Dog Days

It's August 17th, the first day of the Kentucky State Fair World's Championship Horse Show. We are parked at the Clarksville, Indiana KOA with Mary. We seem to have made this a year of firsts. Obviously this is the first year here with Mary which we are thrilled about. No more hotel rooms! We can sleep in our own bed, cook our own food, kick back when we aren't at the show and watch the Olympics and best of all we can have Breezy with us! It is a first for John being as his business has changed from training and sales to sales and marketing so he no longer has his name on a stable banner. And for the first time he doesn't have a horse entered at the show. We are just spectators this year! Of course that won't stop him from getting up before the sun to go out to the show. Some things never change and his appetite for the energy of the competition will never diminish.

The other first is that John is being inducted into the Kentucky State Fair World's Championship Horse Show Hall of Fame on Saturday night. He is so honored to be included in the ranks of so many top professional and amateur horsemen and women. His son and daughter, Jason and Jennifer will be attending on Saturday night and he is so happy to have them make the trip from North Carolina to celebrate with us.

We arrived yesterday. John drove Mary down with the Camry in tow and I drove the 4-Runner down with Breezy after I ran a few last minute errands. When I got here John was busy putting up the privacy screen on Mary's window. We unloaded the 4-Runner and he parked it in the front parking lot and left the Camry parked behind Mary. We had dinner with the Brookshires as we do every Saturday night before the show starts and when we came back he pulled in behind Mary. We watched a little of the Olympics and went to sleep. John woke up at about 4:30 and apparently decided to get up. I heard him rattling around in the bathroom and after about 40 minutes I heard Mary's front door close. The windows were open in the bedroom and it was quiet out. We are parked between two other big coaches which leaves about ten feet between each of us. Our view is nice, thick trees and bushes directly out the front window and the place seems very quiet in comparison to some of the other KOA's that we have stayed at. So I'm waiting to hear the two little beeps of the horn alarm on the Camry before I actually attempt to get a little more sleep. I didn't hear anything. I wondered what he was doing. And then it happened. At 5:15 in the morning on Sunday morning the Camry horn alarm started blaring. I sat straight up in bed with my eyes bugging out. Immediately I thought...this has never happened to him before and he isn't going to know how to turn it off! I was about to bolt out of bed and run out the door to help when it went off. "Shit." I said and fell back on the bed knowing full well that the hearts of our two neighbors were pounding as fast and hard as mine was. Then I heard the Camry horn beep three short half volume beeps. "What the....?" I heard it again and then one more time. I got up and went out into the kitchen just in time to meet John coming in the door. "I'm so sorry," he said. I just stared at him through bleary eyes. "I didn't want to wake anyone so I put the key in the door and unlocked it," he said. I managed to make my mouth move, "If you set the alarm you have to unset it or it thinks you are trying to steal it," I said as I handed him the keys to the 4-Runner. I was unprepared to go outside at 5:20 AM and figure out why it was making the weird little three beep sound. I also knew that if we set it off again one of our neighbors might shoot us on the spot.

I tried to get more sleep but it wasn't meant to be. As soon as I would doze off Breezy would do something like drop her stuffed bone on the ceramic tile and I would bolt upright again. I finally gave up trying and got up at 6:30. It was starting to get light so I was a little nervous about taking Breezy out for fear of running into a hostile neighbor but there was no choice so out we went to the dog walk. I escaped any encounters. We came back to Mary and the second thing I realized was that I needed to get dog food out of the lower bay so that I could feed her. I had to risk another possible neighborly encounter. I grabbed my little plastic bag and scoop, took a deep breath and darted down the stairs, around the front of Mary and to the bay where the dog food is kept. I reached for the door latch. It was locked. I raced back to the door, back up the stairs to my sweet faced dog who is eagerly awaiting her breakfast. I stopped and looked at the ignition. No keys. The next realization is that John has taken the keys to Mary with him, I forgot my key fob at home and the only way I can get into the bay to get the dog food is to use the extra key that we have in the drawer. Breezy's big brown eyes are making me feel guilty so I dug for the extra set of keys and found them. I started for the door when it struck me that if I used the key without disarming the alarm I would set off the coach alarm, just like John did with the Camry, and probably wake everyone in the park. And I would probably be shot by a neighbor to boot. Of course it would be justifiable homicide.

So I made coffee and toast...two pieces so that Breezy could have something to put her tummy until John came back with the keys. As it turns out using the key won't set off the coach alarm and the Camry was making three little beeps because it was trying to tell us that it was okay to open the door. Who knew.

This is a maiden voyage of sorts for us. Due to the astronomical price of fuel and the sorry state of our economy the motor home/travel trailer industry has taken a big hit. Monaco has had to close down operations in Wakarusa, Indiana which means Dennis, our trusty, patient advisor in Wakarusa, is no longer available to us for help. We are at the mercy of the 800 number (help line). We are finding that it is a strong motivator to figure things out for ourselves. I love everything about Monaco except the 800 help line. We've used it occasionally on the weekends when Dennis was getting a well deserved rest from our fifty weekly questions. Sometimes you get someone really helpful but more often it wasn't worth the effort. We wish Dennis the best in his future endeavors. If we haven't burned him out completely he has a bright future in customer service work.

Soap Box Moment: Unfortunately customer service is something that we have mostly lost touch with in our country. Automated phone systems (that don't work and send me into a fit of anguish and eventually anger every time I have to use one), sub-contracting with people who are paid ten cents an hour, don't speak English and live in Bazeeport, Bluperzimbewa or some other obscure place on the planet, and lazy Americans with sucky attitudes who are pissed off couldn't find a better job have left us without a way to get help with the massive amounts of new technology that is pelting toward us each and every day of our lives. When I went to work at USEF part of my job was to answer questions from members. Answering a simple question with a pleasant attitude solicited such gratitude from people. Then is when I began to realize just how bad the customer service part of our working lives has sagged into something that is almost disgraceful.

Okay, back to today. So John is sleeping while I'm writing. We will be here until Sunday morning and then we will go back to Lexington for a week. Around the first of September we will begin another epic journey to the Western United States. This time we are taking the northern route through South Dakota to Wyoming where we will spend a week at a dude ranch with friends. From there we will spend some time in the Northwest and then loop back through Arizona and either to Lexington or Vero Beach depending on our timing. There will be lots to blog about I'm sure!

We have five babies in Kentucky now and should have two more here from Oregon in September. They are all so pretty, healthy and they are hanging out in a beautiful big pasture together enjoying the rest of the summer grass.

Love this colt's face marking!

When we get home next week we are making a trip to Greenville, Kentucky to the Muhlenberg County Humane Society to pick up our new little charge. His name is Ransom and he has been doing time at the Greenville Correctional Facility as part of the Death Row Dogs program. He is about twelve pounds and about two years old. When he gets home I'll post photos and more information about him!

As I look out the front window I see some leaves beginning to fall. The season is getting ready to change again. I hope you have enjoyed every second of every day so far this summer!

Resurrection

The Jones Nursery

Tom Tom Lives.

We ordered a Garmin Nuvi which was delivered to our door the day after we arrived home from our last trip. It is a wonderful little device. It's so simple to use that I had the basics figured out before I ever plugged the disk into my laptop and looked at the instructions. John used it in the 4-Runner learning the ins and outs of it before he left on his next trip with Mary...without Breezy and me. He had a new co-pilot for the trip, Donnie Brookshire or "Brookie" as we call him.

The Tom Tom had been sitting on John's desk since we got back from Tennessee. He picked it up a few days before he left for Springfield and asked me if we should throw it away. "No," I said, "every so often the Lexington recyclers have an electronics recycling day. I'll drop it off when they schedule another drop day."

The next morning I was dusting in the office and as I was dusting around the little carcass sitting there dead as a doornail, my little voice (which is ever so reliable) told me to dig out the charger. John had been using the remote charger to try to revive it when it died but he didn't try the DC charger. So I dug it out of the pile of chargers (the tangle of cords makes me nuts) and read the little names on the end of each one until I found the one that said, "TomTom". I plugged it into the unit and then reached for one of two power strips that hold the ridiculous number of plug in things that sit on my desk. And I do mean RIDICULOUS.

