Some people make a plan and follow through with it. Some make no plans and wander aimlessly. We make partial plans and change them as we see fit. Some times that results in changing our plan as the highway intersection approaches (actually we approach the intersection, but the scotch and wine are speaking). In this case we set out for Huntsville, AL to see the Space and Science Museum there. Somehow when we made the plan we assumed that finding a nearby campground would be trivial. As we prepared to roll out from Pigeon Forge we started looking and could only find two in the vicinity and both are state parks. Rather than wait for someone to wake up and return our call we set out assuming we would hear before we got there. Carol called the Space Center Museum and found out there is a campground on the grounds. It is not in any of our extensive collection of resources nor is it mentioned in any of the literature or on the web site. I guess you are supposed to call and listen to a really long phone message and wait to hear item 5 which offers the campground as an option!!! Carol called the campground and while she was talking the state park returned my 3 hours earlier call. I told them thanks, but no thanks.

We planned a driver change and lunch stop at a rest area that turned out to be closed for renovation. I pulled on to the shoulder there and we had a quick lunch and driver change. As Carol set out I started reading an article about the Space Center looking for a real address or highway intersection. While reading I came across a story about Scottsboro, AL and a special shop. It is the Unclaimed Luggage Center. If you want to know where the suitcase you lost and never recovered on a flight finally came to rest, this is where it ended up. When I looked at the map I realized we were passing right by it on the way to the Space Center in Huntsville. We decided right then to stop there and so we are now in their overflow parking lot with the permission of Gary (Loss Prevention)) to spend the night, having spent more than a night camping would have cost. I have a new iPod, we have a camera for (daughter-in-law) Miriam a set of Tefillin we could not leave there and books. All of these goods were found in lost luggage, airplanes after everyone has deplaned and left and airport lounges. Rather than my regaling you with stories of what has been found go to www.unclaimedluggage.com. Think of a department store stocked from lost luggage. Prices are set at 30 to 80% off retail. I found an old SciFi hardbound priced a $4. I looked inside the cover and found it have a bookstore notation of $2. At the register I pointed this out and with a call to pricing they dropped the price to $1.

You really do not want to know what they have in the electronics area. There are so many headsets of all kinds, including the Bose headsets that retail for $300 that it is hard to imagine. They claim that their inventory is low at the moment. Enough! In the morning we will set out for Huntsville. For now we are happy to be in the overflow lot next to the cemetery. They open at 8 and I may have to sneak in to see what new has been put on the shelves.

The next morning, Saturday, we took a walk to stretch our legs and walked back through the store. Fortunately we found nothing more to buy so we bid the concierge fair well and hit the road for a hefty 42.5 miles which brought us to One Tranquility Base, the campground associated with the U.S Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Al. We set up quickly and headed for the Museum. It was a cloudy day with forecast of rain and the temperatures were in the high 50’s to low 60’s. I report this weather not to taunt those of you freezing in the north, but the museum is a rocket museum and this entails a fair amount of walking around outdoors to see everything. Economic hard times rear their ugly head, especially here. Our first indication was the big sign that National Parks Golden Age Passports are no longer honored. The price for us jumped from $6 to $21.5 with a coupon and including the Imax film. We paid! I had checked out the museum on Google Maps while at Dan’s and in the satellite view the surviving Saturn V rocket can be seen on its side out in the open air. When we got there we learned that it has been built into a museum building in it entirety. This makes for one very long building. The first two stages are on giant frames and the remainder are suspended from the ceiling. The history of the development of the ability to send men to the moon is highlighted in exhibits of actual artifacts that line the hall. Out in the Rocket Park, there is one of almost every rocket that has been part of NASA or the US Army’s inventory on display, from Jupiter to Juno to Atlas to Nike Ajax and even an antique Nike Zeus (our Boy Scout Explorer Troop went to the Niagara Falls Air Force Base to tour a Nike Zeus launch site shortly before it was decommissioned). We spent close to five hours there, including lunch in the Space Camp Cafeteria (the main food court was closed). We returned to One Tranquility Base so Carol could take a nap and I could putter around. We no sooner got settled in Gee2 than it started to pour and thunder and lightening. Carol slept and I marveled at our good timing. We had dinner on board, got a good night’s sleep and a late start the next morning.

