West To Rapid City

Queen Mary in Rock Island

We are on the road for real after two days in Indianapolis. It was a good stop but we are glad to be heading north to cooler weather and west to our adventures. We will attend the Fall Classic show in Oregon while we are there and the fall show in Scottsdale if all goes as planned. John is judging the American Royal and then we are done with shows for the year. Yay!

Mary has been just a tiny bit contrary since we got to Indianapolis. Two of the touch buttons that open and close the slides have developed a delay that is a little unnerving. When we got to Rock Island, Illinois I pushed the button to open the bedroom passenger side slide and nothing happened. I pushed it again. Nothing. Again. Still nothing. John came in as I was having my moment of panic/deflation/exasperation about how we were going to deal with it. He tapped the button three times and it worked. Next he got on the phone with someone on Monaco's 800 line and spent some time explaining that they were still working but only after twisting your tongue a certain way. The guy was nice and tried to be helpful but in the end we will probably have to live with it until we get to Oregon and can drop her off at the factory...provided that it doesn't quit working when the slide is extended. Then we are not going anywhere until they come to us. I have a developing list of little things for them to do when we get there.

A whacky wiper

John put on his fix-it hat today. He increased his fix-it kit to include a hair band and a paper clip. Those join the duct tape, WD40, Elmer's Glue, three screw drivers and a pack of chewing gum. Yesterday, true to our travel karma we got caught up in the remnants of Gustov. When it started raining he turned on the windshield wipers. They worked just fine for about an hour. Then the one on the passenger side took on a strange angle. Instead of being in line with the arm like the drivers side it was kind of loose on the arm so it had a weird waving motion. He mentioned it and that he would look at it when we stopped to let the dogs out. It never stopped pouring so when we got them out Breezy did duties in record time and Ransom spent his time trying to seek shelter (while I got drenched). When I got back to the coach he told me that the wiper was broken and would need to be replaced. So we hit the road again with a waving wiper. I made a mental note: This will drive him mad. Fifteen minutes later he said, "This is going to drive me nuts," (true story). So the next time we stopped he started digging through our little junk drawer. I asked him what he was looking for. "A rubber band," he said. "Hmmm, I don't think we have one...but I have an elastic hair band." He said, "That'll work." So I dug one out and he went to work in the rain fixing the wiper. I went to get a snack and when I came back he was in the driver's seat, dripping rain, but ready to roll. The waving wiper blade was working much better. "I fixed it!" He grinned. He sure did. As I watched the wiper blade moving back and forth and noticed a little bit of something bright blue on the blade. "What's the blue thing?" I asked. "A paper clip!" he beamed. "Pretty inventive," I said and away we went.

The Fix (you are looking at a wiper blade, hair band and paper clip)

We went to Tremont, Illinois to see some colts. We nearly drowned before the end of the day due to Gustav. I really wanted to take some photos while we were out of the coach because the farm was so beautiful but I was afraid I would water log my camera. We drove in rain, we walked in rain and we set Mary up in Rock Island in the rain. We were parked under trees so we didn't have satellite or cable so we had an quiet evening without all of the political hubbub that was going on. It is the longest political season in the history of man. I'm worn out with all of it. We started following all of this as we were making our maiden voyage with Mary back in February! Sixty days and counting.