Soap box moment: I'm going to comment on a side effect of John's and my passion (some would call it an obsession) with electronic gadgets. John has two laptops. One is in Florida and one is in Lexington. I have two laptops. One serves as a desktop processor in Lexington because the back light in the monitor went out. It works intermittently...like once a month or so which was a little bit inconvenient. You could kind of see the display if you used a bright flashlight and eliminated background lighting. That required that you sit in a dark room with the flashlight straining to read the display. Fixing it meant sinking half of the original value into the thing so I retired it to the office and added an external monitor. And then bought the wonderful little Toshiba laptop that I'm using now (that is an endorsement). In between the blind HP and the wonderful Toshiba a Dell laptop died. It had all of the business software and records on it. So I had to seek out a computer genius to get all of the stuff off of the hard drive. Computer geniuses don't come cheap. He told me that he had to put it in the refrigerator and spent the weekend coaxing the thing to give up the information but he got it. I almost hugged him when he told me that he got everything. Before all of those I had a nice Sony laptop and the hard drive died on it and I lost everything. It was heartbreaking. Now I have a backup hard drive which requires a USB port and a plug. In fact I believe that every single peripheral that is made requires another USB port so I ran out of ports before I had everything plugged in. So I got an external USB port dock which plugs in. And every so often it goes funky and sends the blind laptop into a fit of insanity. Then I have to shut down the computer and restart it. I have an iPod and I listen to iTunes when I'm working so I added external speakers which required a USB port and a plug in. I have a scanner so that I can scan and copy things. It requires a USB port and a plug in. I have a printer which requires a USB port and a plug in. I have a calculator and two desk lamps which require plug ins. Oh yeah, there's a shredder too. And I use the power strips to charge the video camera, my Blackberry, digital camera and now the TomTom. And to add more fun to our electronic madness we just bought two Kindles. If you haven't seen a Kindle check it out on Amazon.com. Very cool. But they plug in to charge and also require a USB port when it needs to talk to my computer. Every so often I look at the tangle of wires under the desk and the pile of little electronics on top of it and sigh. There is probably an answer to the mess and I will probably tackle it at some point. Right now I'm too busy learning how to use all of the little electronic gadgets that we have.

So I found a free space on the power strip and plugged the TomTom in. The little green light came on like it did when John plugged it in with the remote charger in Mary. I let it sit there and charge for twenty minutes or so while I did some work and then I reached over and pushed the "On" button. To my utter shock TomTom came to life! It still had the directions to the property that we went to see in Lexington, South Carolina...where I thought it died (or was murdered). I played with it a little bit and realized that it was working as well as it ever did...which wasn't good, but nothing seemed technically wrong with it.

Now I had a dilemma. I spent so much time trashing it for not getting us where we needed to go that I wondered if I should just turn it off and pretend like it was still dead. I could just send it off to the recycle center and no one would be the wiser. Of course I would know. And then I really would be the murderer.

I picked it up and started moving through the different settings. It occurred to me that it probably heard me say that I was going to send it to the bone yard so it stopped sulking over my verbal abuse and decided a life with me was better than no life at all. I reprogrammed the entire thing. I changed the voice from a woman's to a man's and I changed the look of the screen and added a compass on the display. I overhauled the entire thing and have decided to give it another chance. The Garmin is in Mary now and TomTom will serve as our car GPS.

John and Brookie took Mary and went to Springfield, Illinois to the Midwest Charity Horse Show. They left at the crack of dawn and arrived without incident. When I worked for USEF they used to send me there for the National Show Horse Finals in September. I enjoyed the National Show Horse people. They were very nice. The show wasn't the most stimulating horse show on the planet but it wasn't bad and the facility is great. The problem with Springfield to me was that it is out in the middle of nowhere. I chose to drive up there once I figured out that it would take me as long to fly as to drive (six and a half hours) by the time I made all of the plane changes. I lost track of how many different interstates that I drove on to get there. I repeatedly lost my cell phone signal out in the middle of vast amounts of corn and soybean fields, usually in the middle of a conversation with someone who was keeping me awake. One time I drove back to Lexington in a torrential rain storm. I don't think that it stopped raining all the way from Springfield until I got the the Ohio River. It is just one of those bank of memories that will probably keep me from returning to Springfield again in this lifetime. I said "probably" because I tend not to say "never" about much. Saying "never" usually dooms me to what ever I never want to do again.

So Breezy and I had a quiet week at home in Lexington. I got lots of home projects done and we walked every day on the beautiful walking paths around our area. She spent her days following me around the house, interested in every little thing that I was doing and in some cases attempting to help me. She knows that the last thing I do before I turn the lights out and go to bed is to get to dog cookies out of the jar and put them on her bed. All I have to do is take the top off of the jar after I set up the coffee for morning and she races for her bed. She really is a delight.

There were lots of stories to report from Springfield but I will relay the best one. They got up early on the first morning, raring to go, anxious to get out and see the horses work. Everything went as planned, showers, breakfast, coffee, tidying up and making beds. They got their shoes on and headed for the door. Apparently Mary was less than thrilled to be in Springfield. I didn't tell her where she was going I swear but she decided that no one was going anywhere. They pulled on the door handle and nothing happened. They tried again and again. And again. She wouldn't budge. They were locked in and the only way out was through a window. It as a long way to the pavement out the window so they kept trying. They fiddled with the locks, coaxed it gently and jerked on it. I suspect there was some cussing and possibly some pleading going on too. Finally John called Brad Bacon, who he knew would be on the show grounds, to come and rescue them. I'm not sure how he did it but finally she decided to let them out. And I'm sure that Brad will never let them live it down.

Of course John called Dennis.

Then there was the incident when they were getting ready to leave and putting the passenger side slide in. Apparently focused on something besides the slide (like maybe telling Brookie how cool it is to just push a button and have the side of the bus slide into place) while standing a foot from it with his finger on the button the slide hit the back of the navigator's seat and cracked a big piece of the cherry wood.

Of course John called Dennis. Again.

We spent a week working on that (he got a piece of cherry wood, had it cut and planed to the right length, width and thickness, I sanded, stained and varnished it and he installed it...we're a team!) and she is good as new.

Now she is resting before our next big trip. After Louisville we will be heading north to the Dakotas and then west again. Of course I'll post our adventures on the blog as we go. In the mean time I'll add a few posts about our summer. We have been in Lexington since Memorial Day with the exception of the adventure to Springfield.

I'm adding a couple of photos that Annalize van der Walt sent us from Oregon where most of our broodmares are. They have all foaled and all are healthy and happy. Thank you Annalize! We have six new babies on the ground. Time to start thinking of names!

And we will have a new addition to our family in August. I'll post on that as soon as he arrives! I hope your summer is spectacular so far!

Honeysuckle Heaven

Watts Bar Lake, Tennessee

We just spent the Memorial Day weekend and the two days preceding it at the Soaring Eagle Campground in Kingston, Tennessee. The Soaring Eagle was actually more like a Hovering Buzzard but it served its purpose which was a place to park Mary where we could hook up and watch the American Idol Finale. Let's hear it for David Cook! Yaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy!!!!!!! It was a fun season to watch and we are both glad it is over.

When we first pulled in on Wednesday afternoon we parked Mary and discovered to our dismay that we couldn't get the satellite to lock on or the Fox channel on our antenna. I sunk into the chair in utter despair as John shot out the door and made a run for the office. While he was gone I was bemoaning the fact (to Breezy) that we had not missed on episode of the competition since it got started in January and here we were in the Hovering Buzzard and we would have to read on the Internet about who won and how the two hour finale was the most entertaining and best one ever. Breezy put her chin in my knee and looked at me with sympathy in her big brown eyes. "I guess that's just the way it goes sometimes," I said to her as I hooked her leash on her collar and we went to explore the Hovering Buzzard. We found a pretty park-like area in the back and the Clinch River flowing along the perimeter of the property. Fifteen minutes later we returned to the coach and found that John had put the slide outs back in and was getting ready to move Mary. "Are we leaving?" I asked. "Nope! The nice lady at the office gave us a different space so we have more clearance," he said as he fired her up. We moved and miracle of all miracles we got satellite and Fox! He is a problem solver.