Sunday morning the 11th found us ready to move on. Our route took us through some territory we don’t remember, across I 20 to Jackson MS where we picked up our old friend the Natchez Trace Parkway southbound to Natchez. We stopped for the night at Rocky Springs Campground for our third time. A reminder for those who appreciated good mystery stories, Nevada Barr bases all of her stories on the struggles of Anna Pigeon, Ranger, to catch the bad guys while not becoming one of the victims. Several of her stories are based on the parkway and she (Nevada Barr) has made this area her home. Rocky Springs is the scene of one of these stories and we have walked the ground and she has not used any literary license in her description of the place.

For those interested in camping details, there are maybe 20 sites with no facilities other than what you bring (and what you must take away with you). The price is appropriate for the lack of any facilities, nothing. It is at mile 54.8 on the Parkway. We highly recommend it. There are several nice hikes and we will take one in the morning before leaving. We are not sure where we are headed yet, but we will have a plan of sorts before we turn the key, if Carol has anything to say about it.

We kissed the boys good bye and said our farewells to Malena and then Dan as they went off to school and to work. With the place to ourselves we got the coach ready for the road and set off with Carol taking the lead down the road to warn of cars and trucks headed the other way and of tree limbs that might have fallen between Dan’s departure and ours. The drive down the 1.8 mile stretch of dirt road was uneventful until the last couple of hundred yards when five deer bounded across the road in front of the coach and behind Carol in the car. She never saw them. My heart rate accelerated like it does when I peak on the treadmill. They had it timed quite nicely and I merely had to slow the coach to somewhat less than my heart rate.

In the driveway of the Church of the Hookup/Disconnect (a small Baptist church which is a tenth of a mile up Heards Mountain Rd from US 29 with a very nice driveway) we aligned the car and had it completely hooked up with the exception of one hold down when I looked up and noticed something was very wrong. There were no bicycles in the bike rack on the roof! “Oh Darn!” I said. We decided that this was a practice hook up and disconnected so I could drive the car back to Dan and Malena’s and put the bikes on the roof rack and return to Carol to complete a “for real” hook up. For a wonder weverything worked, including all the lights AND the breakaway switch. The rest of the day was fortunately boring. 373 miles of uneventful driving that brought us to Walden Creek Campground in Pigeon Forge, TN

I will report on what we found to do here in another post, on another day.

Oh yes there has been some excitement. I have been engaged in an email discussion of possible responses to Israel’s attempts to dislodge Hamas from Gaza. Since I believe that there is no alternative for dealing with people who want all of the Jews removed by any means from the State of Israel and others believe that we must talk while they destroy us, the conversation has not gone entirely well. I would not choose to live in Sderot or Ashdod or anyplace within the reach of Hamas’ rockets knowing that there are no real targets and everything and everybody is a target. It is the Government of Israel’s duty to provide security for it’s citizens living within its borders as defined by the UN and recognized by most of the world.

Stepping down from my soapbox. I will try to keep these matters out of this blog in the future.

In reporting about our activities, I have missed one of the more exciting days here. On December 30th we looked up the mountain behind the house and saw smoke rising below the far ridge. Very shortly there were local firefighters at the foot of the driveway looking for a way to get to the fire. Dan went up as a guide to show them the logging road that reaches an old CCC road that goes up toward the ridge. The firemen, in the mean time, had found an approach from above using a road built to service a radio tower on the high point. Firemen prefer to approach a fire from below so Dan opened the gate so they could use the private road below his property to get to the fire. A bit later in the day the owner of the land, where the fire was, arrived to see what was going on.

The wind switched and began to blow the fire down the ridge for a bit, but the firemen got it under control and left a small watcher force of Forestry Dept employees to keep an eye on the area. By the next morning they had left and the winds began to pick up. Malena left for a supply run only to find the road closed by a couple of fallen trees. While she called some neighbors, Dan grabbed his chainsaw and I joined him to see if we could open the road. It took about 60 minutes with help from Dan’s neighbor David to cut the fallen wood and clear the road. David was busy cutting it into firewood lengths while Dan cut longer pieces with the plan of cutting them to wood stove length later in the day. Having cleared the road, Malena was free to go on her errands while the rest of us left for Richmond to go to the Science Museum.

