the movie “12 O’clock High” and who hasn’t, then you’ll know what this museum is all about. The movie was filmed on location with the Mighty Eighth and just about all the film footage in the movie is actual footage of the air battles. Probably 75% of the movie was taken from the experiences of the crewmembers of the Mighty Eighth. They have tons of exhibits and five different movies, the best part is a big room that is designed like the airfield in England that they flew out of. You start by entering the Nissen Hut (now called a Quonset hut) here you get a pre-flight briefing for your bombing mission in a B-17. They will also teach you the difference between a B-17 & a B-24. Then you go out with the maintance crew to make sure the aircraft is ready for flight, then it’s off you go into the wild blue yonder. They have what they call the “immersion theater” which has about 6 different screens and you’re right in the middle of them, flying a bombing mission to destroy the oil refiners in Germany. Other then a flight simulator this is as close as you’ll ever come to being Gregory Peck on his 25th mission. In another part of the building the have it set you where you’re a waist gunner with a 50 caliber trying to shot a bunch of MIG’s out of the sky. The guide we had was 8 years old when the war started, but his big brother was old enough to join up and he did. He was one of the original pilots and flew his plane and crew from the USA to England; he was also one of the first to fly 25 missions just to have them raise the number to 30 for rotation home. He flew his 30 missions and only lost two aircraft but also a few crew men, After his 30 missions (which he flew in 52 days) they told him if he flew 5 more missions they would promote him to Captain, which would have made him the youngest Captain in history, he had just turned 19. He declined their offer and rotated home to enjoy life until he died in 1989.


The other thing that we found fascinating was the Memorial Garden, It’s kind of set up like an old English garden with some broken gates and small brick walls, each plane had it’s own name and logo painted on it, pretty much whatever the Pilot wanted. In the garden the have carved stone, granite or marble plaques with the name & logo of the aircraft and names of the crew members for most of the planes, also listed behind the name is whether they were, KIA, MIA or POW. During WW II the Mighty Eighth had over 24,000 killed in action & over 28,000 taken as prisoners of war.
When the museum opened in 1996, General Jimmy Dolittle’s son had his tombstone moved from Arlington to a place in the garden here, he said it’s what his dad would have wanted.
They have a nice little English pub style restaurant in the corner of the museum for lunch.
Admission is $10.00 a head but well worth it, we’ve already decided that we’re going to stop again next year.

Halloween in Savannah

As most of you know Cathy and I have a hobby called Geocaching, it involves using a GPS and finding things that have been hidden by other cachers around the world. Sometimes it's little pill bottles or large ammo or Tupperware boxes. Some of them contain Travel Bugs, which is an item that you take from one cache and put it in another farther down the road. Well that's what we were doing today, we had picked up a Travel Bug that was named Mr. Bones and it is a small skeleton that likes scary places. Lets see it's Halloween Eve, we have Mr. Bones and there's a scary cache in the Bonaventure Cemetery in downtown Savannah, so here's our story.

We had spent most of the day walking around downtown Savannah and the Riverfront and had just enjoyed a great meal at a little café when we decided to walk over to the Bonaventure Cemetery and drop off Mr. Bones at the 'Legend of John Daly Cache".

Legend has it the John Daly passed away on a cold wet autumn day just before Halloween and that he was laid to rest on Halloween Eve, 1899 at Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah, Georgia, the one made famous by the movie Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, this is a large, eerie cemetery at the bank of the river. But it doesn't say how he died.

One year after his death, his wife, Hazel, decided to visit his grave on the anniversary of his death. She went there after dinner, even though it was late and getting dark, she told a neighbor that she would just be there for a minute and would be home in about 30 minutes. The neighbor forgot all about it until the next day when she went to Hazel's house and found the doors open and no one there. The neighbor got her husband and they went to John Daly's grave, where they found some fresh turned dirt, lying on top of the dirt was Hazel's gold wedding ring. She was never seen or heard from again.

Fifty years later Hazel's granddaughter, Janet, who had heard tales of her grandmothers disappearance wanted to try and figure out what happened so she decided to re-enact what her grandmother had done. She went to her grandmother's old house on Halloween Eve, and walked the same streets to the cemetery. When she didn't return home by 8 o'clock that night her husband called the police and told them the entire story. The police and her husband drove over to the cemetery and walked up to John Daly's grave where they found some fresh turned dirt, and lying right on top of it was a gold bracelet that had belonged to Hazel, and Janet had worn everyday since her mother, Hazel's daughter, gave it to her. Janet was never seen or heard from again.

Some storm clouds have moved in while we were eating dinner, it's starting to get dark and the wind is really picking up and blowing in off the river. You can feel the rain in the air, there's a huge flash of lightning and a loud crash of thunder so we were moving pretty fast now. After placing Mr. Bones in the cache container, which was hidden right behind the headstone, I stood up and noticed some fresh turned dirt on the grave, and right there on top of the dirt was my gold watch………………… and I was never seen or heard from again.