We had spent Tuesday night, that actual final night of the competition in Charlotte where we had dinner with Jason and Jennifer, John's two grown children. We had a wonderful time with them and they spent the evening with us watching American Idol. Jason, with his inventive mind and computer software expertise actually spent the evening attempting to figure out how to write software that would send out millions of votes at a time. Jason is a never ending source of ideas and creativity and more fun that a barrel of monkeys on top of it. So on Wednesday when David Cook won by 12 million votes we both looked at each other and said, "Jason..." and started to laugh.

From Charlotte we drove way out in the country to look at some horses. When I say way out in the country I mean waaaaaaayyyyyyy out in the country. We drove Mary until we found an empty parking area by an abandoned school to leave her. There was plywood over most of the windows so we decided to ignore the sign that said "No unauthorized parking," and "No overnight parking," and "Violators will be towed." We unhooked the Camry and put Breezy in the back seat and away we went. Because Tom Tom was dead we had to find this place Mapquest directions that I had printed out. To get there involved a series of turns on country roads...like a hundred of them. I was afraid that we might not find our way back to Mary before someone had her towed. As I was thinking that John said, "I hope Mary will still be there when we get back." I nodded my head thinking, "IF we get back." We finally found the place and looked at the horses. John was as jumpy as a fart in a skillet and as soon as we saw the last one he blurted out, "Thanks so much for showing us your horses. We have to get back and get on the road." He took off toward the Camry with me running along behind him. We jumped in the car and he threw it in reverse. "How do we get back?" he asked. I got the directions and read them backwards to him as we screamed around corners and ran stop signs. "You know, it would take one of those huge tow trucks to handle Mary," I said bracing myself for the next turn. "Do you think we could slow down to a little UNDER the speed of sound?" He eased up a little bit. We made the final turn on to the four lane highway where the old school was located. When we got within a half mile of the school I was studying the road to find her and I heard John utter, "Oh #@%*&." Use your imagination for the expletive. I looked up and saw a mega sized tow truck, one of those that can handle a semi truck and trailer rig or a D-8 Cat, or a 42 foot Monaco motor coach named Queen Mary, with ease. It was at the intersection just before the driveway to the school. I realized what he was thinking and I started to laugh. I laughed and laughed and laughed until we got to Mary. He hooked the Camry to her in record time and I was still laughing when we pulled out of the school parking lot and headed for Kingston, Tennessee. He failed to see the humor.

Knoxville to Chattanooga and all surrounding areas is the land of the Tennessee Valley Authority and the land of lakes. We learned some things about lakes and lake property while we were in Tennessee. An important one is that some lakes go dry in the winter. So when you receive one of those fliers that tempts you to go and look at lake lots for ten dollars down and ten dollars a month for the rest of your life be sure to ask if the lake remains a lake during the winter or does it turn into a mud hole. Not many people want to look out their window at a mud hole. The nice lady who was showing us property spent some time explaining which lakes stayed full and which ones went dry. We spent time exploring on our own and found west Knoxville and the Kingston, Harriman area to be very pretty. I was totally convinced that it was a perfectly livable area yesterday. We were driving down to look at the Caney Creek Campground to see if it was more pleasant than the Hovering Buzzard when I saw a Starbucks sign for the next exit. "Starbucks!" I hollered. John just rolled his eyes. He thinks I'm a little around the bend about Starbucks coffee. I refuse to apologize for my coffee preferences. He thinks it is an addiction. It is a preference. Never mind that I won't drink anything else except for some coffee that the Arcuris brought us when we were in Oregon. It was every bit as good as Starbucks but you can't find it out here in the eastern part of the country so it is Starbucks or nothing for me. I digress.

The Caney Creek Campground is beautiful and it sits right on the bank of the Clinch river like Hovering Buzzard but it is three and a half miles off of the Interstate. It is quiet. Since we got Mary I've spent so much time sleeping alongside Interstates that I'm not sure if I could sleep where it is quiet. The last truly quiet spot that we stayed was in Las Cruces, New Mexico. That is still my favorite campground of all. The Hovering Buzzard sits where I could literally throw a rock and hit Interstate 40. We love to sleep with the windows open for fresh air so we spent from Wednesday to last night slumbering to the sounds of 18 wheelers. A person can adjust to anything with the right attitude. And Queen Mary.

It is honeysuckle season in Tennessee. Honeysuckle rates as one of my top five favorite scents in the world. Blooming lilac, gardenia, honeysuckle, freshly cut grass (lawn or a hay field) and of course Starbucks coffee round out the top five. Roasting turkey and freshly baked pumpkin pie come in a close sixth and seventh. I guess it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what my favorite holiday is.

Right now honeysuckle is dripping off of every bush and tree in Tennessee. I couldn't walk ten feet in the wooded area without stopping when I hit a wall of its sweet perfume. The scent was dizzying. It does have a bit of a down side though. John, Breezy and I all spent our days at Hovering Buzzard sneezing and sniffling from the little yellow and white blossoms. They poof out glorious scent while we run for Kleenex and bless each other's sneezes. A multitude of angels got their wings while we camped at Hovering Buzzard.

We are in Kentucky now heading up Interstate 75 for Lexington to unload Mary and give her another brief rest. June will see us in Florida and probably back in Tennessee along with some time at horse shows in the local area. I hope you all had a great Memorial Day weekend!!

The Land of Piggly Wiggly

Lake Murray, South Carolina

When I was growing up in rural Oregon (back in the stone age) there was a Piggly Wiggly grocery store about fifteen miles from our house in a little town called Progress. There was a small sign on the county road that said, "Watch Progress progress". Now there is a huge shopping mall, a major highway and tons of strip malls, gas stations, condos, signal lights and tons of traffic. The original Piggly Wiggly shopping complex is still there but the grocery store is gone. Next to the old store was a One Hour Martinizing (for you young 'uns that's a dry cleaners) a pet store that sold tropical fish and also an S&H Green Stamp store. We used to collect S&H Green Stamps, which were distributed by certain retailers and gas stations in proportion to the amount of money you spent at their establishments. They were little olive colored stamps that came in sheets much like the old you-lick-'em postage stamps. S&H Company would give you little booklets in which you could put the stamps and once you collected enough of them you could trade your stamps for merchandise. My sister and I spent many hours licking stamps and placing them on the pages of those booklets. We licked and worked until our tongues stuck to the roofs of our mouths and then poured over the S&H catalog to make our choice. I know One Hour Martinzing and S&H Green Stamps are long gone but to my surprise I've rediscovered Piggly Wiggly in South Carolina! Their slogan is "Shop the Pig and SAVE!". That makes me smile...for some reason. They have the same little friendly pig face for their logo.

We are just leaving Lexington, South Carolina and heading toward Charlotte, North Carolina to see John's two kids, who as he reminds me regularly, aren't kids anymore. Our stay in Lexington was very pleasant. We weren't sure that would be the case when we exited off of I-26 onto US 1 looking for the Barnyard RV Park (I know...what did we expect right?). When I began looking for a place large enough to park Mary I checked the KOA website. No luck. Then I got into the Trailer Life Directory (the phone book sized guide to RV parks across America) and to my surprise there was only one park that would handle Mary. With a name like Barnyard and a location described as "Right behind the Barnyard Flea Market!" I was pretty skeptical. But we had some business in the Columbia area so I called and made a reservation for Sunday and Monday nights. Once we got on US 1 we passed Carolina Pottery, Lowes and then a big flea market and then the neighborhood got a little dicey. We were listening to Tom Tom who was telling us that we were very close to our destination when I spotted the Barnyard Flea Market. It was huge and crawling with people. Flea markets can be pretty cool if they are in the right area. They can also be kind of scary if they aren't. Tom Tom said turn right on Oak Drive but I could see the RV Park sign two blocks down the road. John asked me what we should do. This is the problem with having a GPS unit that you don't trust (or like). Do you listen to it or do you trust your own eyes? I opted for trusting my eyes.

