HAPPY 7TH ANNIVERSARY TO US

October 16, 2016 – This is the last day of our seventh year of travel. Although we no longer “full-time,” we continue to travel more than six months per year. Here is a little summary of our seventh year of travel.

We began the year in Fort Myers, FL, in the middle of a whirlwind tour of Florida. We traveled on both coasts of the state. The Fort Myers area was one of our favorite spots. Later in the month of October, we met up with friends Jeri and Terry Williams and Jan and Jerry Hyde in Santa Rosa Beach. We met both these couple the first year of our travels, and we've renewed friendship occasionally ever since.

Paul, Marsha, Jerry, Jan, Terry, Jeri

November found us in our second home, at the Elks Lodge CG in Houston, TX. We usually spend the Thanksgiving holiday through December there to visit with our daughter, Carrie. We will continue that tradition this year.  Then Marsha flies back to Ohio early in December, and Paul and Carrie join her a few weeks before Christmas.

January found us with RV friends in Mission, TX, part of the Texas Rio Grande Valley on the Texas– Mexico borders. We really enjoyed our time with old friends.

We also visited our dentist in Nuevo Progresso, Mexico. We had significant dental work performed this past year at a mere fraction of what we were quoted in the States. We will only need cleaning this winter and will have it taken care of that when visiting Los Algodones, MX across the border from Yuma, AZ later in January 2017.

After our visit to the Rio Grande Valley, we returned to spend the rest of the winter in the Houston, area. Paul had been having problems with his right knee and had arthroscopic surgery in February.

Paul did recover enough from the arthroscopic surgery to attend the Houston Barbecue Cook-off and the Houston Rodeo in March. What a great time we have visiting both of these events.

Barbecue Cook off

April found us in Springfield, IL, to visit “Everything Lincoln.” This is something Marsha has been looking forward to for some time. We had a great time and recommend this stop to anyone interested in historical areas.

Winter caught up with us in Illinois. We tried to outrun some cold temperatures and a few snow flurries, but unfortunately we failed. The good news, it was only for one night and only a little snow stuck to the ground!

Home a bit too early.

Back in our summer home in Canton, Ohio, Paul dove into a remodeling project. He had plans to build a second bathroom in the basement, which is a common project in our neighborhood. It ended up being a bigger project then planned. He had to bust up some of the concrete floor to install under-ground plumbing. But alas, he was able to finish the bathroom before his total knee replacement surgery in mid-July.

Marsha kept busy with her many crafts, volunteering at her Church, working in the yard, visiting with her dad and the rest of her family and catching up with her many friends.

We enjoyed visits with our daughter, Kelly and her husband, Dave. They live in NE Ohio in wine country, so that meant visiting several wineries. What fun! Our Texas daughter, Carrie, arrived for a visit over the July 4^th holiday. What a great time to have the entire family together.

Having fun at the annual wine tasting party.

We even had a visit in Ohio with Paul's brother, John and Karen, from Augusta, GA. We had a fun get-together at Linda and Dave's home (Paul's other brother) in Barberton, OH. Most of the family was able to be there, so it was like a family reunion.

Karen, John, Linda, Dave, Marsha, Paul

Of course, we had to attend a Cleveland Indians baseball game! We did this with Kelly and Dave and a couple of Marsha’s brothers and their wives. We helped cheer the Tribe to a victory and eventually Central Division Champs.

That is our group in the upper-right corner.

Paul did enjoy working with Dave and Kelly in a bathroom remodeling project of their own. They did a beautiful master bathroom remodel in their gorgeous home in Chardon, Ohio. Dave is quite the hobby tiler and did a huge tiling job in the new bathroom. Paul was his “cut-man” trimming the tiles where needed. A fun couple of weekends.

We finished the summer with a visit from Angie and Rick, our Mission, Texas, friends. They were on their way to Chicago and swung a little bit our of their way to stop for a few days and visit with us. It was a nice visit. We enjoyed having them as house guests.

Paul, Marsha, Rick, Angie, Kelly, Dave

We had hoped to leave Ohio around the first of September, but Paul's knee was still giving him some discomfort, so we postponed our departure and changed our travel plans. We eventually departed near the end of September and experienced a travel week full of problems. The air-conditioner on the 5^th wheel died; we had a check engine light on our Ford truck requiring cleaning of the exhaust filter; our new tire pressure monitor failed; we needed to replace our shower fixture; Marsha's Kindle reader wouldn't charge and was replaced under warranty; and to add insult to injury, Paul's rear bike tire blew out on our first bike ride on the beautiful trails in Gulf Coast, AL.

Gulf Shores, AL

Bay St. Louis, MS

After an abbreviated visit to many of our favorite areas in the Gulf of Mexico, we limped into the Houston Elks Lodge in Stafford, TX. There was only one RV site open, and we quickly settled in for the next couple of months.

