Monday, February 12, 2007

We were both up early this morning as Sharon was going with Mary to clean toys for the charity that she works for.  They'll be gone from 8:30 to noon and Dennis and I didn't have anything to do.  I went in the house and had some toast and coffee and sat and talked for a while before I finally came back out to the motorhome and made Breakfast and Showered and cleaned up.

We had plenty of time to look for a new T-shirt for me so Dennis and I took off to find one.  We visited several stores before we started back home and Dennis decided to try one final store.  It just so happened that they had a very good selection of shirts that I liked.  I had a hard time finding one in the size I wanted but finally found what I was looking for.

We made it back home just in time to put potatoes in the oven for our "Linner."  That's the meal that comes between lunch and Dinner.  We would be having Grilled Pork Chops, Baked Potato and Cole Slaw with apple slices.  And the capper would be a Chocolate Pie with Cream Topping.  It was all quite good and another full stomach made its appearance.  It was a perfect time for a little nap to rest the bounty.

A little later I Showed Mary and Dennis a few pointer on putting together a slide show to put their Germany pictures on a DVD.  The pictures we saw last night were from the people they went to Germany with, and not theirs.

"24" had another two hour extravaganza on tonight and Dennis and I went to the "football room" to watch it.  Mary made popcorn tonight to carry us over to bedtime and we all lasted til 10 before we finally headed for the feathers.  We actually came back out to the motorhome and I watched a couple of half hour shows before we finally made it to bed.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

We hit the road early and rolling this morning at 8:30 headed south toward I-10 and points east.

We ran into a little rain prior to getting into El Paso.  Just enough to slop up th outside of the motorhome.

We wanted to make it to Exit 37 in El Paso, Texas since gas there would be $1.95.  At about 11 we rolled into the Flying J where gas was, indeed the price I found on the Internet this morning.  Gas across the street at Love's was still $2.05.

I also had Sharon stop at McDonald's for Breakfast but we were too late.  I knew that they didn't serve Breakfast after 10:30 but had no idea it was that late.

We continued on after our gas stop and Sharon drove for a couple of hours before I took over again and drove as far as Sonora, Texas and the rest stop there.  We don't usually stay overnight in Rest Areas but we suspected that this one might have free Wi-Fi even though it didn't advertise it.  And suspecting as we did, the Wi-Fi was up and running and free.

We watched TV all night after Sharon called the 800 number at the USPS and got the right zip code for Sonora.  We had some of our favorites on tonight and didn't want to be without TV.

We did however dash to the feathers at 10 and the warmth under the covers.

Wednesday, February 14, 2007HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

We were on the road early again today hoping to make it to Louisiana by the end of the day.  Texas is a giant trip and takes almost 900 miles to get through it by way of Interstate 10.

We both took our turns behind the wheel today except when we went through San Antonio and Houston.  San Antonio was horrendous to drive through during the morning and Houston was not too bad at rush hour at 4 PM.  We actually took a bypass to avoid most of the traffic going through San Antonio.  It didn't seem to make much difference.

We stopped a couple of times today to find a grocery store to pick up a few things that Sharon wanted for a diet.  She got the diet from Norm and Sue Jones a couple of weeks ago in Yuma.  We didn't have any luck with the grocery store until we found our final gas station in Texas at Orange.

It had already turned into night by the time she got done with her shopping.  Luckily we only had a few miles to drive to get to the Louisiana Rest Area where we would spend the night.  We're not that crazy about Rest Areas and this one was quite noisy to say the least.  We were however, hoping for some more of that free Wi-Fi for tonight.  We endured the noise and didn't get the Wi-Fi.

We settled in for TV and All the batteries went dead in about a half hour.  The car was the only thing working so we pulled it up on the sidewalk to jump the Generator and Engine batteries on the motorhome.  It didn't work until I spotted the problem.  One of the cables on the Auxiliary Batteries had broken completely off the connector.  The broken cable laid directly in place so it was almost impossible to detect.  After spotting the problem we had everything up and running in a few minutes after the repair.  A temporary repair but at least it worked.