Murphy won that round and Tom Tom was right. I recall telling Tom Tom to shut up when it told us that we had missed our turn. Now I'm feeling a little guilty about that. More on that later. We made the turn by the RV park sign and ended up in the middle of the flea market...on Sunday...at noon. Church was over for a lot of people and I think that they all headed for the flea market to find a good deal because it looked like an ant hill. We could see the park behind the flea market but had to get there without wiping out any fruit stands or blue tarped clothing stores not to mention not making road kill out of any flea marketers. John calmly eased Mary through the crowds (as they looked up at us and scattered), around parked vehicles and by tables and tables of used merchandise while I had my own personal and silent nervous breakdown. I'm learning. Finally we found the entrance to the RV park. The office was closed until 12:30 on Sunday so that gave us a half hour to have some lunch and watch people shop.

Before I booked us in to Barnyard RV Park I checked the Internet to see if I could find any reviews. I found one by a woman who said that she originally was a little daunted when she pulled into the place but found it to be quite pleasant once she was there. That turned out to be an apt description of the place. The flea market only happens on the weekends so by 5:00 on Sunday the place was like a ghost town and the park was quiet. We spent two very nice nights at the Barnyard.

I have to report a casualty. I wish I could say that I'm sad about the passing but I'd be a liar if I did.

Tom Tom died.

I know...you think I killed him. Even though I was the last one to touch Tom Tom before he died I did not do anything to hasten his demise. I swear I didn't. All I did was turn him off. That was it. We made an appointment to see a piece of property on Lake Murray. It was quite a ways out of town so I programmed the address in to Tom Tom. John took him off of his mount in the coach and I carried him to the Camry where we proceeded to get exact directions to our destination. Well...Tom Tom didn't actually have the address that we were going to but he took us within a mile of the place and we used old fashioned Mapquest directions to double check Tom Tom and to find our way for the last mile.

When we got ready to leave I decided to turn Tom Tom back on to reverse our route. I picked him up and pushed the button but nothing happened. Finally I decided that he must have run out of battery charge so I put him down (gently) and we found our way back to Barnyard. John plugged it in and the green light came on but the screen was blank. He let it charge for hours and it still wouldn't turn on. We hunted for a reset button but none was to be found. For 24 hours John fussed with Tom Tom.

The name "Garmin" kept coming up in those 24 hours. It was mentioned three or four times. My hands are clean. I didn't kill Tom Tom. But now I'm not so sure about my husband. I caught him talking on the phone to his son Jason about his Garmin GPS unit. I don't want to think that it is possible that he murdered Tom Tom but when we were looking at the property he disappeared twice to get Breezy out of the car and put her back in. He had the motive. He hated Tom Tom probably as much as I did. And he had the opportunity. He could have dropped Tom Tom into the koi pond until he drowned and then dried him off and put him back in the Camry in the time that it took to take Breezy out for a walk. He could have offed Tom Tom.

I have to admit that I'm not without fault here. I'm guilty of verbal abuse. I cussed that little GPS until on several occasions and as recently as Sunday told it to shut up when it was telling us the correct way to go. I publicly humiliated him on several occasions on this very blog. Perhaps he couldn't take it anymore and just checked out on us. I may bear some responsibility for his death.

Or maybe it was accidental. The little piece of shit suction cup was always coming loose and Tom Tom would fall to the floor of the coach with a crash. Perhaps it took one fall too many.

I guess we'll never know.

This morning I ordered a Garmin Nuvi 660 and had it shipped home. It should be there when we get there on Sunday. For the duration of our trip we will have to find our way around using the laptop. I can deal with it. We found our way out to a local horse farm that way and found our way back. It's amazing how quickly we get dependent on our technology. As much as I cursed the GPS and as unreliable as it was, with Mary we used it as a backup to the laptop to be sure that we would get where we were going...without backing up. When I realized it was dead I had a moment of trepidation. Then we realized with the exception of one side trip out into the country which we will do with the car we will be on interstates for the duration of our trip. I believe that we can handle it.

I said to John this morning that things were going so smoothly with Mary and our travels that soon we would be the ones giving advice to other new coach owners. He pointed out that when that happens we won't have anything to blog about. Not true. No doubt we will continue to have experiences worth writing about. With Murphy as our traveling companion we can't help but to have some interesting encounters. Even without Murphy we are perfectly capable of doing dumb things.

We are now situated at a nice KOA in Fort Mill, South Carolina. It is just over the border from Charlotte. John whipped Mary into her space and within five minutes we were hooked up, set up and leveled. Mary is a miracle machine. And we are doing pretty well with her too. Tonight we will watch the American Idol finale and cheer on David Cook. We will look at some horses in the morning and then we are off to Tennessee for the Memorial Day weekend. I hope you have a terrific weekend. I'll post again after we get settled in Tennessee!

Off to Asheville

The Biltmore Estate

It's really spring now, as opposed to the false-start spring that we always endure in the mid south. But it is always worth the wait. In Kentucky the foliage is breathtaking, the blossoms on the dogwood trees were more profuse and brighter than I recall ever seeing them and the pastures of the Bluegrass are growing lush and are full of mares with new foals by their sides. Sunny seventy-five degree days are more the norm than not. As much as both John and I are not fans of winter I think we appreciate spring more because of it.

Mary had a nice rest at Prospect Lane in Versailles after we returned from our trip across the country and back. Tre and Emily put down some new gravel for her space next to the barn and John plugged her in and commenced his "piddling" (his description) with her. His first big project was to get her cleaned up. After 7,000 miles of weather and bugs she was pretty disgusting. We immediately eliminated a truck wash (we are talking about MARY here...no truck wash for her) and then discussed finding someone who details vehicles on site but John insisted that he could do it himself. "Are you sure you want to tackle that?" I asked. "Yep," he said with the kind of confidence that told me there was no point in arguing with him. After seeing Mary parked inside of the shop in Wakarusa I was awed (and terrorized) by her size. The difference between washing a car and washing Mary seemed to me to be the difference between washing a car and washing an office building.

John left the house that morning with a lilt in his step. He is very expressive with his body language and there was so much enthusiasm in his gait that I thought maybe it would be enough to get him through the washing project. I went on about my day which after returning from a long absence entails a lot of catching up. I was so busy that I didn't notice until 1:00 that I hadn't heard from him. That is unusual. Normally he will call me in the morning once or twice and if I don't see him at lunch time he calls again in the afternoon. "Hmmm..." I said after looking at my watch. I considered calling him but didn't want to interrupt his work so I moved on with my day. At 3:00 the phone finally rang.

"Hi!" I said. "How did it go?" He groaned. "I've been washing and rinsing for five and a half hours. But she's clean." I held my breath for a beat to stifle a giggle. "I suppose tomorrow's waxing project is out of the question then?" I said. Enthusiasm returned to his voice again. "Nope! Richmond and the guys are going to help me tomorrow." Richmond is Tre's right hand man at Prospect Lane and one of the nicest young men that you would ever want to know. "Did you promise him our first born foal this year?" I asked. "Nope. I told him I would do his colt's tail for free." Ahhh...a good trade. "And the guys?" (Tre's grooms). "I'll pay them," he said. It was a good plan and by the end of the next afternoon Mary was not only clean, she was sparkling.

The next Mary project involved shopping for new toys for her. After staying in campgrounds and RV parks across the country for five weeks John discovered a whole new world of goodies that more experienced fellow coach owners have unearthed. And while washing Mary he discovered some snap receivers that surrounded the windshield and side windows. It was time to call Dennis.

Sidebar: Hi Dennis! We are on the road again so you may hear from us. There has been real progress in our understanding of the coach...so much so that I actually (this is momentous) put The Bible away in the cupboard next to The Super Bible. We been gone for four days and haven't looked at it once!

So after making a few phone calls with questions about water filters and antenna boosters and snap receivers we began receiving daily shipments from UPS, FED EX and the post office. Mary's air conditioner shroud which was damaged by a low branch at the farm in Springfield arrived in a HUGE box. John took it to Richmond at the barn who gave it to a friend of his who owns a paint shop. It came back with a perfect match to Mary's paint. When she is parked she is sporting new sun shades that snap into place covering the windshield and side windows allowing us to see out but blacking out the windows to viewers from the outside. They are really cool. She has new water filters and she is clean inside and out. And the new-Mary-goodies wish list continues to grow.