We successfully completed many of the needed repairs and are moving forward with plans to visit Arizona and the Southwestern part of the U.S. in 2017.

SOME INTERESTING STATISTICS FROM OUR 7TH YEAR ON THE ROAD:

Starting Date: 10/17/15
Starting Location: Alva, Florida
Ending Location: Houston, Texas

Number of different cities visited:  19
Average length of stay per visit:  8.53 days
Average campground cost: $13.52
Truck miles driven:  11044

Highest price paid for diesel fuel:  $2.54 (Cedar Creek, FL)
Lowest price paid for diesel fuel:  $1.59 (Houston, TX)
Average price for diesel fuel:  $2.04
Average miles per gallon:  10.361

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. have a great day!

FINALLY AC

Friday, October 7 – We finally got the air conditioner installed, and it's working hard to cool the 5^th wheel here in Houston (currently 93 degrees). What a two day nightmare.

Paul picked up the AC and accompanying parts at PPL here in Houston on Wednesday. PPL was very busy and couldn't install the unit for approximately two weeks, so they recommended Jeff Allison of Allison RV Repair for the installation. Jeff is a mobile tech and said he would put us at the top of his list due to the extreme hot weather.

Jeff and another worker arrived Thursday morning and quickly removed the old Carrier (They are no longer made and parts are not available.) from the roof of the 5^th wheel and replaced it with a new Coleman Mach 8, 15,000 BTU unit. Now for the interior wiring.

Good thing our neighbor stopped over to supervise…lol

The Carrier had a remote control panel, which are no longer available, so Jeff had to install a wall thermostat to control the new unit. This is where the trouble began. He followed the schematic shown in the installation instructions carefully and could not get the thermostat to work. He worked over 6 hours on Thursday and finally had to call it a day. He promised to return Friday after investigating with several other techs what the problem could possibly be. (Yikes, this has Paul nervous). Another night in hot Houston without air conditioning!

Friday arrived and thankfully so did Jeff. After-all, he wasn't paid for his work all day on Thursday. He was alone today, so Paul helped troubleshoot the thermostat installation problem. Well, after another four more hours, getting a replacement thermostat from PPL in case the original was bad, four calls to Coleman Technical Support and many re-wiring tries, they finally got the AC to cool properly.

The problem was in the installation instructions. On our final call to the Coleman Technical Support, the technician was explaining the wiring and mentioned it should look just like the diagram ON THE BACK of the thermostat, which was all ready mounted to the wall, NOT like it is shown in the instructions. What! We removed the thermostat and rewired it according to the diagram and PRESTO it worked. Over 8 hours of frustration solved in about ten minutes. Crazy!

Looks pretty nice.

Paul and Jeff arrived at what they felt was a fair price for two days of frustration and parted friends. Everyone was happy. Friday evening was spent at home relaxing in the air conditioned 5^th wheel watching the Cleveland Indians win game two of the American League Division Series. They've won the first two games over Boston. GO TRIBE!!

The Elks Lodge campground it packed. We were very lucky to grab the last spot available. It is on grass, but we have a spot. The people in Site 1, our normal site, will be leaving in two weeks. We will pull into that spot as soon as they pull out.

Site 9

Looking right.

Looking left.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!

BAY ST. LOUIS GETS READY FOR CRUZIN’

Tuesday, October 4 – Well, we didn't win the millions we hoped for at the casino last night. Marsha did win $37, but Paul lost his usual $20. It was a fun evening regardless.

This morning we were on the beach, across the street from the campground, bright and early to take full advantage of our last day. Another beautiful day!

We cleaned-up around lunch time to head downtown Bay St. Louis, MS, to do a little window shopping among the many small shops. If you visit this area and love delicious breads, stop in at Serious Bread: Handmade Artisan Breads. Yummmmmy!  The gal at the Visitor’s Center suggest we try there Garlic Rosemary Sourdough bread…awesome. We had to buy a loaf. The sales gal suggested we slice and freeze the bread. She said it is still delicious when you take it out of the freezer. Paul also loved the lemon poppy seed muffin.

The sales gal was so excited to explain the benefits of sourdough. Some of you might be interested in the details of the sourdough. Their motto is “All Bread Is Not Created Equal.”

Things are in an exciting mood due to the upcoming Crusin' beginning Thursday. The shopkeepers can almost hear the cash registers ringing. This is a huge event for this entire area. We were told over 7,000 cars are entered in the show. Many are already here. The downtown area is sure a busy place.

We stopped for a delicious seafood lunch at Tony's Seafood in Waveland, MS. We ate here years ago and found it clean, reasonably priced, and plenty of yummy dishes. Paul had the grilled catfish and shrimp dinner, and Marsha enjoyed the grilled shrimp dinner. Both were scrumptious!