We watched TV for the rest of the night having completed the part of the journey we had dreaded most. (The 2½ days through Texas) We only stayed up until 10 and then caved for the night.

Most of the night we listened to the sounds of the Interstate and the trucks that had entered the Rest Area where we parked. 

Thursday, February 15, 2007

We got a leisurely start this morning getting on the road by 9 AM after eating Breakfast and getting our showers in.  We were in no real hurry today as we are thinking we'll need to wait a couple of days down south until the weather breaks up north.

We tried to find Sicily's near Broussard and drove right past the exit.  My Navigator was napping at the time.  We also knew that there was another one near Baton Rouge but we couldn't find that one either.  It's probably IN Baton Rouge and not a place you want to be driving with a motorhome.

We continued on and finally wound up in Robert, Louisiana at a Jellystone Park that we had been to several years before.  We'll watch the weather over the next couple of days and if it happens to break we'll try to slip through to the"frozen tundra."  This campground started to fill up while we were here and it's probably for Mardi Gras next week.

Sharon was perusing the papers here and found that there was going to be one of the Mardi Gras parades here in Hammond, Louisiana tonight.  We've always wanted to come to Mardi Gras but we were never here at this time of the year.  We'll probably bite the bullet even though it's a little nippy out and take in the parade.

After Sharon ate her diet supper we took off to Hammond to see the parade.  Hammond was only about 10 miles away from our campground so it only took us a few minutes to drive over.  And then it took us about a half hour to find a good place to view the whole extravaganza.  Because the night had fallen it was difficult to take pictures, but we did manage a few.  We did however manage to retrieve 129 sets of beads that we had around our necks.  We also caught a number of cups, candy and other items including one ceramic rabbit with a broken ear, probably from hitting the ground even though it was wrapped up in a padded bundle.

On the way home we got waylaid by a one way street that was supposed to be our highway back home.  After about 20 minutes we figured out the problem and got back on our highway to Robert.  We were back home in about 15 minutes and camped in front of a nice warm TV.  We watched a couple of shows until 10, but were still not warmed up by the time we hit the hay at 10.

Friday, February 16, 2007

We didn't have anything to do today except stay here and wait for the weather to break up north.  After checking the extended forecast it looks like it will get warmer by Monday and Tuesday.  We'll need about 3 days to get home and we'll probably start on Sunday headed north.  It looks like we'll take I-55 up through Mississippi from here.  We were on I-55 several years ago and were not pleased about it's condition.  Hopefully it's improved since then.

I worked on the Newsletter for most of the morning until we left to find Sicily's Restaurant in Covington.  We feel like this restaurant is more like Sicily's Lite since it doesn't really compare to the other two we've been to.  Be that as it may we drove all the way through Covington and didn't find it. The traffic was really busy and we wondered if it was because of Mardi Gras or not.   On the way back we stopped at a gas station to ask about it.  The White, Elderly woman that we asked had no idea where, or even if, it was.  She gave us the phone book and we found it on the 300 block of hwy 190.  When asked the address of where we were, she had no idea.  As a matter of fact we were in the 400 block of hwy 190.  The restaurant was literally in a mall across the street from the station.  Never, never expect to get directions from a person in a gas station no matter who it is.

We stopped at Sicily's after all that trouble and had a very delicious lunch.  They only had two offerings of Gumbo and no other Cajun food that we could detect.  The Pizzas, however, were very good and we ordered a Cherry Pizza for dessert.  The waitress put a couple of pieces in a box for us to take along.  We had no room left to eat them there.

We came home and both settled in for a little nap until our lunch had settled.  By suppertime we were ready to watch some tube for the night and not much else.  There were a couple of shows on tonight that were running original episodes and we were content to just watch them and then settle into the sheets at 10 o'clock for the long winter's nap.  We'll stay here for another day but checking the weather will be our primary goal over the next couple of days.

