Monday, April 23, 2012

We got up this morning optimistic that our car would be finished and that we could pick it up this afternoon.

We ate Breakfast at home this morning and took care of a couple of things including checking the oil on the motorhome, cleaning the windshield and dumping the holding tanks.

I waited until after our lunch at Burger King before I called the dealer confident that the transmission would have arrived and that they were working on it.  I was told by Ronnie, the Service Advisor, that it had already been installed and that they needed to finish up on the torque converter and the pump.  I was told to call back around 3:30 when it was probable it would be done.

By 3:30 we were anxious to know if we could pick up the car and get rid of this Ford Focus.  We were told that by 4:30 the car would be more than likely ready to go, so stop by at that time.  True to their word, we returned at 4:30 and it was ready to go.

We got back home by 5 and continued getting ourselves ready to leave tomorrow morning.  We mad our final plans to get on the road as early as possible because we knew that we were stopping at Groom, Texas and the giant cross.  It will take us a little over 3 hours to get there, and then we’ll just go as far as we can go tomorrow night.

Neither of us was hungry for supper tonight after we consumed a Chocolate Brownie Sundae after lunch today.  We just fended for ourselves when we got hungry.  Sharon made a meatloaf yesterday so I had a meatloaf sandwich tonight and Sharon had a Big Salad with leftover Chicken Strips from last night’s Supper.

We settled in front of the TV for the night waiting for the invasion of the moths again.  It really didn’t happen tonight but we did have a couple make their way into the shack.  We dispatched them immediately by spraying them with either Windex or Febreze depending on where they landed.

We had a pretty good night with the programming that we watched tonight.  We had a couple of repeats but there were new episodes of American Chopper and American Pickers.  Sharon headed for the feathers at 10 but I hung in there until 11 since I wasn’t really tired at that time.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

We had everything together this morning and we were on the road headed toward the gas station at 9.  Everything seemed to be working according to plan and except for a snafu at the gas station our start was uneventful.  It’s always good to get a clean start after you’ve had some trouble like we did.  Our snafu at the gas station involved not being able to get the tank topped off.  Its happened before and it wasn’t a big deal, just annoying.

As we approached Amarillo we decided to take the loop road around the downtown.  We figured we would avoid the majority of the traffic and it would get us through in a hurry.  The Loop actually exited between the Petro and Flying J Stations on east I-40.

We had planned on stopping at the Giant Cross in Groom, Texas and we figured it would take us about 3 hours from Lubbock to get there.  We rolled into Groom just after noon and settled in to eat lunch before we started the touristy things outside.  We stayed at Groom for about an hour and a half before we got back in the motorhome and moved on again.  This was quite the beautiful place with exquisite sculptures and an enlightening experience.

As soon as we got back on the road we started looking for a place to stay the night.  We thought a casino with free hookups would be ideal, but we were having trouble finding one in the area where we were going to stop for the night.  We finally found one in Clinton, Oklahoma just a little short of our planned stop at Oklahoma City.  As soon as we got to the casino we got a “follow me” sign from a guy in a golf cart.  We parked next to a power pole with several electric plug-ins.  We really had no intention of going in the casino to gamble, but they offered us a ride up to the building anyway.  They sounded like they really wanted us spending money and who can argue with that?

But we settled in front of the TV and in the Air Conditioning for the rest of the night.  I wasn’t budging but Sharon would have gone inside for awhile if they would have driven the shuttle past the motorhome.  We were in time and settled before our regular TV schedule started tonight.  We even had some shows to tape for tomorrow or the next day.  Both of us toughed it out until 11 before we finally gave it up for a soft place to lay down, and a pillow.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

We awoke this morning to a bright sunshiny day that was expected to get to 92 degrees wherever we went.  There was going to be no escape from the heat today except in the air conditioning.

We were off “early” with the intention of driving as fast and as far as we could today trying to make up for some of the lost time at Lubbock.  Our first stop on the way out of town was at Subway to pick up a couple of Steak, Egg and Cheese Sandwiches on Flatbread.  We’ve been tearing Subway up this month with their BOGO offer to give us one for free.  We stayed right in Subway’s parking lot and ate our Breakfast and then moved on.