There is a tree several yards behind our site that Marsha just loves. She says it has so much character.

We then headed back to the campground to relax and get ready for tomorrow's travel day. We may try to make it all the way to Houston but have a couple places to stop if we decide to it's too long of a day. Normally we wouldn't drive that far but there is only one site open at the Houston Elks, and we would like to get it. Also, our AC/heat pump replacement has arrived at PPL in Houston. We are anxious to get it installed. You can’t believe how hot it is until you don’t have AC.

Bella actually crossed the street with us and walked a short ways to the beach before she scrambled to get back to the safety of her home.

So stop back tomorrow and see where we finished our day. Regardless, we'll be in Houston by Thursday, so if you're passing through in the next several weeks, give us a shout out!

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!

BAY ST. LOUIS, MS.

Sunday, October 2 – It was an easy 3.5 hour drive to our next stop at the Silver Slipper Casino CG in Bay St. Louis, MS. This is a frequent stop for us. As a matter of fact, this is our fifth stop at this casino campground. The price has increased significantly since we began coming here.

We really like that the campground is only 100 feet from the beautiful blue water of the Gulf. The sites are FHU with concrete pads, a patio with a picnic table, and all sites have a great view of the Gulf. We are in the 2^nd lot this year – our first time, and we love the site we were assigned. Site #25 is an end site giving us a very large grassy area to enjoy.

Looking right.

Looking left.

The casino is about a half mile down the coastal street.

We'll spend a couple days enjoying the beach and most likely try our luck at the casino one night. We plan on winning a load of money!

We are alone yet again.

We had a visitor that entertained us.

There are several sites we would also like to see in the neighboring towns. We only have three days to enjoy this stop because beginning Thursday, Crusin' the Beach starts, and all campgrounds are booked solid. Prices go up too!

The resident eagle is back. It frequents a tree in back of the campground.

A beautiful sunrise.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!

WE ARE HAVING A BIT OF BAD LUCK

Saturday, October 1 – We've spent the last three days at Doc's RV Park here in Gulf Shores, AL, and loved it!  We feel this would be a great place to spend a month. That's something we think we'll do in the next year or so.

We would have considered doing it now, but we've had a week in hell dealing with mishaps. “Times that try men's soles.” Since leaving Ohio a mere one-week ago we've had a few problems.

---First our new Tire Tracker tire pressure monitor died. Luckily it is under warranty and is being replaced.
---Then our fresh water hose splitter and short connection hose failed. Gave Paul a little bath. And our shower head was leaking and had to be replaced.
---The check engine light on our F350 came on indicating a need to service the exhaust filter. We finally were able to get the truck into the Ford dealer here in Gulf Shores where they were able to clean it instead of doing an expensive replacement. Cleaning was expensive enough.
---Our worst problem was our air conditioner/heat pump gave. Unfortunately they do not make Carrier any more and parts are no longer available. We decided to order a new Coleman from PPL in Houston and have it replaced when we get there. Of course with the hot weather here in the south, having no AC forced us to change our travel plans and head directly to Houston to have it replaced. $$$
---Gulf Shores, AL, is loaded with bike trails, so this morning we hit the trail for a little exercise. About 2.5 miles from the RV Park Paul's rear tire exploded. Unfortunately, the trend continues and isn't quite over.
---Marsha's less-than-a-year-old Kindle reader also died today. It just wouldn't charge. Luckily, it is under warranty and will be replaced.

So, hopefully that will put an end to our streak of bad luck.

As stated above, we love the Gulf Shores, AL, area and have enjoyed our stay here in Doc's RV Park. The park has gravel streets and RV sites, FHU, a nice swimming pool, very quite, sites are arranged in a nice park setting arrangement, connection to the city bike trails, and friendly management. We walked around the park last evening and marked down several attractive sights.

Looking right.

Looking left.

The beaches here in Gulf Port are amazing. White, sugar-like sand, warm Gulf water, and plenty of public beaches to spread out the crowds. Interestingly, we were here in 2010 when the oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster was coming ashore. It sure has recovered nicely. Although, in a conversation Paul had with the Ford Dealer, he said the area is still suffering economically from the oil disaster. Tourist found other areas to vacation at and haven't returned as hoped.

We had lots of friends join us on the beach.

Paul took a dip, and said it was great.

One of our favorite places to sit and look out over the Gulf.

We are leaving Gulf Shores on Sunday and heading to Bay St. Louis, MS, for a few days. We're staying at the Silver Slipper Casino RV Park – right on the beach – so maybe we can win a bunch of money to recover from our streak of bad luck!

Life goes on.....check back to see how we've recovered. :-)

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y’all back real soon. Have a great day!