So sleep well tonight all our friends out there in blog land…Oh! And have a Happy Halloween.

Grave Hunting in CHARLESTON

The first two days here in Charleston were sunny and in the 80's so we sat around watching baseball & Football. Monday we decided to do a little grave hunting and of course it had dropped down into the 60's and was raining, good weather for cemeteries. The tomb to the right is that of Francis Marion "the Swamp Fox". Ever since the movie The Patriot came out we've been bumping it to this guy, either a historical marker about his exploits or a location where they filmed part of the movie. We did a little Internet research and found where his grave was, gee it's only a 125 miles round trip from where we're camped so we figured why not. He's buried in a little family cemetery off of a very small side road, once through the gates you drive back on a very narrow one lane road for a mile to the tomb which is very well maintained. Surprize, surprize, in the middle of no where in the rain, back in the woods of the old Belle Isle Plantaions, there were already two people back there. A couple of construction workers who got rained out of work today. One of their daughters was doing a book report on the General and he decided to come back here and check things out for her, we bs'ed for about 45 minutes and he told us about some neat things at a hidden cemetery in Charleston.

Magnolia Cemetery.
This is a photo of the first crew of the Civil War submarine the HUNLEY they drowned when the ship was just pulling away from the dock and the wash from a passing ship went into an open hatch. Their graves were just discovered a few years ago and moved to this location, with full military ceremonies. They were doing some work on the football stadium at the Citidel Military Academy and dug up the bodies. It turns out that the stadium is built on top of an old Mariners cemetery. When the bodies were recovered from the sinking of the ship they were quietly moved to the cemertey for burial, much like today we don't need the bad press. especially when one of them was a 13 year old boy.

This is the monument for the second crew of the Hunley, that drowned about 10 days after the first crew did. This time they made it away from the dock but apparently not to much futher then that. If you notice the designer of the sub Horace Hunley waited until the second sailing before he got on board. Of course the third crew of the Hunley drowned the first time the ship went into battle and it along with their bodies were not recovered until a few years ago.
This cemetery is really hidden and took us awhile to find, even with directions, but any cemetery that has a sign just in side the gate that sez "Five hundred dollar fine for feeding the alligators" well you just have to love it. We ended up spending about 2 hours walking and driving around looking at some of the great tombstones, there are a lot of famous people buried here.

The Greatest Free Show in Charleston. That's how they bill it.
The Citadel Cadets.
3:45 every Friday at the Citadel parade grounds the entire student body of cadets, 1900 strong put on a one hour show that you don't want to miss. They start with the bagpipers then the fife and drums and then the full assembly. This week happened to be the home coming so there were a lot of past graduates there. This included three federal Judges, a few General Officers and a whole bunch of guys with big gold class rings. It was kind of neat, at the end when they march by the stands for review, the alumni in the stands wait until the platoon that they served in is passing then they stand and salute.

This is the schools mascot, When one of the graduates (and later an instructor at the school) was killed in Viet Nam (1965), every cadet in the school donated their brass belt buckles, buttons and head dress. They then had them melted down to cast the statue. A few yeas later this Officer's son ( a citadel grad) was also killed in Viet Nam, the statue is dedicated to both of them.


We leave Charleton tomorrow and are heading to Savannah for another week of adventure.

Myrtle Beach, S.C.

Our main reason for stopping here is we have an appointment at Camping World to get the air conditioner on the motor home fixed. The good news was it was less then a hundred dollars and we were expecting it to run around 500, so that made us happy.

Most of the Campgrounds in the area call themselves resorts which means they charge about 4 times more then they should, we found one a few miles north of town that was in one of our camp clubs so we got away with half price, which is still ridicules. The nice thing about this park is it's right next to the Barefoot Beach complex which a bunch of stores, restaurants, nightclubs and golf courses. Everything from a Tee shirt shop to the House of Blues or Alabama, and Johnny Rockets Hamburgers to Greg Norman's Australian Grill. Its right on the Inter Coastal Waterway and half the buildings are built over the water and have boardwalks going to them. Every morning we do our walk around there and decided which place we'll go to for lunch, so far we've been to Johnny Rockets & Greg Norman's. Johnny Rockets was nice, good burgers, onion rings and paper plates in the middle of the complex, at Greg Norman's we had a table on the water with a very fancy dinning room. I had the Crab Cake sandwich and Cathy had the House Quiche, great service of course and it was only four dollars (total) more then Johnny Rockets.

The downtown area is really congested and since this is a slow time for tourist everybody is doing their clean up work getting ready for the Thanksgiving travelers

It's been sunny and in the 80's all week with the nights dropping down into the mid 60's.

Next stop one of our favorite places, Charleston, S.C. Hopefully WILMA will take a very wide path around the east coast heading to the New England area. We have a World Series to watch.

Macon's Grave-Roanoke Rapids, VA.