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Today would be a "get ready to go" day even though there wouldn't be too much to do.  We don't have anything out to put away but I will be dumping the holding tanks and filling with water.  We'll still have a couple of days on the road before we reach Iron Mountain from here so we need to have our tanks empty when we leave here.

We got a leisurely start this morning but I needed to get a cable clamp to repair the one that broke the other day on our auxiliary batteries.  I've had it temporarily wired since I noticed it was broken but we need a more substantial connection for the rest of the trip home.  We found a clamp just down the road at a hardware store.  We drove past it a couple of times before we realized it was even a store.

As we looked for the cable connector we also noticed a café right next door called Cooter Brown's Seafood.  It looked a little rundown but there were about 15 cars outside the little place.  We figured they were either drinking or eating and as we soon found out, they were all eating.   We were thinking about finding a local place to have lunch or supper, and this looked like what we were looking for.  We boh ordered a seafood selection to eat.  Sharon's was Crawfish New Orleans which was Fried Catfish topped with a Crawfish Etoufeé sauce with Potato Salad and Garlic Bread.  I had Shrimp Lafitte' which was Fried Catfish topped with a Creamed Shrimp Sauce with French Fries and Garlic Bread.  We both had a lettuce salad.   They were both excellent and we were glad that we had bitten the bullet and decided to try this little place.  We couldn't have been more pleasantly surprised.

After lunch we came home and rested our lunch for awhile.  Sharon said I had two good naps.  I didn't argue.  After the naps I got to fixing the battery cable and dumping the holding tanks.  Neither job required much effort and were all done after I filled the water tank.

As usual when supper rolled around neither of us was up to eating it.  We snacked later on but we never ate another meal.

Our usual nighttime position was taken up in front of the TV for the night.  While there wasn't much of an original nature on, there was enough to watch so that we didn't get bored.   I stayed up until 10:30 and Sharon sauntered off to the feathers at 10.  It hadn't been a long day but we were both thinking about leaving tomorrow for the frozen north.  Even though the weather looks like it will get warmer for a few days, It could fool us and stay cold and miserable.

Sunday, February 18, 2007

We left Robert, LA this morning about 8:30 wanting to make sure we made it as far as we should today.  We ha nothing else to do today except make it to about 150 miles from Sikeston, MO so we could stop at Lambert's Café for lunch tomorrow.

We fully expected to hit the rough spots on Interstate 55 that we had experienced several years ago but the bad road never did really materialize.  Sharon had a bad night last night sleeping so she took a little nap along the way this morning.  After she woke up Phil and Joyce Bach called us just to see where we were at.  Sharon had sent them an e-mail telling them that we had caught 130 beads at the Mardi Gras parade at Hammond.  They just wondered if Sharon had "shown" anything to get that many.  It was actually too cold for any skin to make an appearance.

After lunch at a Rest Area Sharon drove for a couple of hours just to make some mileage until the end of the day.  We actually went through 4 states today even though a couple were  only for a few miles.  Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Arkansas were the four states.  We actually ended up for the night in a Wal-Mart in West Memphis, Arkansas.  It was a couple miles out of the way but this area was where we wanted to end up tonight.  Besides there were no campgrounds in this area anyway.

By the time we got here the last 100 laps of the Daytona 500 were on the Telly.  We settled in and just sat down to watch.  It was one of the most exciting finishes we had ever seen.  Cars piled up behind the two leaders when a mishap took place almost at the finish line.  It was quite a melee.

We had Chicken and Rice Casserole for Supper and it was quite good indeed.  Sharon also heated up a medley of vegetables that I pretty much passed on, but the rest of the meal was excellent.

With nothing else to do except go into Wal-Mart and shop, we opted instead to just sit in front of the TV and let it entertain us.  We both made it until 10:30 before the curtain fell on the last act., the audience went home, and we locked up the theater.  It had been a somewhat long day since we were driving all day only stopping to eat lunch.  Tomorrow will be much more of the same except we'll probably drive until dark tomorrow.  Those long stretches aren't that difficult with two people driving.