Friday

Corn fields in Iowa

We went to sleep early last night...like at 8:30 so I woke up at 5:00 this morning with two dogs peering over the top of the mattress at me. All I could see was ears, eyes and noses. Time to go out. So I got up and threw on clothes and a jacket (it is really cool up here and it feels wonderful!) and snapped on two leashes, took two poop bags and away we went into the darkness. This KOA sits on a lake and is really big compared to some that we have stayed at. The dogs dragged me around in the dark, sniffing the grass and jumping to attention (which made me jump to attention) every time they heard something that they couldn't identify. We were out for ten minutes or so before we come back and started our morning...their breakfast which consists of Science Diet dry food (small bites for Ransom, regular bites for Breezy...regular adult food for Ransom, light food for Breezy...she is an easy keeper) and some Science Diet regular wet food, a little bit to mix in for both dogs. Breezy was kept on regular light dry food until Ransom came. He is a little guy who didn't have much interest in dry dog food so I started with a little bit of wet food to get him to eat. It worked. But I couldn't give it to him and not give it to Breezy. She has been a little ho-hum about her food in the past but she eats it. Now when it comes to meal time she is the first one to remind me of the time. She starts lobbying me about an hour or so before it is actually time to have dinner. Her head plops into my lap like a ton of lead and pleading brown eyes look up at me as though she has not eaten in a week. They both get two meals a day. Again, Ransom is taking his cues from her so now while she is sitting with her head in my lap giving me the, "Won't you take pity on a poor starving dog?" look Ransom is sitting right next to her giving me the same expression. More often than not they get dinner a little early.

Later

Outside of Davenport, Iowa

We just pulled into the KOA at Sioux City, South Dakota. So much for taking our time (this rush to South Dakota is my doing). We had a nice discussion about how we were going to take our time and go 300 miles a day at most and just enjoy a leisurely trip across the country. I've been a little busy so I haven't totally counted days between the departure date and when we are due in Jackson, Wyoming, until yesterday. Part of our plan was to include a visit to Glacier National Park. We both loved the idea. It is the perfect time of year for a visit up there. Then I counted days. Then we decided that we couldn't do it. So this morning we got up and started out on our pre-planned route. This is where our blessed little GPS gets involved.

Garmin. Garmin replaced TomTom (which is now MY GPS unit...I'm not lying...its in the Camry!). Garmin in my opinion is a step up from TomTom. A small step up. I'm now convinced that the technology is in serious need of some upgrading in general. So every time I program the Garmin it takes us (or tries to take us) over hill and dale and through the woods to grandma's house to meet the three bears and Goldilocks and the three little pigs and the wolf who will huff and puff and... We are 52 feet long with the car attached, can't back up unless we unhook the car, twelve and a half feet tall and we cannot go everywhere that the Garmin wants to take us. I've programed it with "Bus" and "Truck" and it still tries to take us to gramma's house. So today I programed it to take us to La Crosse, Wisconsin from Rock Island, Illinois and it gave us a thousand different turns and intersections and finally I got exasperated and said, "Just stay on 61 and we will get to La Crosse. Make a hard left on 90 to Jackson." Then we started talking about not making the trip to Glacier. Then I started looking at the map and realized that if we went west from Dubuque we could cut off some time. It wouldn't be as scenic of a trip but it would be a little faster to a destination for the night. Okay. So I suggested that we do that and didn't get an argument so I reprogrammed Garmin for Fairmont, Minnesota (a possible night time destination). Garmin wanted to take us on some back roads to US 20. First I opposed the idea then I really looked at the route and said, "Why not?" We ended up on a beautiful route for awhile and then on a very narrow twisting road until we got to US 20. I checked the route to Fairmont. It wanted us to go north at Waterloo. I looked at the list of twists and turns and said, "Just take US 20 to I-35 and go north." Then I got to calculating how much time that would save. Then I calculated that if we made it to Sioux Falls tonight we could make it to Rapid City tomorrow night and we could see Mt. Rushmore and some other cool spots and possibly get to Glacier before we are due in Jackson. I ran it by the pilot and he said "Let's go for it," so we did.

We are in Sioux Falls at the KOA..logged in almost 500 miles today. The park is sandwiched in between I-90 (a half block from here) and the Sioux Falls airport. Thankfully it isn't O'Hare traffic-wise but when one of those jets takes off it drowns out the television...which is tuned to CNN listening to all of the hubbub of the election. What WILL we do when it is over!

More tomorrow. I hope you all had a wonderful Friday and a terrific weekend ahead!