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.

Catching up on things

I got a little lazy with the entrys so this will catch you up on where we've been.
We took a lot of backroads heading south and made stops at the Cowpens National Battlefield and Kings Mountain National Military Park. The movie the Patriot was a combination of these battles. Then we made stops at Ninty-Six National Battlefield and Alexander H Stephens State Memorial Park (Vice President of the CSA).
Then about ten days in Elko Ga (just south of Perry), we visited the the National MIA-POW Museum in Andersonville.
A month in the Gainesvile/Ocala Fla area just lying around the park relaxing, and now we're in North Fort Myers until Dec 7th, enjoying the sun and warm weather.
Hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving and if I get lazy again Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Boo!!!!!! Happy Halloween

Another 7 Day Weekend.
We started the week in the Mts of Virginia and just took a bunch of backroads through the Mts. We made stops at General Campbells grave, he led the men on the Overmountain Victory Trail, then we stopped at Kings Mt and Cowpens Nat Battlefields. Once we were out of the mountains we spent the night at A.H.Stephens State Park, he was the Vice President of the Confederacy, didn't know that did you. We spent the morning doing a tour of the museum and his house which is 90% original, furniture and all.
Right now we are camped in Elko Ga. it's about 10 miles south of Perry, we will be here for a week before moving on. Yesterday we went to Anderson for the National POW Museum, if you're in the area you gotta go to this, just be sure to take a hanky with you.
The park that we are at has a hot tub that nobody else uses and FREE WI-FI, we may never leave. We will be crossing the border into Florida and onto Ocala on Nov 8th.
More when ever it happens

We spent yesterday touring Saltville and visiting the Museum of the Middle Appalachians. Today we took a bunch of backroads and ended up climbing Backbone Rock to the top of the old railroad tunnel, then we walked part of the Appalachian Trial into the town of Damacus Va.. After that we walked part of the Virginia Creeper Trail which follows a great little mountain stream. We ate lunch at one old mill and then stumbled across this one (pictured above) which has been in operation for 214 years, bought some ground popcorn meal to try and make some bread with. The weather has been great and the fall color is fantastic.

We're on the road again and heading south but as you can see by the sign we're not to sure of where we're going. Right now we're camped at Chilihowie, Va. for about a week, YES THE Chilihowie Va. Cathy's doing some genealogy research and we're just cruising the back road to see what we can find Tomorow we plan on spending the day touring the town of Saltville Va. YES THE Saltville Va. Actually it has a ton of history to it from pre-historic through the Civil War so it should be a long day. The fall colors down here are at about 80% but there has been a light rain or drizzle for the last two days. Hopefully the sun will come out to show off the colors for us.
More to come later.

Tenative Schedule has been changed

Our Tenative schedule for the time period starting the end of February has been changed to the following;
We don't know where we'll be because of the Hurricanes in Fla & La. When we figure it out we'll let you know.

First there was Lewis & Clark NOW there... is Jim & Nick

Looking a litte worried

Don & Suz were off to the M Go Blue football game, so Grandpa and Nick took on the mighty Huron River with Troop 104 for a canoe trip. It was to be a two hour tour, a two hour tour. We started out it was cold and cloudly, not the perfect afternoon for a canoe ride. There were about twenty canoes with Troop 104 and we all launched at once, we were some where near the middle, but within 15 minutes we could not see a canoe in front of us or behind us. We were all alone to fend for ourselves, a lot of noises were heard in the woods along the shore so we made sure that we stayed to the middle of the river where nothing could attack us. After 2 days without seeing another soul and without food or water we came across a 30 foot waterfall that we were forced to portage around, during this portage we did manage to find some drinking water to substain us for the rest of our journey. Another day into the trip and the river started to run dry, grandpa was forced to carry the canoe, Nick and the supplies throught the shallow water, about 5 miles. Once we were in deep water again we started to make pretty good time. With both of us paddleing like little wind up toys we were able to out run the small band of indians that we came across near the 15th tee, try as they might to hit us with their little round white balls of death we were able to stay ahead of them. A few more bends in the river and we were down to our last bit of strenght, when we heard shouts from the shore. It was fellow Troop 104er's, They dashed into the water and pulled us ashore and provided us with nurishment. After a short rest and medical treatment we were put in a big wagon and sent home to mend.