When you travel a bunch of back roads and stop at just about anything that looks interesting you come across some very strange things. The picture about is one of those things, but more on that later.

We were going to stay in Richmond for a week but we had trouble finding a campground in the area, we did find one but we decided that I didn't have enough guns in the rig to make it a safe stay. We were going to spend the weekend at the National Folk Festival, which was being held in Richmond this year except Tropical Storm Tammy decided that she was going to make it the wettest weekend of the year so we just kept heading south. After a very long drive in a very heavy rain we got off the freeway at Roanoke Rapids for dinner and found nice little campground, since it was going to rain non-stop for the entire weekend we decided that this was home and we would spend the weekend watching football and the baseball playoffs.

It's Monday morning, and sometime during the night the rains have stopped so we jumped in the car and decided to check out the area, the town has an old canal with a couple of mills and an aqueduct that went around the rapids. Today it's a seven mile walking path which takes you from one side of town to the other following the old canal, actually the canal is dry and you walk in the middle of what was the canal and across the old aqueduct. After the walk we took a drive out around the lakes and came across what the historical marker said was Macon's Grave 2 miles north, now how can you not make a right turn to find out what this is all about.

Macon's Grave is a small family cemetery across from where the family farm was located. Nathaniel Macon was a soldier in the Revolutionary war, serving at the surrender of Fort Moultrie, the fall of Charleston, the rout at Camden, and with General Nathaniel Greene in his retreat across Carolina. When he left the military he refused a pension and all pay for his military service, he went on to serve as a congressman and US Senator for the next 37 years, Macon, Georgia and Fort Macon are both named in his honor. Now after all this you have to wonder why some thugs would dump a truckload of stones on top of his grave, well they didn't. He requested that at his death no grief be expressed and that dinner and a grog be served and that all his friends cast a stone on his grave, which they did. Over the years the tradition has continued and anyone visiting his grave brings a stone to throw onto the pile, which now covers the graves of his wife, son and grandson. Really it's true, you could look it up.

Jim n Cathy

Charleston, W. Virginia

Capitol Bldg

The view from our camp site

We spent two days in Charleston W.V. so Cathy could get in a little genealogy research. We stayed in the St Albans city park with is right on the Kanawah River, they have about 5 sites and the best part is they're FREE.

The capitol dome is being real done and they only have half of it revealed, the Gov. and his wife are having a big party on the 14th when they unveil it. I spent about an hour walking around inside the capitol bldg, I walked into the Governors office and talked with his receptionist, stepped in the Sec of States office to say hi and a few other places. During the hour, I did not see one security person or cop, everybody was just as friendly as could be and wanted to know if they could help you with anything.

This is a realy great area if you like driving UP & Down mountainsides.
When we left here we took the Midland Trail (Hwy 60 east across the state) this is the original two lane hwy that looks like they built it around 1800. We were either doing 20 mph up hill, 20 mph through one of the switchbacks or riding the brakes down hill. I don't think I'm going to like seeing what our gas mileage is next time we fill up. Fortunately it was only 90 miles long and we covered it in about 3+ hrs and of course we found a spot right in the middle of it that we want to go back to in the spring for a week if I can find another road.

Right now we're in Charlottoville, Virginia for a week catching up on our history lessons.

Lancaster, Ohio

Lancaster Ohio

We�ve been here for about a week and will be leaving on Wednesday. Just been doing a lot of back road trips this week, the other day we did a 90 mile loop and discovered about 15 covered bridges and about 9 sites of the old Erie Canal with the stone locks. A ton of little towns, and a million cemeteries for Cathy to roam. Of course we did a day in Columbus for genealogy. That�s about it for this week.

The Toledo Zoo

Well I don't think that we drove far enough south, We set up at our new camp Wednesday and the first thing Thursday morning we get a call from Nick wanting to know when we were going to come get him and his sister to spend the night and go to the Toledo Zoo. Well I've had enought of this so I put my foot down, right down on the gas pedal and we drove up to Wixom to get him and Rachel. Good thing this park has WIFI because it kept Rachel busy all night so Nick and I could watch the Tigers lose another one.
A beautiful day at the Toledo Zoo, 80 degrees and sunny and all the animals were moving around alot rather then just sleeping. The kids had a really good time as always, except for the long drive home to Wixom from Toledo, a little over two hours. How do you keep the kids quiet that long, easy you just stop every 30 minutes and get them more ICE CREAM, I mean we're dropping them off with their parents, let them handle the suger high.
I slept very well tonight.

The GRAND Opening

August 30th 2005, Suz held the grand opening of her Candy Bouquet Store. It was a double grand opening with the busness next door. It was a nice sunny day and she had a lot of friends show up to help her on her way.

The Ribbon Cutting

This is one of her display areas, they can make up a bouquet for any occassion that you can think of.



Here are two that she made for Aunt Sandy to take to their tailgateing party for the opening of the MEEEECHIGAN football season.