The museum was a bit of a bust. It is intended for a slightly older audience than our gang and it is a bit used up. I doubt we will undertake that hour long drive again in a hurry. We did have to cope with high winds both ways on the drive.

This seems to have been enough excitement for a 36 hour period and we resumed a semblance of normal life – such as that is with two families plus grandparents living together for ten days.

All the flights worked just fine. This must be a miracle for our family at this time of year. What remains is Josh getting back to Rochester and Yechiel and family back to Los Angeles. The in between has been a great family gathering.

Backing up to my departure from Rochester with Yechiel in the navigator seat on December 24 at 1:40 PM. The Perils of Paul set in almost immediately. One of the draw bars on the tow bar was stuck and I could not extend it out to align the car. With Yechiel in the driver seat of the car we maneuvered the car into position to fasten it to the recalcitrant draw bar and used the car to extend it. Since we were not planning to disconnect before reaching Dan and Malena’s and the tow seemed fine, we set off for a two day journey, with the emergency brake still set on the tow’d. It really is teamwork to get this rig on the road and with half the team missing something was bound to be missed. Fortunately I felt the drag and the ugly sounds before we did any damage. Yechiel went back to release the brakes and we started out again.

The drive was uneventful, if you call 5 hours of driving through wind and rain uneventful. We had plenty of fuel and there was no place to stop overnight along the way so between us we made it to the Flying J in Carlisle, PA by about 7, only to find they had no fuel to sell. We went across the street and fueled there (used the Dunkin Donut parking lot to get to the cross street), paying a nickel a gallon surcharge because I refuse to use a debit card (won’t possess one). Crossed the highway again to the Flying J where the lot was almost empty, maybe eight other rigs in there for Christmas Eve. I was able to park along the western edge of the lot and put the living room slide over the curb so I could open it to allow the convertible sofa to open. In the morning we topped off propane and emptied the holding tanks before moving on. The drive to Covesville was even more uneventful as the weather had cleared. Yechiel had his second turn at the wheel and, I suspect enjoyed the opportunity to drive the motorhome.

After setting up in our usual position, I discovered that the door latch was hard to operate. Two issues to deal with. I was not able to retract the extended tow bar arm and had to leave it extended. A call to Jody at Roadmaster tech support yielded instructions for dismantling the bar and freeing it up with a vigorous cleaning to remove rust and road grime from the nose cone. This required dismantling the mechanism on that side and driving the interior bar out. Once it was out I was able to see the cause of the problem, the aforementioned rust and road grime under the split ring collar in the nose cone. Oops, in removing the bar I had lost a spring and pin that are crucial to the function of the tow bar, they are the locking mechanism. Some searching in the gravel and debris yielded the pin, but not the spring. Jody had not mentioned that parts might fly. Another call to him got me the promise of the needed parts. I relaxed and finished cleaning the parts I had and everything went into storage to wait for the the replacement parts. The door got harder and harder to operate.

Being unsure of myself in in fixing the tow bar and not knowing how to deal with the door, I called a local mobile RV mechanic, Ed Stigle, and had a conversation with him. He made himself available if I needed him for the tow bar, but declined to work on the door as he felt he did not have any particular capability with locks. He did suggest lubricating the parts that seemed to be causing a problem. After slapping myself on the forehead several times I applied three sprays of pure silicone lube to the accessible openings in the lock mechanism. Now Carol can open the door herself and I no longer have to climb in through the driver door to open the main door (boy am I happy I have that optional door). When the parts arrived on Friday it was a matter of ten minutes to reassemble the tow bar (with a tarp spread to catch flying parts) which now seems to be ready for service.