Our next stop was in the Oklahoma City area to fill up with gas.  We figured that today the cheapest gas we would encounter would hopefully be in the Oklahoma City area.  And we were right.  We found it for $3.46.  Of course 2 miles farther up the road they were selling it for 2 cents cheaper.  We didn’t have internet last night so I couldn’t check to see who was cheaper, so we just flew by the seat of our pants for today.

At lunchtime we just pulled over into an empty parking lot and ate sandwiches.  We weren’t interested in doing anything elaborate, and beside we were just driving our guts out today.  We thought that if we got between Joplin and Kansas City, Missouri we’d be doing good for the day.  We actually finished up about 40 miles north of Kansas City in a little town named Cameron, MO.  We pulled into a Wal-Mart for the night even though we had no generator.  We figured we wouldn’t be watching TV tonight anyway because of the late hour.  We found the Wal-Mart at 8 o’clock just as the sun was setting for the day.  We pulled in while we could still see daylight.  Perfect timing.

We decided we would go out for Dinner tonight if we could find something but the GPS wasn’t helping us at all.  We just decided to drive across the Interstate and see what we could find.  We found a place called Ma and Pa’s Kettle.  It was really a pretty good sized restaurant with a lot of seating.  We ordered and sat and enjoyed our Dinner.  I had Chicken Fried Steak and Sharon had a Ham Steak Dinner.  It was very good having just found the place by chance.

By the time we got home around 9:30 my eyes were so heavy I could hardly keep them open, so I quit trying just before 10. I went to bed and Sharon stayed up to finish her drink, and I was sleeping by the time she got there.  I was out cold for the rest of the night.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Last night was quite quiet and we had no problem getting a good night’s sleep.  We left the parking lot this morning with a single plan in effect.

First, we were searching for a Subway for our Breakfast.  We were planning to find one after we got on the road and then just take an exit to get to it.  It was getting close to 9 o’clock and the BOGO offer was slipping away from us for today.  But low and behold just before 9 we managed to find the “Great Provider” and pulled off the highway for our Breakfast.  The funny thing is, the more Steak, Egg and Cheeses we buy the cheaper they get.  Today’s Breakfast came to $4.04.  Quite the bargain for two Breakfasts.

After Breakfast we were on our way again only to stop for gas for the rest of the day.  We arrived in LeClaire, Iowa about 3 o’clock and set out to find the home of the “American Pickers.”  The GPS managed to take us right to it.  We found a spot to park right on a hill in back of the shop.  We were surprised what we found as compared to our impression formulated from the TV show.  A lot of times the reality doesn’t match up to the fantasy.  Their location is not in a rural area but in the middle of town.  Apparently the surrounding area has been airbrushed out for the show, and the shop is located on a hill with very little room on the lot.  None of the stars from the show were in today as we just walked around the shop recognizing several prominent items that we had seen them “pick” on the show.  We had spent about an hour in LeClaire which included a short stop at Denny D’s vintage clothes store across the street.

After our short stop we were on the road again to find a campground.  We had a Coast to Coast listing that really sounded good.  It was close so we could finally get to a campground early in the day.  The name of te resort was Sunset Lakes in Hillsdale, Illinois.  We found it to be one of the nicest campgrounds that we’ve been in in a long time.  Their clubhouse was absolutely gorgeous and the sites were all grassy and very clean.  We were only staying overnight but it was a nice place to stop.

We settled into our site and the satellite receiver was acting up again.  The signal was dropping out for no apparent reason.  We just bit the bullet and settled for the intermittent reception for the rest of the night.  It would only go out momentarily and it really didn’t become annoying watching our repeats.  We were out of there by 10 o’clock and into the sack.

Friday, April 27, 2012

By the time we got going this morning we knew we were going to have a short day with very few, about 200 miles, to drive.  We knew that once we got to my sister’s in Racine, Wisconsin we would be done for the day.

We stopped at a place called Riga-Tony’s for lunch today right around Lake Geneva, WI.  We had a really good meal but had to eat it on paper plates and with plastic utensils.  Had we known we could have bought it to go,  and eaten it in the motorhome on plates and real silverware.  It was really good however.  I had a Stuffed Green Pepper and Sharon had Sicilian Lasagna.