M GO Blue

With that all done Cathy & I packed up and moved south about 25 miles to a little RV park in Monroe, Michigan. With everything going on in the Gulf of Mexico we decided that we'll stay here for 3 to 4 weeks until things stabilize a little with gas prices and supply. The other day we were excited to buy gas for only $3.00 a gallon. It's going to make travel a little bit more expensive but what are you going to do.
We've spent the last few springs along the Gulf coast between Pensacola and Baton Rouge just laying back and relaxing, after seeing the films of the area it looks like it will be a long time before anyone can return to that area for any reason.
As always if we get in your area we'll give ya a call.

Charlotte, Michigan

Time to do a little catching up, when we left you we were in Lapeer, Michigan, well we moved a grand total of about 80 miles to Charlotte (pronounced Char-looooootte) if you say it like the girls name you�re in big trouble. Were at the fairgrounds and so far they�ve had a circus, rodeo, and that thing were the cars race through the mud pit, and all free. Of course when we�re here we spend every other day in Lansing at the library so Cathy can do her research. We did manage to go to a Lansing Lugnuts Baseball game, double a team for the Toronto Bluejays. With our luck it was bring a drunk get in free night, really it was 2 dollar beer night so we were in the minority that wasn�t falling down the steps for throwing up in the stands. We did a few back road tours, a day in Marshall and a day in Grand Rapids. And that�s about it, we�re leaving here Wednesday and heading down by the kids for a month, Suz is doing her Grand Opening on the 30th. Hopefully they will be packed, she's been doing pretty good for just getting started. Finally got the new car clean so I thought I would post the picture because it may never be clean again.
We�ll see everybody when we start our winter migration.

Port Huron, Michigan

Kids at the Blue Water Bridges

Watching a Big Ships pass by

We brought the kids up to lapeer for a few days and spent one in Port Huron. We walked the entire river front from north of the bridge to the Huron Light Boat. We toured the Huron Lightship. This was the last lightship used on the Great Lakes and has been turned in to a museum. Then we walked to the Thomas Edison Museum which is located right under the bridges. There are now two bridges side by side in order to handle the traffic. The kids got a chance to see some of the big ships as they passed under the bridges, Nick thinks that maybe he could have thrown a baseball to one of the ships since they were so close. We then drove up to the Gratiot Lighthouse & Beach for a little picnic lunch, while we were there the Canadian Coast Guard boat showed up and was doing manuvers about a 100 yards off shore and the local lifeguards were doing their rescue training. The kids really liked the Campground that we're in, it's near a rails to trails park and the trail circles two lakes and there is tons of wildlife to see.
Nick & Don's birthdays are August 2nd so we'll be heading back down to Wixon for that.
Later

Trading up

We decided that it was time to trade up to a new rig and Move on up to the east side to that deluxe motorhome.
Were camped in Lapeer Michigan for about another 2-3 weeks. Cathy looked out the window today and saw this thing driving down US24, the main drag through town. When we went to dinner a few hours later we saw it parked and stopped to get a picture. This is how itwas when it was driving down the road, the pop up was open.
I think thats a pair of bloomers hanging in the door.
Taking the Grandkids to Port Huron for the day next week, going to let them see some real blue water.

Another Landmark Day.
Suz opened her store today, The Walled Lake Candy Bouquet is now open and available to take your order. It was rush rush rush right till the last minute but she opened on time. The big Grand opening will be sometime around the first part of August. Nick and Rachel were a little disappointed that there wasn�t a line waiting to get in when they unlocked the door.
So if you�re in the area of Walled Lake Michigan she located on Pontiac Trail just east of Commerce Rd.
We�re so proud of our little girl, and we get free brownies and candy.