One of the most enthusiastic (understatement) coach owners that we met while we were away was a guy named Phil. We were in Arkansas at the KOA just getting settled when I looked out the window and saw a Monaco coach pull into the camp ground. "There's a big Monaco pulling in," I say looking out Mary's window. John jumped up and out the door he went. He was gone for about twenty minutes before he returned with Phil in tow. Phil was a big guy with a big voice, a big head with a hole in his haircut and wearing shorts, knee high socks, atheletic shoes and a flowered shirt that stretched around his big middle. After the initial introduction he asked me if I had a checklist for departure, arrival and setup. Puzzled I said, "Yes, I created a list to keep us from doing anything stupid." He announced that he had one too and informed me that we had to exchange lists. I was a little put off by Phil's pushiness. He was more interested in dictating to us about things to do and not do than he was in any kind of conversation about coaching. I did what I do when I encounter someone with frantic know-it-all energy. I withdraw my energy from the conversation so that it peters out fast and they go away. After he left I looked at John and rolled my eyes. "Yeah, I didn't realize until it was too late," he said. Before we left the next day Phil had delivered his "Pre-flight" and "Post-flight" check lists. I consider myself a pretty organized person...not as good at it as I was before middle age memory deficit took over but pretty good. My list is about half of a page long. Phil's list was five pages complete with instructions on filling the fresh water tank half full and dumping a half cup of Calgon water softener in the tank before leaving each destination. As I was reading this bizarre document which included items as basic as closing the door (I can be a little dense at times but we have never driven away from anywhere in any vehicle with the door hanging open) John asked, "What is Calgon water softener?" I shook my head and put the list down. "Nothing that we need to concern ourselves with," I said. I'm still not sure what the purpose of the water softener was but Monaco didn't recommend it so I decided it was probably something that flowered-shirt Phil invented. We ducked Phil for the rest of our stay and drove away without water softener and with our door closed.

Back to Asheville.

Our plan was to leave for Asheville, North Carolina on Monday, May 12th and stay for part of the week. John judged the show last year and we made a trip up to The Biltmore Estate which was a wonderful and amazing experience. If you are ever in the area it is well worth the price of admission. Between trips we were able to watch "John Adams" on HBO (which is a series that I highly recommend...if you are interested in how this country was founded it is a must see) so I have a renewed interest in American history. Consequently we added Colonial Williamsburg and a trip to Monticello to the agenda. Stops at stables along the way were added and the plan was to end up in Pennsylvania at the Devon horse show at the end of May.

At the moment we are still at the Asheville show (its Saturday) and we had to eliminate Devon due to an inablity to find a place to put Mary. We leave for the Columbia, South Carolina area tomorrow to spend a little time around Lake Murray, see some horses in the area and then we'll figure out what the next stop is. We left Lexington a day later than planned due to some bad weather and Donnie Brookshire met us here in Asheville on Wednesday for a visit and to see the show. We ate our way through Asheville (Brookie is the best person on the planet to eat with because he is a foodie...an adventurous food lover and head chef of Chez Brookshire) while he was here and we shared some good laughs.

I've finally given up on driving Mary for this year. I figure it will probably take that long for the "new toy-ness" to wear off. Then there is the navigation issue. From the time that we begin our trip until we stop I'm engaged in navigation and various other duties. Those involve several things; maping distances, researching addresses, programming the useless piece of shit to see if by some miracle it has our destination in its data base, giving "all clears" during turns and stops, locating truck stops and rest areas and calculating distances to the next one, researching and booking spaces for Mary, researching possible future destinations and answering any of a thousand"I wonder..." questions that happen to come up for either of us. It's busy work. I couldn't do most of it without my laptop and the trusty air card. I try to take breaks to enjoy the scenery, make lunch, refresh water, lemonade or what ever the refreshment of choice is as we travel. So I have an important function. Breezy is the comfort dog. She provides blood pressure control (petting her regularly keeps it steady) maintains calm when we lose it in a crisis and makes sure that we stop and get out for fresh air and walks at regular intervals. She has a very important function. So for this year I'll stop complaining about not driving. I'm confident that in a pinch I could get us from point A to point B. I may take out a few cars, light poles and put a few dents in Mary and/or the Camry but we would get there.

I'll post again once we get to Lake Murray. It is a gorgeous day here in Asheville, which is a gorgeous part of the world, so I think I'll get outside and enjoy it. I hope your Saturday was a good one!

Home again, Home again...

Heading East

"OoooooooooK........lahoma where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain

And the wavin' wheat can sure smell sweet

And the wind comes right behind the rain."

Rogers and Hammerstein got it.

Now I get it.

Because I'm blogging again it is obvious we did not get swept away like Dorothy and Toto by a tornado. I'm grateful for that. But we did endure torrential downpours accompanied by thunder and lightening, high winds and a some small hail. That was on Wednesday. I didn't leave Mary all afternoon choosing instead to continue my cleaning frenzy. Wednesday night the three of us went to the horse show. John told me it was a half block to the arena from where Mary was parked so we bundled up and grabbed the umbrella and Breezy and started toward the arena. Two blocks and gobs of rain later I was asking, "Where is the arena?" He says, "See that brick building up there?" I saw it. "You have a different definition of a half block than I do," I say as I slog through the puddles soaking my socks and working to keep the umbrella from turning inside out in the wind.

I attempted to sleep that night but the Interstate had different ideas for me. Apparently truck drivers don't like to stop in Oklahoma City at night when it is pouring down rain because they roared down I-44 in a procession all night long. I'm sure my tossing and turning deflated the Sleep Number by 10. On Thursday morning I dragged my butt out of bed feeling like I had run a marathon.

On the up side of our time in Oklahoma City, I met and got acquainted with Mary Ellen and Mike Carlson from Missouri. John has known Mike for many years but this was my first introduction to them. They are salt of the earth, wonderful people and we had a great time with them. Meeting them made the stop totally worthwhile.

On Thursday, as Rogers and Hammerstein predicted, the wind came in after the rain. We got up to a sunny day but Mary was rocking and rolling to 25 to 35 mile an hour winds...all day long. I kept checking the weather reports. They said, "WINDY". They weren't kidding. I really needed to go out and do some shopping but as John is well aware there isn't much in the world that can piss me off faster or more than stepping outside and having the wind wreck my hair style. It drives me around the bend. He was out and about at the show and would drop in on me every so often, relieved when he found me still in the coach working on bills and paperwork. Mary Ellen came to visit and then Bill and Mary Lynn Whitley stopped by and we exchanged coach stories for awhile. It was a nice afternoon to be sure. We had dinner with Mike and Mary Ellen at a historic steak house and then it was time to go to the show again.

There was something weird going on with the sky in Oklahoma City that evening. The sky was yellow. We had never seen anything like it and kept commenting on it. At first I thought it was dust from all of the wind but then I remembered that we had four inches of rain resulting in a lot of flooding the day before. I still don't know what that was. It was very weird like being on Jupiter or something.

Because of the construction there wasn't any place to park the car so there was no choice but to walk to the arena...in the wind. By this time the wind gusts were up to 50 miles an hour. I arrived at the arena looking like I had done my hair in a wind tunnel. I'll leave my frame of mind to your imagination. Suffice it to say that I was ready to move on from Oklahoma City. We watched the show with Breezy, Mike and Mary Ellen, visited with some people and then headed back to Mary for what I hoped would be a decent night of sleep. When we stepped out of the building the wind was still blowing but the temperature had dropped by twenty degrees. Now we were being blown to kingdom come and we were COLD. We arrived back at Mary who was warm and cozy. We dropped the black out shades in the bedroom to block the light from the electronic billboard and settled in for the night.

I knocked another ten numbers out of the mattress tossing and turning to the sound of trucks and woke up in the morning feeling completely worn out. That didn't stop me from jumping into the shower, into my clothes, buttoning up Mary and having everything ready to go when John got back from the videographer. He laughed. "I take it you are ready to go?"

I need to go back a bit to our trip from Needles to Albuquerque. Fabulous. That's the best word I can think of and it doesn't cover the beauty of New Mexico's rocky landscape. I tried to catch it with my camera but I really couldn't do it justice. I will include what photos I took in the Picassa album. It was a pleasant sunny day of travel. We stayed at a KOA in Albuquerque and the next morning did our last leg to Oklahoma City. It included a trip across the TEXAS panhandle.