All during this time, from December 26th on we have taken several excursions with various groupings of the family. There was an ice skating trip and a trip to Richmond to go to the Science Museum and a trip to Lynchburg to play in the Children’s Museum and several hikes and walks and even days playing around the house. Although this was holiday and vacation time, Dan dealt with calls from work almost every day, Yechiel received a copy of his latest article which needs corrections and a clarification or two before being published and I was in touch with several clients. Miriam’s sister and her two children came for a visit on Sunday and Monday and her father, Les, arrived on Monday. Although they were not sleeping at the house, the added energy sure got things hopping. I think the maximum number we seated for dinner was 15 and the minimum was 11. Oh yes, grandson Josh arrived after Les’ departure and his personality added to the mix made it all even sweeter. We celebrated his 17th birthday a couple of days early and he spent two hours in the kitchen preparing a white chocolate cake from a recipe from his mother. The rest of the meal was steak (for the omnivores) and artichoke and huevos rancheros (for the vegetarians) and salad it was a grand meal.

Malena and Miriam and Carol turned out meal after delicious meal. It is amazing that they were able to keep it all straight between the Kosher Vegetarian, the Vegetarian, the omnivores and a couple of special dietary needs. No one got the wrong food and we all ate very well. Now we are down to merely vegetarian and omnivore. We already miss Yechiel, Miriam, Azriel and Avtalyon who have driven to Arlington to see the Capital and the Mall before flying back to Los Angeles. I am not sure what we will do tomorrow (Monday January 5), Dan is still off work, but the children are back in school and I think the house will be very quiet for an hour or two.

Sitting in the den in Rochester, excitement about getting on the road is starting to build. I have had my tooth ache (sinus congestion actually), my back ache has been treated with cortisone shots, Carol seems to be in good health as does my mother, a nursing home resident here in Rochester. Sunday, Carol (Ann Carol to those of you in the Art World) will fly to Los Angeles to accompany Miriam and the boys across the country by plane to Charlottesville, VA. Yechiel in the mean time will be flying to DC to attend a conference and give a paper and hopefully have a job interview or two. After the conference he will fly to Rochester on the 23rd to drive with me in the coach to Charlottesville after visiting his grandmother. Some time on the 26th we will all convene at Dan and Malena’s house south of Charlottesville, VA for ten days of togetherness and family reunion, Josh (eldest grandson) will be flying into the middle of this gang and we expect visits from Miriam’s sister and family and maybe even her father Les.

The weather outside is predicted to be frightful in Rochester. We hope to pull the coach into the yard on Thursday so Carol can get her stuff on board before leaving for LA. I plan to get the exterior mechanical work done in the breaks in the bad weather. Sometime late on the 24th or early on the 25th we will roll from here. I am excited to have a chance to share the coach and driving with one of my son’s. They have both been on the coach and are familiar with it, but neither has ever traveled on it, much less driven and Yechiel will get his 5 or 6 hour driving lesson next week as we have 10 or 11 hour drive with a stop someplace in southern PA or MD along I 81.

When we leave Charlottesville sometime after the 6th we will be heading south west with the eventual goal of camping at Dockweilers Beach under the LAX departure runways. The route is open to debate. There is always the possibility of going immediately south to the Florida Panhandle if Carol’s brother and sister-in-law will come north from St Pete to meet us. There is the possibility of traversing TN on I 40 before heading south. Of course there is also the middle route on I 20 from Birmingham AL as well. All routes take us through Texas. And in Texas we will stop in Austin for a visit with the Rainwaters. Then we need to get to Falcon SP and this year we want to return to Big Bend NP. Onward with a stop in Las Cruces, NM and then to Senator Wash on the CA/AZ border.

Egad, this sounds like a lot of planning with little unplanned time. Somehow I firmly expect that much of it will happen, whether on the way out or the way home. We have not made plans to meet our peripatetic friends the Hoggs or the Topfs among others and somehow I suspect that there are many people out there, including the Armstrongs who on reading this and later postings will pull us off our planned course for a visit, overnight or for a week as we get within a few hundred miles of each other.

Another project of mine to watch for. I have photographed our coach in almost every campground we have stayed in, Wal Marts included, and I am starting to gather those pictures into an album, for my own curiosity. I will put them up on my site on Picasa when I feel I am ready. I think by late January.