Catching up on things

Well I guess it’s time to do a little catching up on this Blog thing. We got back to Michigan about mid June and watched the grandkids while Suz & Don went of to Little Rock Arkansas for their Candy Class. They have the franchise for the Candy Bouquet in the Wixom area, they have all types of candy and instead of sending a floral bouquet they make them out of chocolate and candy. Very unique. We spent just about everyday with the kids at the beach swimming and as Rachel calls it Cardiacking, the rest of us call it kayaking. After a week of this I started to think she was right and I was heading for a Cardiack arrest.
We got BOLO’ed in Livingston County (BOLO police slang for Be On the Look Out for), We had picked up the new car a few days earlier and decided to take the kids to the Zoo in Lansing to put a few miles on the car and get the engine broken in. Well we’re on the freeway in the right lane doing 60mph, minding our own business when this Bandana head Willie Nelson wanna be comes flying up on our butt at about 90 and locks on his brakes about 3 feet off our back bumper. With no other cars in the other lanes he starts beeping and signaling me to speed up so of course I hit the brakes instead which I believe caused everything on his front seat to hit the floor. Now he decides to pass us on the shoulder of the freeway, while he’s doing this he flips Cathy and the grandkids the bird, I still can’t figure out why he was mad at them. He then starts to pull in front of us forcing us into the second lane which is now occupied by a semi truck. Being a fast thinker I threw my badge up in the windshield, he immediately pulled back onto the shoulder and took off at about 90 mph. He got off at the next exit and we continued on our way to the zoo. About 15 miles down the road we see a Deputy standing outside his car shooting radar. As we go by he looks up his jaw drops open and his head swivels around watching us go by. I made the comment to Cathy that this must really be a great looking car. So great that he chased us down with his lights and siren running. It turns out that the Willie Nelson wanna be got off the freeway and called the sheriffs office and told them that there was a crazy guy flying down the freeway hanging out the window with a badge in his hand running everyone off the road. So the Sheriff orders all his deputies to the freeway overpasses to catch us. After fifteen minutes of talking with a K9 unit deputy (the dog was the friendly smart one) and waiting for them to call Detroit PD to verify I was a real cop, they decided to give us a break and let us go. About half way through all this Rachel pops up with “It shouldn’t take this long just to write a ticket”. We did finally get to the zoo and had a really good time. On the way home Nick had us drive by Michigan State’s Stadium to get a picture of him standing in front of it, to make a screen saver for his mom (a University of Michigan Grad).
Suz & Don got back and we let them visit the kids for a day and a half before we loaded them in the motorhome and took off for Mackinac Island for a week. The weather was in the low 90’s everyday and only about 30 minutes of rain all week. We did 4 crossings of the BIG MACK Bridge and spent one day walking around the Island eating fudge and saltwater taffy. The kids got to swim under the bridge, this is the dividing point for Lake Michigan and Lake Huron so Nick named it Lake Michuron, of course the water temp was just a tad above freezing. Fortunately we found a little beach on a bay in Lake Michigan that was pure white sand shallow and about 75 degree water temp so we pretty much lived there for the rest of the week. Cathy wouldn’t let us use the campground pool any more after I beat up the eleven year old (he was a really big eleven year old in my own defense). But that’s another story.
When we left Mackinac we followed US 23 down the coast past the 45th parallel to Oscoda, this was the start of the 4th of July week in Oscoda for the family. Normally we camp near by but this year we just met Don & Suz and dropped off the kids, then went to Wixom to house sit the dog and cats. I was able to spend 5 days washing and waxing the motorhome and 5 evenings at the chiropractor getting straighten out. The kids had a great week and came home and tanned and bronzed from the time on the beach.
Pack up the motorhome and we’re gone for a month of relaxing in Lapeer Michigan. Of course we have to go back for the opening of the store and then for Nick and Don’s birthdays and probably 3 or 4 other things, who knows or as Rachel always sez “Who cares”.
The car we bought is a PT Cruiser, I spent more time in line at the DMV then I did in the dealership buying it. It’s a nice car with lots of room and so far we’re both happy with it. I’m trying to get Cathy to wear a Pink mohair sweater (tight) a Poodle skirt and saddle shoes so we can go down to the drive-in but she’s not having any of it.
Time to relax, later

In Honor of Cathy's 49th Birthday

Louisville "Hometown of Jackie"

Downtown Louisville


Louisville Slugger Museum


Building down the street from the Bat Factory

We're camped right across the river, in Indiana, from Louisville. The other day we took of on the bicycle to ride along the river and we were gone for 5 hours. We went to the Falls of Ohio, a ton of little parks along the river and in the little town centers. We took a tour of the Louisville Slugger Bat Factory and Museum, had to buy a Babe Ruth signature bat for Nick. It takes about an hour and half to see everything and is well worth the trip. They have the big bat out front as you can see in the picture, then about 1/2 a block down the street is the Plate Glass Building with the ball through the window.
We went to both National Cemeteries in the area, New Albany, which is one of the original 13, and the Louisville National Cemetery which is in the Cave Hill Cemetery.
It was raining today (Thursday) so we just did a little shopping and tried another restaurant. Before we leave Sunday we want to get to Locust Grove, last home of George Lewis Clark, and President. Zachary Taylors Grave site.
Looks like we're going to have to save the Chuchill Downs Museum for our next trip here.
Gotta go turn the steaks.