Boy I sure hope I get to go with Nick next year when they do it again.

Tenative Winter Schedule

Well this is roughly where we will be and when this winter, unless all the hurricanes have wiped out some of the parks we planned to stay in.
We're not leaving SE Michigan until after Oct 14th, Cathy has her pension meeting that day so since the City of Detroit is going to start paying her we figured that she should be there to dot all the I's and cross the T's.
We're going to spend the first couple of weeks taking the back roads across Ohio,Kent, Tenn, W/Vir and Georgia before we arrive in Florida. From Nov 8th thru Dec 7th we will be just south of Gainesville. Then from Dec 8th thru Jan 7th we will be in North Fort Myers. Jan8th -15 in Ellenton. Jan 16th thru Feb 4th in Crystal River.
Then we're going to take the rig and park it in Chattanooga while we drive up to the kids for winter break. After that no definite plans, we will be heading to the panhandle and along the Gulf shore over to Biloxi. From there hopefully north to Memphis for a week or so the to St Louis for a week or so. Then it will be time to head back to Michigan to get ready to take the grandkids up north for a week before the BIG 4th of July bash in Oscoda.
We just got a new laptop with WI-FI, alot of the campgrounds are setting up with FREE Wi-FI so we're looking forward to that. Maybe no more 14.4 modem through the cellphone.
That's about it for now, if any of these dates look like we'll be crossing paths give us a call or email and we'll try to get together.
Jim n Cathy

The BIG Labor day move

Well we spent the Labor Day weekend helping the kids move into their new house. Thank God it was only a 3 minute drive from their old house, so we got most of the boxes moved with the little van ( about 15 trips) and then Don and his buddies moved all the furniture in a rental truck. The move was from Wolverine Lake to Wixom, which means we crossed Bennstein road and drove south about 1/2 a mile. The kids will still go to St William's school and they'll even get to ride the bus this year. This is Rachels first year in school so she's all hyped up for it. The new house is really nice and it's in a great neighborhood. The street is a circle and in the middle all the backyards open up onto a big park, with all the things kids need to be happy, swings, slides,bike paths and a firepit for S'mores on the weekend. Most of the house on the park have kids that go to St William and a good assortment of ages so everybody has someone to play with. The bike path takes you down to the private beach and lake, this is where they have spent the first few days at.
Cathy and I are back at the Wayne County Fairgrounds for about a month getting all the medical stuff taken care. Cathy starts receiving her pension this year so we have to get downtown and sign all the paperwork for that. It's about time she started earning her way.
Not much else going on with us right now except that the cable for the cell phone is acting up and we have to rely on the library to get and send email for now but that should be fixed pretty soon.
Everybody take care, those of you down south watch out for the storms.
Jim n Cathy

Moving on

Well our week in Tecumseh is up and we were going to set up at the Wayne County fairgrounds but when we got there the cupboard was bare. They were having some kind of dog show and the entire place was filled. Not one open spot, so we ended up in the kids driveway for a few days until the campground clear out. If it wasn't for a few doctor appointments this week we would have just headed up north or something. I'll be glad when the holiday weekend is over and all the weekend campers put there rigs away for the winter.
The kids just bought a new house and are planning on making the move over the holiday weekend, see how well my back holds out, it's still in the same neighborhood so all the schools stay the same, which start on September 7th (I think).
THat's about it for now
Jim n Cathy

Very slow learner

I think maybe I figured out how this works, so I'll give it another try.
The Tigers (Detroit) lost today so we're bummed out about that, our grandson was at the game for his birthday.
Right now we're finishing up a week in Charlotte, Michigan and will be moving tomorrow to Tecumseh, Michigan for a week. Then back to the area of the grandkids.