More of our Sierras drive

I told John about the last time (and the first time) I drove through the TEXAS panhandle. I had come from Kentucky via Tulsa on my way to meet my friend Nancy in Phoenix. It was a pleasant drive until I got to the TEXAS border. For some strange reason I just assumed that there would continue to be gas available along Interstate 40 into TEXAS. I had about a third of a tank when I headed out into the vastness of TEXAS. I drove and I drove and I drove. I kept driving but I didn't see any gas stations that were inhabited. I drove and drove some more. The needle on my fuel gauge kept getting lower in tiny increments. Finally like a mirage I saw an exit with a gas station. I pulled off. I drove up to the station. It was abandoned. The pumps were still there but no one was home. I looked down at the gas gauge and sighed. I looked in the back seat at my sweet dog Tag (the Border Collie who graced my life for 14 years before Breezy) and said, "I don't know Miss Tag...I hope this Camry has a good reserve because we are about to test it." She looked at me with her big brown eyes and then curled up on the seat to prepare for what ever bizarre situation that I might get us into. She endured a lot of adventures with me in 14 years. We hit I-40 again in search of fuel. I drove and drove and drove some more. My gas gauge was getting very close to E and finally the fuel light came on. My imagination went to work as I visualized Tag and I hitching along I-40, thirsty and hot (it was August and scorching) waiting for the serial killer to come and pick us up. I was getting pretty worried. Then I encountered a bug storm. Massive big black kamikaze bugs with massive wing spans and huge gobs of guts impaled themselves on my windshield, wiper blades, grill and antenna. It was disgusting. After the flurry of cussing Tag decided that riding on the floor behind my seat was a safer place. Finally off in the distance I saw a sign. It was one of those state road signs that advertises gas and food and lodging. There was no food and no lodging but there was a mini market with gas. I pulled off and found that it actually had fuel and thankfully a window cleaning squeegee/sponge thingie so that I could clear the bug guts off of my windshield. After I filled the tank I gave Tag a drink of water and a handful of doggie treats and we blasted across the rest of the panhandle. At one point I looked off into the vastness of the flat barren landscape and I saw something sticking up on the horizon. A few minutes later I could see it more clearly. It was a HUGE white cross. I was sure that it was only five minutes away but I kept driving and driving and I could still see it. And the farther I drove the bigger it got. Finally I thought that I'd never get to that cross and that it must belong the hugest church on the planet. I drove and drove some more. Finally I came to the cross. It wasn't a church but more like a monument. I never forgot that TEXAS size cross.

As we drove down I-40 through the panhandle the other day I remembered the cross. It was in Groom, Texas. I saw it as huge and white as ever way before we got to Groom. I looked it up on the Internet (typed in Google "Texas panhandle big white cross"...what would we do without Google?) and came up with the facts. It is 19 stories high and it took 100 welders in two shops to complete it. It has been there since 1995. I don't know much else about it except it is huge and the panhandle is as flat as a pancake with nothing to block the view so you can see it for miles. I wondered what aliens landing here eons after we are extinct would think of such a thing standing there... I know. I wonder weird stuff.

So we finished up on Oklahoma and took off on Friday morning for Little Rock. I'd never been to Arkansas and was surprised how much it looks like Central Kentucky. Neither of us slept much during out stay in OKC so we made a short day of it. We found a nice little KOA off of the Interstate...but not far enough off of the Interstate. It was charming with nice owners but noisy and I didn't sleep much again. Even though I was pretty worn out from lack of sleep I decided that it was time to go shopping. The cupboard was really bare. John wanted to watch The Masters so he tuned in and I looked on the Internet for a grocery store. I found a Kroger about seven miles from the KOA. Feeling like I needed a back up to my driving directions I programmed Tom Tom and took off for Kroger with the bike rack and one bicycle on the back of the car. Believe it or not Tom Tom took me right to the store! I made the left turn into the parking lot and realized that even though it was the correct turn it was the wrong turn. The parking lot was full...full of demolition derby cars, nothing newer that 1980s and everything beat to hell. There were derelict people laying in front of the store on the sidewalk and a guy and a thrashed up Caddy. The black paint had peeled off of the sides and the front bumper was hanging down. He was trying to park it and was having trouble putting in the parking space. It was a diagonal pull in space. Not rocket science. A two year old could have put that car in that space. At that point I determined that he was probably somehow impaired and so were the rest of the people wandering in the parking lot and that I needed to go directly back where I came from. When I got back to Mary John offered to help me unload the groceries. "No need," I said. He looked at me funny. "I didn't go." He said, "Couldn't you find it?" I said, "Oh, I found it. But if I had gone into the store and been lucky enough to come out the bike would have been gone, the bike rack would have been gone and the car might have been up on blocks and the wheels gone." He went to the KOA office and found out that there was a new Super Walmart three miles from the KOA. We got groceries. We left Little Rock, me totally sleep deprived and John driving expertly and quickly toward Kentucky. We had planned a route through western Tennessee up US 51 to Paducah. When I was checking for KOAs I noticed one at Lake Barkley. Hmmm...a night at the Lake might be kind of nice after all of the noise.

I must say here that we have stayed in KOA campgrounds all across the country and back. Our experience at Wildwood was an isolated one and most of them are great places to stop for an overnight when you are traveling. Our best one was at Las Cruces, New Mexico. They are so convenient. You can find them on the KOA website, book the reservation, pay for it and specify exactly what you want. Most of the KOA owners are very nice and the parks are conveniently located, easy to get to and easy to find. I like that. But most of them are pretty close to the Interstates. So when we started talking about taking a day out before we get home and spending some time at the Lake it sounded like heaven to me. As I type we are parked lakeside. We are under some trees and parked next to some bass fishermen who are here for a tournament. The people across from us are nature lovers. They have to be. It's 4o degrees out, windy and they cooked out beside their coach and sat outside wrapped up in layers of clothes until dark.

Our only problem was a conversation that I had with the woman in the office. We found the KOA but couldn't determine where the office was. That's unusual. So I called the office as we sat in the road poised to make a right hand turn toward the marina. There was no traffic so we decided to just stop before we did something that would require that we back up (still touchy after Baytown). So I called the woman. The conversation went something pretty close to this:

Her: "KOA Lake Barkley. How can I help you?"

Me: "Yes, this is Karen Jones and we have a reservation for tonight for a 42 foot motor coach and we are sitting by the sign that says "Ramp" to the right and "Camping and Lodging" to the left. Can you tell me which direction we should go to the registration office?"

Her: "You're where?"

I repeated myself.

Her: "Just a minute." (I hear rattling) "Is that YOU sitting out there in the big tannish colored motor home?"

Me: "Yes, that's us."

Her: "You can't go up there. The owner's house is up there."

Me: "That's fine. So where do we go, to the right?"

Her: "You're gonna hafta back up. You're goin' to the owner's house. You can't do that."

Me: "Ma'am we can't back up. We are towing a car. We can make a turn. Can you tell me which direction we should go?"

Her: "Well can you see the yellow car in the parking lot?"

I scan to left and then to the right and see a blazing yellow car.

Me: "Yes. Do we turn to the right? We can make the turn without backing up."

Her: "Do you see the flag pole?"

What the????

Me: "Yes. It's by the yellow car. Now, do we turn right?"

Her: "Come down by the little wood lookin' buildin' with the green metal roof."

I look to the right again.

Me: "DO WE TURN RIGHT?"

We have been sitting there for five minutes and I can't get an answer to one simple question. Do we turn to the right, YES or NO.

Her: "Just drive down by the flag pole and pull in front of the little building. Come in and I'll give you your packet."

Me: "So we turn right and drive by the flag pole and the yellow car and pull up in front of the wood building with the green roof." I didn't want to ask any more questions but I had to be sure that we were parking in the right place. "So we don't pull into the parking lot?"

Her: "You'll have to turn your motor home around after you register."

Big sigh.

Me: "So we do NOT go into the parking lot."

Her: "Pull in front of the building."

Me: (I gave up). "Okay, thank you very much."

Apparently "yes" and "no" are not part of her vocabulary. She probably thought I was the dumbest person on the planet too. Oh well...