Nashville, Tennessee

Tennessee Capitol Building

Mansker Station wood turner

Who am I?
There are two ways to drive north through Nashville, the east way or the west way, we took the wrong way. What looked like the easiest way turned out to be the very long way, just as we got to the Cumberland River Bridge we were about 40 cars behind the accident that blocked the entire freeway. Then the rubbernecks on the other side of the freeway decided to have one of their own and block all but one lane on that side of the bridge. Six Police cars, 3 Rescue Squads, 3 Fire trucks including a hook and ladder, 2 EMS units, a Helicopter and one hour later we managed to get one lane open and we were back on our way. Best of all we were only 10 minutes away from our exit for the RV Park.
Cathy got to spend 2 full 8-hour days in the State Archives and I just wandered around downtown Nashville trying to avoid all the construction. Most of the monuments and memorial stuff was total blocked off to the public because they were putting in new sidewalks.
We stopped by Mansker Station, which was the first establish fort in Tennessee, they had a few re-enactors there to show you around the fort and plantation house. The house is the oldest brick building in Tennessee. The fort is an exact 1/3 model of the original.
Since we both love Country Western Music so much we avoided the Grand Ole Opry. No such luck we just found out that the RV Park is hosting a big Holiday weekend Hoe Down tonight right across from our site. (Hoe Down in Detroit means one of your Bi**hes just got shot).
The biggest thing this week is we got a new little grill (we haven’t had one for over 2 years) so we’re BBQing all our meals.
Leaving for Louisville in the Morning (Sunday) hopefully the traffic won’t be as bad as Nashville and we’ll get out and do a little more exploring.
Answer: Alvin York

Florence / Tuscumbia, Alabama

We reluctantly left Baton Rouge, we still had a lot of stuff that we wanted to do there and started our journey north to see the grandkids. We took the north end of the Natchez Trace and spent the night in Tupelo, birthplace of Elvis Presley.

Then on to Florence Ala. where we are camped on the shore of the Tennessee River, we're just driving around a bunch of the back roads seeing what we stumble across. Today (Friday) we found the Alabama Music Hall of Fame, being such big country music fans we decided to pass on it. The waterfall is located in a downtown park in Tuscumbia; there is also a waterwheel, small-scale train, a fountain with music and colored lights for night viewing and tons of ducks and geese waiting to be fed. We got lost for awhile and found a neighborhood called "City One" it was built by the government during WW I to house people that worked at a nitrate factory, the main streets form a big liberty bell if seen from the sky. Most of the homes are still there and in like new shape. Then we found a dead end street that took us to the edge of the cliffs on the north shore of the river for a fantastic view. Then while driving along a little out of the way street that went right along the river we stumbled across a little park where there was a film crew, filming scenes for an up coming movie. They had about 10 trucks filled with equipment and probably 100 people running around and it looked like all they did was film about a minute of a tugboat going by and blowing his horn at some actor on a dock. The name of the movie is "Where (or when) I found the Ocean", well they're sure not going to find it in northern Alabama. When we were here about 8 to 10 years ago we had to hunt for a grocery store, now we have a Super Wal-Mart, Sam's Club, Target, Sears, K-Mart and every type of restaurant that you can think of then some. The Ranger told us that the campground would be bulldozed in October for a Pro Bass Shop and a major sports complex to go with the Trent Jones golf course right across the river, also a 4-1/2 mile river walk that will cover the city end to end.

Tomorrow we head up to Nashville and a resort with WiFi , Cathy will be so happy for the week that we are there. We'll eventually make it back to Michigan, we have to be there for the big baseball playoffs with Nick "the Flamethrower" Squier is pitching.

More when we get it.

Baton Rouge

Baton Rouge, the Red Stick.
We arrived here last Sunday and it was 80 degrees and sunny, and so far that has been the bad weather day. It has been in the high 80’s to mid 90’s since we’ve been here and the humidity is right around 300%.
We’re camped at a city park which is about 2 miles south of the LSU campus and 3 miles from Downtown and best of all only 2 miles from Mike Andersons Seafood Restaurant. They have the best food and service that we have come across this entire season, we’ve only been there 3 times this week.
We spent one day downtown touring the Capitol Bldg, they show you where Huey Long was assassinated and then you can go up to the observation deck, the Capitol Bldg is the tallest one in the USA. The observation deck is on the 27 floor and is right on the Mississippi River so you really get a great view of the town and surrounding area. Huey Long had the first bridge built crossing the river here and he had them make it low enough so that the big ship could not get any further up the river and had to stop at the Port of Baton Rouge, you gotta love a man that thinks like that. The amazing thing is you can’t say Louisiana with out thinking of Huey Long yet he only served one term as Governor and was assassinated during the 2nd year of his term as Senator. He made quite a name for such a short time.
We went to the city Zoo, which we had almost all to ourselves, it’s a very nice zoo and you can cover it in about two hours. All the animals were very active while we were there.
There are a ton of other things to do in this area and you could spend a month here very easy.
Today we’re going to tour the Old Capitol Museum and tomorrow we’ll drive over to Lafayette to visit with Cathy’s Sister
More to follow.