Stay safe, drive safe, and stay warm!

Oh, by the way, these postings are now available on my Facebook page.

Haven't posted one of these to this list before and haven't posted one
to the movie list in over a year either.

We just saw TransSiberian
http://www.firstlookstudios.com/films/transsiberian/
at The Little Theatre, for non Rochesterians this is an Art Film House.
If you are looking for a really well made film with fine acting and
good music. This may be the one. It spends much of its time on the
Trans Siberian Railroad with wonderful railroad shots including some
great old steam. There are also classic uses of the trains in the story
line.

This is not for the squeamish, it earns its R rating but Carol was not
in the least turned off. She says, "Edge of the seat"

The synopsis is:
One of those legendary train trips that people used to dream about
taking, the Transsiberian Express has probably seen better days. An
American couple, Roy (Woody Harrelson) and Jessie (Emily Mortimer),
decide to return home the long way from their recent sojourn in Peking
and meet another couple from the West, Carlos (Eduardo Noriega) and Abby
(Kate Mara), with whom they quickly form that tenuous bond that often
unites fellow travelers away from home. When Roy gets separated from the
train at a stopover, Jessie begins to realize that their compatriots
aren't exactly who or what they seem to be. But the real dangers of
their unforgettable trip have only begun to surface; Russian cops (Ben
Kingsley plays one), mobsters, and locals are still to come.

Enjoy, and if you see it please let me know what you think.

Paul

I can’t believe it has taken so long but this link will take you to the
photo summary of our Winter ’08 travels.
http://picasaweb.google.com/xctraveler/Winter08?authkey=KNgdIOXRsIo

I will be posting photos from our summer travels Real Soon Now.

Made it out of St Paul, whew! But where are we going. We have in mind recapitulating a trip we made in 1975 or so when the boys were young and we visited in Edina, MN to attend Erica Rudin’s Bat Mitzvah. So it was clear that out next stop had to be on or near the North Shore of Lake Superior. Carol, in the mean time, had been studying maps and found several interesting side trips that coincided with her desire to go kayaking in the Boundary Water Canoe Wilderness Area (BWCWA).

The first stop was Two Harbors, MN, just north of Duluth. Here we stayed in a lovely public campground on the edge of town and right on the lake. We started out by touring the town and its piers and lighthouse area. We were stunned to find a very small locomotive collection, two engines, one very old and quite small and the other, well I’ll insert the pictures and they tell the story of this 2-8-8-4 monster built in 1943 (for those who don’t have fond memories of steam the numbers mean the locomotive has 2 wheels on the front guide truck and a total of 16 drive wheels in two groups of 8 followed by 4 more wheels on the trailing truck).

We kept hearing noise from the area where the piers were located, but could not see what was going on. As we continued the tour we got around the other side of the harbor and were able to see a lake freighter between the piers taking on ore in a gravity feed down the chutes from the ore pockets on the pier as they were designed many years ago. Although the industry has declined significantly from its hey day in the ’30s it still continues to mine and load ore for the making of steel in other ports on the Great Lakes. The next day we drove up to Gooseberry State park where we planned to see the falls and then bike to Split Rock Lighthouse about 6 miles further up the coast. We stayed a bit longer than planned at Gooseberry and then found that the bike trail out of the park was under construction and we would have to drive a couple of miles up the road to begin our ride. Ultimately our ride became a total of about 6 or 7 miles none of which were level. The downhills were terrifying and the uphills grueling, we enjoyed the ride and the visit to the lighthouse was fascinating. Of course there was much more to see than we were here last in 1975, a large visitor center has been built and much of the equipment has been restore or reconstructed. When the Coast Guard closed the lighthouse in the 60’s they has stripped it of any useful equipment and essentially abandoned it to the state. This had been the most visited lighthouse in the service until that time so its reconstruction was a matter of time and money. I am sure it is once again one of the most visited lighthouse locations (along with several others we have visited :))

