We stayed with friends in Yankton, South Dakota last week. It was a nice long weekend visit. I played golf twice while Louise got her quota of card games. We shared plans and updated each other on family matters. As we left, we had a two travel days planned on our way to the Denver area where we are now. As we pulled away we began talking about the possibilities. I asked if Louise would enjoy a drive along the South Dakota border and what roads were there for us to travel? She looked at t
Louise’s mother, Irene, lived in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, for many years. When we visited her one of the things she would always talk about was the production of her fruit trees. She kept count of the number of oranges, lemons and grapefruit that each of her three trees produced. We used to laugh about her recordkeeping tendencies. She did serve as the chief accountant for the Denver airport for many years, so she came by the recordkeeping honestly.
Tonight as I was recording our mileage for
This is the cruise that started the whole trip to New Zealand and Australia. We signed on for the cruise and later decided to make it part of a longer trip. Now with our exploration of New Zealand and Australia behind us we are exploring another part of the world. Our cruise started in Fiji on Saturday, May 31 in Lautoka, Fiji. Leaving Lautoka at sunset we sail for a day and a half to the island nation of Vanuatu. Once known as the New Hebrides Islands, this group of many islands is sparsel
Our third day in Sydney, Monday, May 26, is a big day. We start out with a second ride on the tour bus. We purchased a two-day ticket. There are two routes for the scenic drives, this one takes us south of the city to Bondi Beach and then back to the city. We remained in the urban area the whole trip but are away from the large buildings of city center. This trip was interesting as we traveled through many older parts of the city. Bondi Beach itself is a gorgeous wide beach with a nice sur
On Friday, January 24, 2014, just five days before our scheduled departure for New Zealand, we stopped on our way into the park to pick our mail. In the mail was a summons for jury duty for me, Tom. Oh, Great!
I read the information carefully. The report date was scheduled for after our departure. There was an information sheet to be completed and returned within 5 days. It was possible to submit the information by computer, so I logged on and filled out the required information. At the
We have just completed one busy week while putting some serious miles on the motor home. We've made a few trips like this before. I would like to think that this is the last one but somehow the need to quickly move from one place to another seems to keep popping up. Unlike much of our travel, this trip was in the middle of summer in the very places we have avoided during the summer for the past 12 years.
We have never been at home in Edinburg, Texas in July. The same could be said for June,
For sixteen years we have returned to the Rio Grande Valley, in the southern tip of Texas, each fall. We enjoy the mild winters and the abundance of recreation, natural resources and wildlife in the area. The December issue of Texas Parks and Wildlife Magazine is dedicated entirely to the Rio Grande Valley (RGV). This publication from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is an excellent resource for those looking for a spot to visit in the winter, perhaps like us, you'll find it to be just
There are two ways to get from Te Anau to Invercargo. The fast route is inland and shorter but the scenic route is recommended by the guide books and it is designated as a scenic route by New Zealand so we’re taking the scenic route. The route stays close to but not in Fiordland National Park, running along the eastern side of the mountain range. Still, the glacial evidence abounds on this side of the mountains. The valley is broad and flat and the road is good for a scenic road. Being glac
We have moved in with my mother! A failure at 63!
No, not really, just a temporary setback. We're having some painting done on the motor home and it has been in the shop for three days now. I just talked to Mark at First Class Fiberglass in St. Peters, Mo., and he has promised to be done about noon tomorrow. We'll be glad to get our little home back again.
We have one more repair to accomplish and that is to get the KVH dish fixed. It quit working several weeks ago. I think we are lined up to
This day is February 21, 2014. We are now in our final week in New Zealand. Our objective today is a train tour into the Taieri Gorge. The tour starts at 2:00 in the afternoon so we had a leisurely morning before catching the bus just a block from our holiday park. The bus driver was quite friendly. We paid our fare, $5.50 NZ for the two of us one way to downtown. The driver took cash and made change. The bus drivers in Dunedin carry large amounts of cash which they use to make change for
With this entry, we are clearly outside the realm of motor home experience but the remainder of our trip started with almost three months in the motor home so I'll finish off the last three weeks just to give the story an ending. We've flown to Sydney after turning in the campervan at Britz in Perth.
When we checked into our hotel they gave us some information about a festival starting in Sydney on Friday night, the night we arrived. It is a two-week festival of lights, sound and ideas. The
By Tuesday we had accomplished all our first priority activities for our stay in Sydney. The forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday was a chance of rain but the rain never materialized. We left the hotel and took a city bus downtown to Circular Key, the heart of the transportation hub in Sydney. The bus route terminates near the ferry terminal and the commuter train station. We went to the ferry terminal and located the Manly Fast Ferry, a ferry service for people traveling to and from destinati
Monday, May 12, we went out to swim with the whalesharks. We chose Ningaloo Whaleshark Swim as the company based on the information we could gather. We were picked up at our park at 7:15 and driven to the dock which is on the other side of the peninsula. There were 19 adults in the group plus three young children. We were transferred to the boat which was anchored offshore and then taken to a reef area. The snorkeling was partly a training exercise for the whaleshark swim which has to be ex
Suva is the capital city of Fiji. It is located on the southeast side of Viti Levu, the largest island in the Fiji Islands. Our cruise started when we departed the western side of the island from Lautoka. Suva is the largest city in Fiji. Within view of our ship at the dock we can see the downtown area of Suva. There is a huge bus station. Most of the inhabitants don’t own automobiles so they depend heavily on public transportation. There are three large sheds, each with a half dozen park
Do you have stuff? We have stuff! George Carlin used to do a routine on stuff. He had stuff, but he had another s word for other people's stuff. George was probably right, we have too much stuff. Andy Rooney, are you reading this?