Bay St Louis

We're staying at a park in Bay St. Louis, Miss, which is about 45-50 miles east of New Orleans. We drove over to New Orleans and spent the morning in the north end of town at City Park touring the botanical gardens and the Sculptors garden. We kind of raced through the Sculptors garden since there were about ten school bus's worth of kinds just running wild. The City Park covers the north central part of the city and has just about everything you can think of for the family from a kiddies park to a 18 hole golf course. It's a lot like Belle Isle in Detroit except that none of the buildings are boarded up and people use it.
Then we drove down to Jackson Barracks Museum, this is the military base for the Louisiana Air National Guard, this base has been active since before the Battle of New Orleans "In 1814 we took a little trip down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico"
Remember that song. If you do I'll bet your humming it the rest of the day.
This is one of the better Military Museums that we have ever been to. Then the best part of the day, "A Cheeseburger in Paradise" at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville.
So far we've spent two days dropping coins into the slots without any luck, going to give them one more chance later this week.
We drove through Kiln, Miss, known as "The Kil" by the locals and saw what we believe to be Brett Farves house, it was the only one that sat in the middle of 300 hundred cleared acres with security fences surrounding it.
We didn't have internet at Bay St Louis, so I just got this posted. We just got in and set up in Baton Rouge.

Through the Windshield

Spent a day at the Battleship Park in Downtown Mobile, they have a really nice War Memorial, The Battleship Alabama,a Submarine, a hanger with about 30 planes on display and alot more. We walked around the grounds and looked at the War Memorial part but there were about 6 bus loads of kids going into the ships so we decided to pass on it this time.
Thursday was a nice sunny day so we drove down to Dauphin Island and spent the day bicycling around the island. We saw some storm damage but not to much considering how far out in the gulf the island is. There are a lot of flowers blooming and it was the tail end of the bird migration back north, Dauphin Island is the last stop they make heading south and the first stop they make heading north. Cathy and I were here one year, at Fort Morgan, and it was at the time the Monarch Butterflys were gathering for their flight to Mexico. The bushes were just covered with them, there were so many that you could hardly see the bushes.
They seem to have trouble predicting the weather in the gulf area, they have predicted heavy storms just about every day for the last week and all we got was a little spinkle one night, not that I'm complaining mind you.
Tomorrow is moving day and we'll be heading to Bay St Louis, Miss. Which means we have to drive 90 miles tomorrow, better go to bed early tonight.
Almost forgot the Detroit TIGERS got SNOWED OUT today.

Mobile, Alabama

We’re in Mobile Alabama for a few weeks and have been busy just about every minute. We drove around the bay to Gulf Shores to see the hurricane damage, just about every business or bldg on the beach had extensive damage and it looks like most of them are going to have to be bulldozed. I would say that the construction along this area (Gulf Shores to Pensacola) is going to be so bad for the next couple of years I would avoid this area. They bulldozed the famous Flora-Bama Bar yesterday a very sad day for the wild party crowd.
We went to The Hank Aaron Stadium and saw a Mobile Baybears Baseball game, they lost in the ninth to the Chattanooga Lookouts. Then we went to the Dew Drop Inn, it was the diners cheeseburger that inspired Jimmy Buffet to write Cheeseburger in Paradise. We tried one and both of us agree that the cheeseburger at Margaritaville is ten times better. We went back again to try their world famous hot dogs and they really were great.
We found a little cemetery . The Church Street Grave Yard, never saw one before that said Grave Yard. This is one if not the oldest cemetery in Mobile and has some significant graves, including one of the founders of Madis Gras. Every year during Mardi Gras they have a mini festival in the grave yard and all the graves and monuments end up covered with beads.
The best thing for Cathy was we found a bookstore that is going out of business and all the books were 50 cents. We were there when they opened and took advantage of it, the motor home will probably only get about 3 MPG now that we added 1000 LBS of books to it.
We still have to go to Dauphin Island, Bellingrath Gardens, the genealogy center and the Expo Center to see the Dead Sea Scrolls (they’re on display until May 8th). Other then that will be heading to the Biloxi area for a couple of weeks.
Enjoy the Spring weather.

April 6th Duh!!!!!!!!!

For all of you out there that forgot our anniversary, don't worry about it.
So did we until about an hour ago.

Time Flies

Today we start our FIFTH year of Fulltiming.
That's
1460 Days
35040 Hours
2102400 Minutes &
12,614,400 Seconds
As the song sez "LOVE THE ONE YOU'RE WITH"

MOAB

Almost forgot to post this, this is MOAB (Mother OF All Bombs) It is the biggest most powerful non-nuclear bomb in the world. Cathy and I were camped here when then did the first air drop test of this bomb. We were about 30 miles away when it went off and the shock wave rocked the motorhome. Eglin AFB is 30 miles from here and is where the Air Force developes and test all its armament. They have nice FREE museum displaying stuff that you never heard of before, also outside they have approx. 35 aircraft including the BLACKBIRD.
We are now starting day 2 of our 48 hour THUNDERSTORM, Non stop rain for the last 36 hours. Florida the SUNSHINE STATE......NOT