Showers and dinner back at Gee 2 prepared us for our next adventure further up the coast. We headed up to Grand Marais a mere 50 miles from the Canadian Border. There is the beginning of the Gunfllint Trail and we had set our sights on driving the trail and camping along it. We noted that all the campgrounds along the trail are operated by the National Forest Service. We have always found those parks among the prettiest. Given that we wanted to see Grand Marais as well we chose the first campground on the way, Devil Track Lake is its name and I can highly recommend any site in that campground, but #10 is truly exquisite. Carol backed Gee 2 into the site so our curb side faced the lake and the rest of the coach was nestled in the trees such that once we closed the front drapes we were totally private. The sites on either side of us were occupied and not much else in the campground. We were unaware of our neighbors and they of us unless we chose to step out on the road to greet them on the way to and from the boat launch. We inflated our Sea Eagle kayak and launched it on the lake for a mornings play right from our site. Our plan had been to go further into the BWCWA, but the shortest routes were measured in days and even the shortest hike we could find was 52 kilometers. We spent much of the rest of the day sitting in the sun, on our oh so private and beautiful campsite, reading. You should know that all of this luxury cost $7.50 a night (that is a 50% discount for surviving to 65). Thank you fellow taxpayers. Of course there was no running water, sanitary sewer or electricity available, but what do you want for $7.50 a night. We were well prepared for an extended stay as we had just been dry camping (with electric) for 7 nights at the convention. Our generator supplied all the electricity we needed. We did drive into Grand Marais twice, the second time because there was a semblance of cell service there so we could be in touch with family. This was our last time on the network until we reached Sault Ste Marie, two days later.

We left our site in the woods as the campground was starting to fill with the weekend approaching. At the border the Canadian inspector was most concerned about the car in tow which I assured him was ours and we did indeed intend to bring it back to the States with us. He did not ask for papers.

Before we reached the border we entered the Grand Portage Reservation and stopped at Grand Portage National Monument. This was the location of the Rendezvous where the Voyageurs from Montreal met the trappers who had spent the winter collecting furs to trade with the East. It was managed by the Northwest Trading Company until the border between the US and Canada was established at which point the trading post was moved to Fort William on the other side of the border. This is a wonderful stop and the costumed interpreters were excellent. After a couple of hours we continued on to Thunder Bay ON where we eventually found our targeted campground and set up for a night. We thought we might stay two nights, but after a drive through of the town we decided that there was little of interest to hold us. In the morning we broke camp and drove to Fort William and parked in a very empty lot as the place was not yet open. This is done on a much grander scale than Grand Portage. It has been operating since the 70’s and has a lot of people playing the roles of life at the fort in1815. It is better not to admit being from “America” as the Scots are not particularly well disposed to the people who defeated them in the War of 1812. We managed not to get arrested, but were challenged a couple of times in the name of fun. Among the highlights of our visit was a chance to join the crew of a Voyageur canoe and paddle it on the river that the Fort sits on. It is no small task to paddle a broad beamed 24 foot birch bark canoe with a couple of kids waving paddles at random. And two other adult visitors and a crew of two from the Fort.

By noon or so we worked our way back to the entrance and after lunch on Gee 2 we set off for Sault Ste Marie where I am sitting now in Glenview Cottages and Campground. We are just down the road from Blueberry Hill where we remember staying with the kids on that long ago trip. We will be going on a Lock Tour soon. It is a two hour boat ride that includes going up the American Locks and down the Canadian Locks and a tour of the area as time permits after the locks.

After seven days at the Minnesota State Fairground outside St Paul, we decided to spend a couple of days seeing the area so we took our shortest one day drive yet – 6 miles – to Lowry Grove RV Park. It has a good laundry, full hookups and apparent proximity to everything we want to see . It is otherwise over priced and the sites are small and difficult to access amidst the broken down seasonals and mobile homes.

Friday after setting up and doing laundry we set out to see the State Capitol in St Paul and the Cathedral just down the street. Both are very impressive and worth the stop, bring quarters to the Capitol as there is no place to get them and the meters take 6 for an hour, allow at least an hour for the tour. The parking at the Cathedral was free and depending on your interests it could take 30 minutes or as much more as your inclinations suggest.