We drove about six miles off of the main highway to get here. After my exhausting conversation with the woman in the office John went in and paid for two nights and came back fifteen minutes later exhausted from trying to talk to the woman. Then in KOA fashion the manager came out in his golf cart with his little yellow flag flying on the top. We unhooked the car and I drove behind Mary while the little golf cart guided her to our spot. We wound around on narrow roads and big trees and then he guided John into this treed area right next to the lake. John has earned his Master's degree in coach driving in the last six weeks. I believe he could parallel park her in downtown New York City if he had to. We are almost home and I still haven't driven it. There is future post on the repsonibilities of navigation. I promise. So the KOA guy disappeared from my sight behind Mary as he guided her back toward the lake. I sat there and held my breath with Breezy hanging over my shoulder in the Camry as I watched her back tires get closer and closer to the bank of the lake. She stopped on the edge and I let out my breath. I thought after this long journey of learning and fun and panic and laughter and old friends and new ones, and every emotion known to man it would be a bad ending to put her in the lake. But between the KOA guy and John's expertise she is sitting on the pad overlooking the water and we are settled in for a day of rest before we go home and resume our daily duties of life.

I'm sure reflections on this adventure will come as the days pass. We are already planning our next trip toward the end of May. It will probably include a trip to the Carolinas and then a drive to Pennsylvania to the Devon horse show. We are also talking about going west again after the show in Louisville in August, this time taking the northern route through the Dakotas and stopping at some shows and stables along the way. And if we need a little quiet time we can just take her and disappear into some nice campground somewhere close by and have a retreat! Mary and the Camry are due for a good bath and some service for their next trip. They are both covered with bird crap, bug parts, dust, mud, cinders, muck and who knows what else. It's been driving us both nuts since we were in Oregon.

I'm anxious to get home to Lexington and enjoy the spring in Kentucky and sad that the trip is nearly over. As many people know better than we do owning a motor coach can be a challenging experience and some present such problems that they can drive people to do things totally out of their character. We've heard some horror stories that were unbelievable but believable at the same time. We were so fortunate to have gotten this coach with the help of some good friends. She's a good one too, beautiful and smart and solid as a rock. We have had lots of help from the Monaco people and we are so grateful for their assistance along the way. John called Dennis the other day to tell him that we survived the storms in Oklahoma. I realized after he hung up that he didn't ask Dennis one question. Not one! That doesn't mean that we don't have a thousand more to ask but that we jumped in the deep end and learned how to swim with it. Thankfully the coaching gods have been very good to us!

Here is the address to the web album of photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/tagfish1/FloridaToOregonToKentucky2008?authkey=LV-MrZqG-xA

Enjoy!

PS.

The tall one lasted until last night. Perhaps now that we are somewhat calmer about Mary the short one will make it through the summer!

,

From Heaven to Oklahoma

The Pilot and Our Comfort Dog




Today (April 8th) we are crossing New Mexico from Albuquerque across the panhandle of Texas and on to Oklahoma. At the moment we aren't at the end of the earth...but I believe I can see it from here.



On Saturday morning we woke up to a brisk Central Oregon morning. I took Breezy out for her morning walk and when we stepped out of the coach the smell of juniper and sage filled my senses and immediately took me back to my days living in the area. It is the best summertime place I've ever lived. The season is dry and warm and being outdoors riding, canoeing, hiking, biking or just hanging out is such a pleasure that you never want to go inside. Breezy spent fifteen minutes sniffing around the bushes on this sunny morning. She sniffed deer tracks, rabbit doo-doo and big holes where ground critters had made their homes. The campground was next to the Crooked River Gorge a huge cavernous gorge where the Crooked River runs. There was a platform overlooking the gorge where John and Breezy and I went to get a good look the day before. I am working on a Picassa web album that will have lots of pictures of our travels. I should have it posted by the weekend.



We just passed into Texas from New Mexico and into the Central time zone. This time I'm keeping up with the changes on my watch so I don't have to sit down with a pen and paper to figure out what time it is. I'm looking out my window at...nothing. Oh wait...I see a tree beside the road! Wait...oh it's dead. We are back in the land of picnic areas on the Interstates. Baffles me...



Okay, so when we left Central Oregon early on Saturday morning I was pretty sure I knew where we were going. I'd been there before. It was a bit of a distant memory but I had driven there. Our destination was Carson City, Nevada, a little south of Reno. My original idea was to head down US 97 and then cut across at Christmas Valley to Lakeview and drop down onto US 395. After our experience the day before on Santiam Pass I decided that because there is no way out of Oregon to our destination (Interstate 40 to Oklahoma City) without going over a mountain pass, I'd better keep us on the best highways that I could. But neither of us wanted to double back on Interstate 5 so I suggested that we go to Klamath Falls on US 97, take Highway 139 to US 395 through Alturas, Susanville and on to Reno and Carson City. Good plan. So we took off.


The drive to Klamath Falls was uneventful and beautiful. We got on 139 without a hitch. At one point we pulled off of the road so that we could eat lunch and take Breezy for a walk. I took her behind an old abandoned service station and waited while she checked out all of the new smells. A truck passed Mary sitting along side the road and then disappeared into the distance. At that point it occurred to me that I couldn't hear one thing except the sound of the wind and some birds. It was like taking a five minute retreat. It struck me that we have too much noise in our lives. We can't seem to go for one minute without filling quiet space with something. I'm one of those weird people who used go for two weeks without turning on my television. Of course that was before Clinton vs. Obama, American Idol, National Geographic Channel and Planet Earth. High def has ruined me. Anyway, the sounds of silence were immediately calming and appreciated.


After lunch we drove on through some pretty country as I checked maps, weather and altitude and answered pilot questions. I looked up and saw that we were coming to a stop sign. There was a huge sign that pointed to the left that said, "Alturas....to RENO" and an arrow pointing to the left. The real road sign said "Susanville 88 miles" and pointed to the right. John asked, "Which way to we go?" I was stumped. I had an instinct to go left but wasn't sure. We have kept Tom Tom programed and on MUTE practically since the incident in Georgia when I thought we lost the car. We've only referred to it as a useless piece of shit a few times since then. So this time, like an idiot, I ignored my intuition and deferred to Tom Tom. It said to go to the right. We went to the right and headed into a pine forest and immediately started gaining altitude. The road narrowed and I said, "I hope to hell this isn't a cow trail." John just drove on with eyes riveted to the road, without comment. We went higher and higher and until we drove past a sign that said, "Adin Pass, 5175 ft." We both took a deep breath. The road was very narrow and bumpy without guard rails and the cliffs were very steep. And there was no traffic. I was glad on the one hand but a little disturbed by it on the other. Why wasn't there any traffic? We continued to climb and twist and turn. I looked at the map again. We were due to make a turn onto a lesser road. It crossed my mind that I didn't think that a road could be lesser than this one unless it was gravel...or dirt. You know how on maps the more major the road the heavier the line that represents it? Well the line for 139 to Susanville was faint pink. Barely visible. We couldn't turn back if we wanted to so we drove on.



John made the turn on to the faded pink line and the road got bumpier but the scenery got better. As we thumped and rattled along we actually started to laugh about the fact that we had essentially made a wrong turn (thank you very much Tom Tom) and were making lemonade from it. The views on both sides of the road were very serene and beautiful. We were in cattle country; grazing land and pine trees and winding creeks. And as we jiggled along hugging the center line quietly appreciating mother nature's gifts we looked up and saw a large turquoise body of water dead ahead. Eagle Lake. It was such a treat that it made the entire side trip through the boonies worthwhile. From there we wound down out of the high altitude to medium altitude and came to Susanville. We found our way through the mountain peaks into Carson City and settled in for a terrific night of sleep.






















First View of Eagle Lake



There is a peculiar thing that happens to Sleep Number beds when you travel through high altitudes. It's one that can cause a lot of trouble if you don't pay attention. This is our first experience with Sleep Number and we are both thinking that it is a pretty neat invention. John can adjust his side to a firmness that he likes and I can do the same and be really comfortable too. I think the claims that you get a better night of sleep are true, at least for us. But when you travel with one you need to deflate both sides before you drive to higher altitudes. When I went to get into bed that night my bed had pumped itself up from 40 to 100. I was tired and looking forward to flopping into bed. When I flopped it was like flopping on a table top. "Crap!" I hollered and sat up. John came running, "What's wrong?" The bed is possessed!" I said as I stared at the sleep number remote adjuster. "It's going to pop!" He nodded. "That's right! Bill Tomin said his bed popped when they went skiing one time." It makes sense. The milk cartons expand anything bagged or sealed expands, why not air mattresses? Visions of an exploding air mattress danced in my head as I dozed off.