The Blue Angels

We went over to Pensacola the other day to watch the Blue Angels practice. If you're ever in the area be sure to go see them, they practice on Tuesdays & Wednesdays. They practice right behind the Navel Air Museum on the base and they start at 8:30am, don't be late. If you go you have to enter the base from the WEST gate and plan on about a 30-40 minute delay getting in with all the traffic and the Vehicle Check point. Be sure to have your license, registration and insurance papers handy. It's really not bad, it's just that there are so many people going in at once. It might have been worst this time since it's Easter break.
They put on a 45 minute show with seven aircraft and they are right in your face, the runway is only about 50 yards away from the fence line. They do most of their stuff right in front of you or right over your head.
Be sure to take some type of EAR PROTECTION, especially for kids, we went to Walmarts and got the cheap orange foam ones for $1.49 and they worked great.
The top picture is right at the end of the show, sort of a final bow as they peal off to land. The picture at the bottom was taken from the Blue Angels web page, take a look at it they have some fantastic photos on it.
If you go on a Wednesday the pilots come to the Museum right after the practice to pose for pictures and sign autographs, but be prepared for a ton of people.
I you want to go see the Museum be sure to pick a day they DON'T practice. It opens at 9:00am and there might be about 20 people there with you, it's a great museum and plan on spending anywhere from 2-4 hours depending on your interest in this type of stuff. The Officers club is on the second floor and open to the public for lunch, good food and prices, (you have to see it even if you don;t eat there.
Well back to camp to sit out a few more rainy days.

The Blue Angels

We didn’t do a lot this week, discovered a few new restaurants, drove along the coast and visited a few more cemeteries.
We found a nice eating spot in the town of Baker, GATORS “Home of the BUBBA Burger” it’s kind of a 60’s diner with great food and a Blue Plate Special.
We took a drive down to the coast to do a little shopping at the Destin Outlet Mall, no good deals today, then down to Grayton Beach, Seaside, Seagrove and Watercolor. All beautiful sounding names but don’t bother going there. They have all turned in to rental towns, beautiful homes that you can rent for $1200 a week, you can’t see the water because of all the buildings and this being Easter break, traffic was moving about zero miles an hour. We spent an hour at Eden Garden’s State Park, nice but not great.
The highlight of the day was in Defuniak Springs, we met a local in an old cemetery and he told us about the Pub Burger at Ed’s. Of course we had to try it since it was dinnertime. This is another place that is right out of the 60’s and the Pub burger is about a half pound, but we managed to eat all of it. One of the better burgers we’ve found.
So much for the diets this month.


Eden Gardens

Hey Buddy, GOT A DIME

Well we must be feeling better, we're back out walking the cemeterys. We were in the north Pensacola area the other day and the hurricane damage is worst then it was in the Port Charlotte area. We're going to take a drive down by the coast next week and see how bad that still is, most of the coast roads are still buried under twenty plus feet of sand.

MOVED SOUTH

We managed to survive our week of cold weather in Michigan for a full 6 days before Jim got sick. We left there on Saturday to miss the 6 inch snow storm which was coming Sunday, so we did the drive back to Chattanooga in one day which gave Cathy a change to catch my cold. When we got back to the motorhome it was raining and cold so we ended up spending the next two weeks sitting around complaining and taking medicine. When we finally felt good enough to travel we loaded up and started driving south until we found the sun and some warm weather. This means that we are back in Florida, Holt which is near Pensacola, we'll be here for about a month.
We did stop for a day in Columbus Ga. and did a walking tour of the Historic District and the riverfront. We went through the home of Dr Pendleton, who was the inventer of French Wine Coca, which today we call Coca Cola. The guy ran into money problems and sold the whole thing to a guy for $1700.00. Bad deal.
Jim & Debbie , sorry that we raced by without saying hi but we would have ended up giving this crud to you. We'll try to get by later in the year.

Country's BBQ

This is the restaurant that we ate at in Columbus Ga. It's the old Trailways Bus Depot the they converted, the bus is actually part of the bldging and you can sit in it to eat your meal. Which we did and you can see what Cathy had in the picture below.

Cathy's Lunch

Cathy ordered the Lunch Special which turned out to be the Pig Tator. As you can see it is the biggest baked potato in the state stuffed with BBQ pork and sour cream. This is the actual size of it, of course she barly put a dent in it

The Lowry Park Zoo

We spent today walking around the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa, Florda, with our friends Debbie and Bernie Hamm. This is one of the nicer zoo's that we have been to, about three hours and you can cover the entire zoo. The picture is from the "Bird of Prey" show that they put on, the birds fly right out over your head and if you're not careful they'll smack you in the head with their wings as they go over.
This is the Red Tailed Hawk, which is the type you see alot on the freeways and roads as you're driving.
The weather has been going back and forth but mostly its be prety nice, another week here and then we start heading north to the Chattanooga area.

2005

It's the start of another new year and we find ourselves in Florida again. Christmas week was a little cold and wet but now with the new year it's been back in the high 70's and fairly sunny. We are still in North Ft Myers and will be here until the 7th, then we head up to Ellenton for a few weeks to visit family and friends. Also to attend the big Florida RV Show in Tampa. The picture is of the Federal Bldg in downtown Fort Myers, a very interesting light display.