Upon leaving the Cathedral at about 4:30 PM we decided that a good plan for the day was to drive to Mall of America in Bloomington, just south of Minneapolis, and take the light rail into the Nicolette Mall in Minneapolis and have dinner at a sidewalk cafe. The drive there was uneventful and Germaine got us there with no problems. We parked in the West lot only to discover that the train ran from the East lot. This enabled us to walk through the entire mall on the second level and get a good overview of a gigantic mall with a huge indoor amusement park in the middle. Amazing! We caught the train for $2 each for 6 hour tickets and wondered as it began to fill to bursting. Only after the third stop did we notice the many Twins shirts and realize that the stop two before ours was the Metrodome where the Twins play, yup it was a game night.

We finally got to Nicolette Mall and took a nice stroll before selecting Zelo’s as the place for dinner. It was a wonderful meal and when we finally got to look inside it turns out to be a very fancy restaurant as well as having fine food. Carol and I had noted during dinner that women going in to the restaurant were very well dressed in fancy outfits and high heels, unlike many others on the street. Following dinner we resumed our stroll and were drawn in by the sound of music, well some might call it music. It was Rock. Minneapolis celebrates summer with the Aquatennial (that is not a misspelling) and it includes loud music, beer and too much smoking of all sorts. The crowd was young and in a party mood. The characteristic that drew us closer to the stage, at the risk of our hearing was a Hammond B3 organ playing at the front of the group. Too much noise and echo to really enjoy it. We bailed out and headed for the train.

Oops, the game wasn’t over but the Twins had a 6 run lead and the fans were headed home. Another train filled to overflowing. By 10:15 or 10:30 we were in the car ready to get to Gee 2 and some sleep. It was not to be for some time. You must have read that a bridge over the Mississippi has fallen down, try to tell that to a Garmen Nuvi 350 GPS, it refused to understand and would not reroute us. Worse I35W Northbound was closed further south and we could not even reach the bridge that was open. We found ourselves on surface streets with no idea where we were. A gas station operator sent us back south to the Mall of America to start over by going east to I 35E to go north. The GPS did not like this and kept trying to turn us around, I kept hoping we would get to where the I35E route would be the more direct route. We reached that point finally only to find the road closed for weekend construction. Back to surface roads, at least by now we were on the east of the river as is the campground. No one we spoke to had any idea how to get anyplace without the Interstates and we could not trust the GPS as it also assumed the interstates were open. Finally, I put in the Fairgrounds as my destination, figuring that I had gotten to the campground from there once and I could do it again. ALMOST!! we ran into two more closed exits blocking our access to the campground. Another 3 miles out of the way and we finally pulled into Lowry Grove after 90 minutes of not having a clue of how to get there. I kissed the hood on Gee 2 and Carol cheered my finally getting us there.

Today has been clean up and relax so far. There is Raptor Center not far from here and other things to see that will not require the use of interstates. We do wonder what the Republicans are going going to do here in late summer when they overlap the State Fair and the road repair will not be finished. The locals are trying to see how far away they can get!

No plan for tomorrow, yet, but I think we will head for the north shore and ultimately, Duluth and over the top of the Great Lakes.

On July 7 we left Rochester for a summer adventure. The plan is to spend a week in St Paul, MN at the Fairgrounds with a few thousand other RVers making new friends and getting some things repaired and learning new and old things about the life style and the equipment we depend on. Then we will move north for some more experiences that are dependent on our own resources. Then we think we will drive over the top of the Great Lakes and return through Niagara Falls eventually, with a stop in Toronto and Hamilton to see family. Time will tell. After a ten day stop in Rochester we will head on down to Charlottesville for a reprise of Camp Goldberg. Yechiel and company are flying in to Dulles and meeting us all at Dan’s place where we will spend the week. They are responsible for planning the events.

But I get ahead of myself.