We just passed into Oklahoma and passed a rest area. I had a revelation; I haven't had to use a disgusting toilet since we have been on the road. Guys probably won't get this but women's public bathrooms in rest areas are very scary. I always feel like I may have contracted bubonic plague or Ebola when I have to use one. And we haven't had to throw good money into a flea ridden hotel so that they would take our dog (who is better behaved than most people's kids) for an overnight stay. Life with Queen Mary has wonderful benefits.



On Sunday morning we got up early and got ready to make a long drive to Needles, California. I finally figured out why it was named Needles. Needle Mountain is close by. The peaks are very sharp in the little range of mountains. Anyway, we left Carson City and headed south. As I said earlier I was sure I knew where we were going because I was sure that I'd been there before. I was wrong. I hadn't been down 395 from Reno to Barstow I had been down 95 through Las Vegas and then on to Phoenix. Big difference. BIG difference. We dropped south through Gardnerville and out into Antelope Valley and by Topaz Lake. We found a little piece of heaven. As the day progressed we found bigger and bigger pieces of heaven.



We are getting close to Oklahoma City now so I have to stop here and resume my navigator responsibilities. Finding the right entrance to the fairgrounds could be a challenge. The Camry had a dead battery yesterday morning so we don't want a repeat performance of Baytown. Another thing we learned (yesterday morning) is that you need to unplug the car from the coach when you stop or it drains the battery. The transmission monitor people in Wakarusa failed to mention that, like they failed to mention that if you warm the car up before you hook it up it will stop the monitor from howling at you for a half hour. Details, details...


April 9th



We found the RV parking at the fairgrounds with the help of a nice lady who took pity on us when she saw us circling the grounds...lost. I flunked navigation yesterday. John had spoken to Charlie at the RV office yesterday and he informed us that it cost $25.00 per night to stay here. We are sitting on asphalt with a 50 amp hookup, sewer, water and cable television (which doesn't seem to work). We have a perfect view of Interstate 44, complete with sound effects, and an electronic billboard that I'm sure will illuminate the bedroom nicely at night and we are sitting down in a hole. There is major construction going on close enough that I could hit the backhoes and jackhammers with a rock.



The grounds are very nice and John says the horse show facility is great. I haven't been out of Mary today except to take Breezy to the grassy area across the parking lot a few times and to empty the garbage. Today I'm cleaning up from the dust storm in Barstow. More on that later. We are in the land a little south of Oz and have been listening to reports of "severe storms" coming through Oklahoma City today and tonight. These storms include some or all of the following: High winds, heavy rain, small hail, LARGE hail, thunder and lightening, flooding and the possibility of tornadoes. John speculated that if we had a tornado we should get in the back closet over the diesel engine. I speculated that if a tornado hit Mary we would probably want a front seat view of our trip over the rainbow. It's been raining complete with thunder and lightening for hours. Perhaps the airbag system that Mary sits on can double as pontoons should the hole we are sitting in flood tonight.



Charlie stopped by first thing this morning to collect the rent. He tapped on the door. John was gone to the arena so it was just Breezy and me. I opened it and looked down at a man in grimy navy blue coveralls with a receipt pad in his hand. "You ready to pay your rent?" he asks. I was speechless for a second. Then I saw "Charles" on an embroidered name tag on his coveralls. There was a smudge of grease on the "L" so it took me a second to decipher his name. "You must be Charlie," I said. He grinned revealing a rack of tobacco and coffee stained teeth. "Will you take a check?" I asked. "Yeeeep. Check'll work." I asked, "How much do we owe you?" He asked, "How long you stayin'?" I was thinking that I was ready to leave immediately. "Two nights," I answered. "That'll be ninety bucks." Pretty steep rent for parking in a asphalt hole and twenty bucks more per night than we were quoted. I decided that it was worth the extra money to get Charlie out of my life.


The last time I took Breezy to the grassy area I noticed a small sign that the wind had blow over that said "VIP parking $45.00 per night". I was glad I didn't argue with Charlie.



Back to our trip through the Sierras. So as we proceeded along US 395 around every turn and over every hill was another treasure of nature. The Sierra Nevada mountain range is by far the most beautiful that I've ever seen. We agreed at the end of the day that neither of us had been on a more beautiful drive than we experienced that day.





















Eastern Slope of the Sierras



We reached altitudes of over 8,000 feet. I saw the sign at Devil's Gate which is a little over 7,500 feet I remembered the Sleep Number bed. I bolted out of my seat and ran for the bedroom with visions of spending the rest of our trip sleeping on the platform under the air mattress. I grabbed the remote adjuster and poked the button and it read 100. I deflated one side and then the other which was also at 100. Whew...close call. Our highest point was at Deadman's Pass, altitude 8,036 feet above sea level. We stopped at Mono Lake and I read where the highest and the lowest points in the United States are just 80 miles apart, Mt. Whitney at 14,494 feet and Death Valley which is 282 feet below sea level. I've always though that California was the most diverse, beautiful and interesting state I've ever been in. This trip really confirmed that.


As we eased out of the altitude we encountered small towns and valleys of green grazing that were full of cattle. In Bishop if people had a blade of grass growing they had a cow to eat it. Even in town there were two fat steers scratching their backs on a billboard that was planted on a tiny patch of grass. I looked out Mary's windows with binoculars completely enjoying the scenery as we descended. Then we came down by the China Lake Naval Weapons Center and started encountering dry lake beds. They look like giant salt flats. We continued to descend and finally approached Barstow. The wind picked up considerably and I could see John muscling Mary's steering wheel with each blast of wind. We made the turn at Four Corners and headed toward Barstow for fuel. Our destination was Needles. This was actually the longest we had gone without buying fuel and John was calculating our mileage and remaining fuel with the Aladdin system as we drove. We were good to go to Barstow.


The wind picked up more. As we got closer to Barstow I was relying on a memory (a dwindling resource) from our last trip through Barstow when we fueled up. There was a Flying J and a Travel America. But I was having trouble trying to remember whether they were on Interstate 15 or Interstate 40 which come together at Barstow. I rattled my brain but nothing was coming to the surface. Then I looked out the window my attention was redirected. A dust storm was blowing across the highway in front of us. By this time we had been through a bug storm and Mary's windshield was a mass of yellow bug guts. Now I was staring at a blast of white powdery dust and we were driving right into it.


"There isn't enough money in the world to make me live out in this wasteland," John says. I concur.





















And it got worse than this..


What passed through my mind, besides the fact that it looked like we were driving into a blinding dust storm was what that dust was going to do once it seeped through the cracks and crevasses of Mary. Leave it to the housekeeper to concern herself about cleaning when things get dangerous. Not only that by the time we drove through it and came out on the other side I realized that it actually was Kingman, Arizona where we fueled up and not Barstow and we had passed through without seeing any truck stops. It was a middle age moment...when you thump yourself on the forehead and say, "I can't believe that I forgot that!" Anyway, the truck stops really are there but just not where we were going. So our next challenge was to find a truck stop between Barstow and Needles. I got out "The Next Exit" and found one. It was a Texaco with a diesel truck station. John eased Mary up to the station and found that all but two of the pumps were out of diesel and the cost of what was left was $4.29 per gallon. I'll resist my urge to launch into a tirade about the cost of fuel and why it is so high. We got 25 gallons, enough to get us to the Kingman truck stops the next day and we drove on to Needles where we found a charming little KOA. The spaces were separated by Oleander and Bougainvillea flowering with white and red blooms. It took us five minutes to set up and three minutes to pour the scotch.


I just heard that we don't have any tornado watches for the Oklahoma metro area at the moment. I was relieved. And then the weather man said that we could have them around 4:00 in the morning. That will make for a restful night of sleep.


John accuses me regularly of attempting to re-write "War and Peace" and I'm sure he would (and will) say that about this blog post so I will stop for now. I'll update next on our trip from Needles to Albuquerque and our impending trip from Oklahoma City to Oz.