Hoping to make it to Oak Creek before needing gas we had to pull over and put 10 gallons in at $3.92.  Ouch!  We arrived in Racine and found our campground after a fashion.  The GPS took us up to a dead end and we had to ask for directions.  We asked a guy just sitting in a car at the end of the cul-de-sac we found ourselves in.  He was very helpful and we found the campground with a couple of turns backtracking.

We had never been to this campground before and found it a bother to have to drive to my sister’s from here.  We’re only here for one night when we come, so to have to drive 7 or so miles to get to her house is really not feasible when we could stay in their driveway.  We got stuck in the grass last year when we drifted off the blacktop, but other than that, it is so much more convenient.  I’ll just have to be more careful in the future.

We went over to their place this afternoon and didn’t get home until 11:45 tonight.  We sat around talking in the afternoon and then later their daughter LouAnn and her husband Pat stopped over to go out to eat with us.  We met their daughter Bria at the restaurant and we all sat and had a nice Dinner together.  I had Stuffed Shrimp and Sharon had a Cod Fish Fry.  The food was good as expected.  We had eaten here at Buono Vita Restaurant before on a couple of occasions.

After Dinner we went back to the house to participate in the annual fleecing of the relatives ritual.  LouAnn and Pat came with us and were a part of the actual fleecing.  Actually they were the main part of the fleecing, since Pat was the big winner for the night.

We managed to extract ourselves after making plans for Breakfast and driving the 7-8 miles back to the campground.  We got back late enough that neither of us cared about any TV for the night.  We were just happy to be home after a long day that we had imposed on ourselves by choice.

Saturday, April 28, 2012

We awoke this morning to rain.  Damn!  We stayed at this campground last night just so we could dump our holding tanks this morning for the trip home.  It’s not going to happen in the rain.

It was quiet here last night and we got a good night’s rest even after coming home late after the fleecing.

We had plans to meet Marge and Wally at the Douglas Street Diner, a little restaurant in the K-Mart Mall, just down the street so we wouldn’t have to drive all the way back into Racine this morning.

By the time we got ready and left the campground this morning, the rain had stopped just long enough to stop at the dump station and take care of business.  The end of the hose at the dump station was a ll screwed up so we didn’t have any water to rinse the tank so we pumped a little of our own water in to get the job done.

We were off and rolling about 9:15 toward the restaurant and we arrived just as Marge and Wally were coming into the parking lot.  Perfect.

For the next hour we sat and ate Breakfast and then we hit the road headed toward Sean and Stephanie’s in West Bend, Wisconsin.  With that stop we’ll have managed to get back on our original schedule with the exception of the lost 5 days in Lubbock.

We arrived in West Bend at about noon and went into Sean and Julie’s and sat and talked for about an hour or so before we went over to Stef’s.  We were going over to see her remodeling job on the basement, her T-shirt stenciling business  and to spend the night having Dinner and adult beverages.  We ordered out Chinese food tonight and Mark and I picked it up at Chinatown Restaurant.  The food was quite good and everybody seemed to love it.

We called it a night about 9 tonight after having some long days over the past week.  It just seemed like the right time to go home and get some rest.  I actually took a pre-sleep in my recliner before I finally went to bed about 11.  It had been a nice day all around.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

We were up late this morning but even then it was only 8 in the morning.  We had said our good-byes to Stephanie and Mark’s Clan last night and we wanted to do the same with Sean and Julie this morning.  We unplugged our electric cord, and rolled it up, and then headed for the house.

It only took a couple of minutes for the kisses and hugs and the final “so longs”, and then we were back to the coach and mounted up.

The morning had greeted us with a bright sunshiny day and it looked like a perfect day for driving.  We would be home around noon because we had no stops to make except for Breakfast today.  We’ll find a McDonald’s or a Subway somewhere on the highway after we get rolling, have a quick Breakfast, and then get right back on the trail.

We were on the road for about 15 minutes when we spotted a road sign that gave us the option of either McDonald’s or Subway.  So we took that exit and the only one we spotted was McDonald’s and they always seem to have a pretty good sized parking lot for us.  So it would be a big breakfast at McD’s for this morning.

After Breakfast we hit the road again with our next stop planned for Iron Mountain and home.  With no other incidents we rolled into home just after noon and got our rig parked, and we took off in the car to visit our kids.  The last time we had seen this driveway was November 27th of 2011.  Welcome back to home sweet home.

THE END