Our normal driving day is 6 hours or about 250 to 300 miles. On Monday we rolled out at 8:45 AM with no real objective other than to get past Toledo, OH. Somehow as we rolled through Toledo at 4:30 or so, it seemed too early to stop. There was plenty of daylight left and neither of us was road weary yet. So on we rolled. Eventually as we were approaching Elkhart, IN we decided enough is enough and I logged on to OvernightRVParking.com and determined there was a Wal Mart that permitted overnight parking just off the Interstate. While we were there I figured out that we were less than 6 miles form the RV/MH Hall of Fame and Museum. Click here for the site. How could we not stop there? After some minimal shopping and a good night’s sleep, we drove to the Museum for a visit. Admission was $6 each and we saw many historical RV’s starting with 1916 trailers and progressing through some stunning machines from the 30’s. There are also RVs from the 40’s through 70’s represented and of course several brand new models in an area labeled “Go RVing.” We tore ourselves away and rolled on down the road headed for Madison, WI to see Mimi (my cousin) some of Madison and to go kayaking on Lake Mendota. As we traveled we were in contact with several people including Janet and Bob Corin, fellow members of CHAI, our Jewish Chapter of FMCA. Since we were headed in together we agreed to meet in Madison and travel together to the Convention. We surprised ourselves, and Mimi, by arriving in Madison in mid afternoon. We had called ahead and told her to expect us and she invited us to dinner at her house for that evening. We reciprocated for the following night. Wow, Madison, WI about 800 miles in two days. It may not seem like a lot to many, but we seldom do two long days back to back and while the second day was about 300 miles, that included driving right through Chicago on I 90.

As we were driving to Mimi’s the Corins called to let us know that they too were running a day ahead and they were set up next to G 2 in the campground. We promised to drop in when we got back and continued on to dinner. We had a wonderful evening with Mimi and the vegetarian meal was wonderful.

We parted exhausted and looking forward to kayaking and dinner on the coach the next night. We spent some time with Janet and Bob when we got back and then we turned in. By now the cold I had left home with was starting to clear and Carol was coming down with it. Wednesday dawned clear and we took the Corins into Madison with us to tour the Capital see what else there was to see in that area. After the tour we met Mimi for lunch and then we went on to Olbrich Gardens, which had been highly recommended and then back to meet Mimi at the coach. She and I went kayaking for about an hour while Carol got the basics of dinner together. On our return it was getting dark and we buttoned up and settled in to dinner and conversation. Eventually it became time for even that to end and we said goodbye and started to square away for two more road days. Thursday to reach Fairchild, WI and a lovely campground called Briarcliff. At a roadside cheese store the staff suggested we listen to weather radio as the weather was getting dicey.

As we drove on the sky turned stormy and the winds began to blow. There were several rain squalls and plenty of thunder and lightening. We reached the park and settled in and prepared for an early departure on Friday to reach the fairgrounds before noon. The weather news was not comforting and there were no storm shelters near the campground. Not a really happy idea, either way. As we turned in we were slashed by a vicious storm and there was a second sometime in the middle of the night. The third started at 5 AM, at least that was when it reached a pitch to wake me, and battered us with high winds, blinding rain, nonstop lightening and hail for a couple of hours. At one point everything seemed to slow down and there was the sound of constant rolling thunder that went on and on. We have since been told that that is the sound of a tornado. Thank you, the next time I hear that I want the sound in digital from a very good speaker, but not live in person. By the time we began our breakfast the sky was clear and the fields were glistening with water in the sunlight. The Corins were ready to roll but had to listen to the endless screeching of an alarm triggered by a hydraulic problem with their leveling jacks, the jacks were properly stowed for travel but the sensor didn’t believe it. They rerouted to a dealership to get it fixed before entering the fairgrounds. Although we agreed to ask the parking crew to hold a space for them next to us, we both knew that it was unlikely they would do such a thing, the rules specifically says they may not. In the event, the way we are stacked there is no way for an interior coach to move in or out without moving several others to make room.

And here we are at the FMCA Convention in St Paul. Carol and I have already put in half our volunteer hours and by 1 PM Sunday we will have completed our task which is stand at the road side on a major route into the fairground with a big sign to welcome the arriving coaches. It seems like a small thing, but the arriving coaches sound their horns when they see us and the occupants smile and wave. It’s nice to make people smile and feel happy so the mechanical job that could be done with a sign board is much better done by a “late middle aged” couple who are part of the club.