Louise and I are coming in off the road. In July of 2001 we moved into a 1994 Monaco Dynasty (no slides) and we've been living on the road ever since. This fall Louise decided we needed a home, so like a good husband I set about working on the project.
We knew where
There is a little bit of everything in Kakadu National Park but the heart of the park is the South Alligator River. The entire drainage basin of the South Alligator River is within Kakadu National Park. About the name, it was incorrectly named when the person who named it mistook the crocodiles for alligators. Once named I guess there is no way to correct the mistake. So there are no alligators in the Alligator River, only crocodiles. This goes along with a standing joke Louise and I have.
I'll start by celebrating the return to life by the FMCA Computer System. Today is the first day I've been able to log on in the last two or three weeks! That doesn't explain my long absence from blogging. When we returned last fall I fell right into some intense volunteer work as Education Chair for the Rio Grande Valley Chapter Texas Master Naturalist. We had a class of 22 trainees who will become new members once they complete their volunteer commitment. With classes and field trips to p
We have traveled 6500 miles so far this summer. One of the things we have noticed while on the road is that there seem to be many more motor homes on the road this year than in years past. I can recall the days when we considered purchasing a motor home and then first hit the road. We would drive down any road and see lots of RV's of all kinds. Then the industry fell on hard times. Fuel prices went up and motor homes pretty quickly disappeared from the roads and highways. We traveled through New
After our long drive from the Waipoua State Forest we pulled up for the night at Sheep World. We had seen this place on the way north, it is right on NZ Hwy 1. It looks for all the world like a real tourist trap but we were tired and it was late so there we’ll stay. The owner is a real character, elderly and quick with his mind.
We had breakfast at their restaurant the next morning then stayed for the dog and sheep show at 11:00. We visited the many animals they had in pens and cages, every
After two days at sea we arrived at Savusavu, Fiji. The city of Savusavu is located on Vanua Levu, one of two large islands in the island nation of Fiji. There are dozens of other islands in the group of islands that make up Fiji. At Savusavu, we had a tour to Wiasali Rainforest Reserve. Billed as a strenuous hike, this lived up to its billing. There were 15 people on this shore excursion. Eleven members of our group fit into a van and the remainder of us rode to the reserve by taxi. Loui
At the Monaco International Pre-Rally for FMCA 2017 in Indianapolis, Louise and I looked at a nice used coach. It was a 2008 Monaco Signature in beautiful condition. Louise loved it, very nice inside and out. I really liked it also but the price, the age and the 45 foot length were a problems for me. We ended up walking away from the deal. I told Louise that I now had a huge budget for making “home improvements” on our 2004 Windsor. So, I started by ordering something I had seen on the Sig
Our travels have taken a turn for the hot lately. We've been spending most of our time in southwestern Colorado, northeastern New Mexico and northern Arizona. The temperatures we've faced have been moderate to cool. Several weeks ago we decided to visit Louise sister in the Mohave Valley in western Arizona. The elevation is 483 feet alongside the Colorado River. Needless to say the temperature was quite a bit warmer than in the mountains and high elevations we were used to. Temperatures we
Rotorua is a good size town. Among its claim to fame is having a number of local boys playing on the All Blacks Rugby Team, the national team of New Zealand. The name comes from their original uniforms which were the least expensive available, all black uniforms, no stripes, no decoration, no names. The team has become a cause celebre for the nation and now are internationally ranked in the top rugby in the world.
We had one objective in Rotorua and that was to learn more about the Maori pe
A month ago we had the close call with fire (see my previous post, Good News, Bad News) in Lander, WY. Leaving Lander we made a dash for California. A night here, two nights there, and next thing you know we are in Valley Springs, CA. Our son-in-law and his father installed a 50A hookup for us on their home so now we can park next to their driveway. What about the lawn you ask? In this part of California, rock and gravel are a natural ground surface and we found the parking spot just made f
Today we become house sitters. Our daughter and her family are off for a family vacation. They are leaving, our motor home remains parked in their driveway. The summer continues to melt away and we aren't going anywhere. Normally, we're long gone by this time of the summer. One of our reasons for buying the motor home in the first place was to escape the unbearably hot mid-west summers. This summer we're stationary and the rest of the world is on the go.
Despite my whining about our being parke
