RV Woes

Well, Full time RVing is really a lot of fun.....usually. Not so this weekend, as Saturday, I discovered that when I depressed the foot pedal toilet flusher, all that happened was the water ran into the bowl! Yes, picture this---the ball (that allows the stuff to go down the soil pipe) did not move.

After looking at things while lying on the floor, I deduced that something broke inside the flushing mechanism. The ball was not stuck. So now I am manually reaching in there with a rubber glove on and manually moving the ball to the side to allow the bowl contents to drain down the soil pipe. Yuck.

It is a 3 day weekend, and we will not be able to contact anyone until Tuesday morning.... :-(

Great Check up for Ellen

Labor Day Weekend...hmmmm....I haven't worked for three years now, but I still get the day off. Retirement sure has hastened the speed with which time flies. I hope all get to enjoy the last taste of summer.

We are in Rochester, MN, where Ellen has gotten another great check up! Hooray!!!! She is still being monitored for repercussions from a thyroidectomy about 5 years ago. The check up was so good that now she has to report back only once a year instead of twice a year. This is great news! We don't return until September of 2010, so this should loosen up our travel schedule. But the best part is that Ellen's blood and mineral levels are doing fine, as is her bone density. We are ecstatic!

I still have my check up in Jacksonville every 6 months, :( but we have decided to have me fly solo from wherever we are for a day or two. We are fortunate to have good friends in Jacksonville, John and Cindy Dahl. John will actually pick me up at the JAX airport, let me use one of their cars to go to my appointment, and then drop me off at the airport!!! Wow, that is simply awesome. This should cut the cost of a trip to JAX by about two-thirds. THANK YOU John and Cindy!

Florida

The past 2 weeks have been a blur. Some notable things have passed, the least of which was my 63rd birthday, August 22nd. We were in a rental car heading for Jacksonville, Florida for my 6 month prostate cancer check up. No cake, no candles, and that's ok. We did celebrate with a late dinner at a Bob Evans in Paducah KY...and a totally unecessary strawberry shortcake. We really like Bob Evans--it's kind of like home cooking (I had their pot roast, Ellen had their fantastic chicken pot pie).

The check up went fine--my PSA has continued to drop, now it is at .6, down from a high of 4.3 and a 1.0 at the 3 month mark. I've gained some pounds (thanks Bob Evans), but my blood pressure, which had been kind of high, was much much better. So good news is great to get. The Proton Institute seemed so different from when we left in February. Missing of course were all the folks we got to know during my treatments. Our nurse and doctor were there, but past that, only a few staff were recognized. One of my favorite techs, Kim from Yulee FL, came up and talked with us for several minutes. That was nice.

We are now in a beautiful condo/timeshare on Daytona Beach. We decided to make the trip a little more worthwhile with a mini vacation. Very very nice to spend a couple of days on the beach!

National Eagle Center

Well, this is not the latest adventure for us, but I am trying to catch up!  

We were RVing at Treasure Island Casino, and having daughter Erin's family staying at the Casino Hotel.  We all drove down the Mississippi River to Wabasha, the home of the National Eagle Center.  What a great place to visit!

Harriet and her handler

There were plenty of exhibits and hands on activities for the kids, free binoculars and sighting telescopes, an observation deck, and eagles!  They have 5 'reclaimed' birds that through accident or whatever are unable to fly.  We saw a great program where the docent explained about the birds of prey, while handling Harriet a beautiful golden eagle.  Harriet was then fed...a few mice, chunks of fish...yum.  It was awesome to see how Harriet used her talons to hold and rip apart the food.

The center is located here because the confluence of the Chippewa and Mississippi Rivers cause turbulent waters that prevents the river from freezing in the winter...so there are lots and lots of eagles that gather here at that time, but not any to see this summer day.

It was a great afternoon, seeing these regal birds, the river and the scenery.  We drove back to Red Wing on the Wisconsin side, having a picnic at Pepin's City Park.

Everybody but Ellen on the observation deck

Our Anniversary

Wow, two posts in one day!!!!!!

I realized after I posted earlier that this day marks our 2nd anniversary of full timing!  Two full years of living in less than 400 square feet.  Two full years of going where we want to (mostly) and when we want to (mostly).  There have been some places we HAD to go (Jacksonville for cancer treatment, and some service centers to get things fixed)...and that goes hand in hand with not really choosing WHEN we went.

But all in all, it has been an awesome journey, allowing us to see so many historic and interesting and beautiful places. This is an amazing way to see the U.S., and we are so fortunate to have been able to do so. I hope to continue this blog to share some of the places we travel to.

We also have met so many neat people from all over America and Canada, keeping in touch with a lot of them, and making plans to reconnect with them down the road.  

We also have been able to keep in touch with our Iowa friends, as we swing through Iowa and Minnesota to visit our 3 daughters' families, although the toughest thing is not seeing the grandchildren as much as we'd like. 

One of the more interesting developments has been the necessity of yours truly to learn about this house on wheels and how to keep things working.  I am also working on how to (try and) fix them when things break or malfunction.  I am not yet a qualified RV Technician, but I sure am more savvy than I used to be.  There is tons yet to learn.

Hopefully we can continue this lifestyle for quite some time.  We have survived horrendous fuel prices, some very nasty weather, inability to get satellite tv, some problems caused by operator error (that's me)....... but my greatest achievement was tolerating the neighbor's dog barking all day while they were gone.

Wish us Luck

We are flirting with disaster.  We're staying at a casino RV park for well over a week.  We are just north of Red Wing Minnesota, at Treasure island Resort and Casino (and rv park...they don't have that on the big sign).

So far so good.  I am down $40 and Ellen is UP $40!  I was doing pretty ok until I had a fling at the Texas Hold'em table.  I had too many teasing hands...just had to stay in and see the flop...then I just HAD to see the turn...then I was committed to see the river.  I just hope her luck continues.  We are definitely not high stakes gamblers as you can tell.

This area is beautiful, with lots of bluffs and hills, and of course, the Mississippi River.  The casino is pretty big, and just what you would expect a casino to be.  Erin's family is going to come up Monday for a few days, and that will be great.

I had quite a long spell with no blog entries, so starting next time I hope to post some pictures and info from the past months.

Here's Ellen when we were in Nashville, with the King and then at the Grand Ol Opry.

Ah, what a view!

                                    Our view of culverts, chain link fence and 55 gal. barrels

We are spending over a week in the beautiful City of Gowrie RV Park.  The ambience is scintillating, right up to the stray cats, and the city municipal storage area out our back windows.  Piles of dirt and gravel, culverts, chain link fence rolls and gates, and 55 gallon drums (hopefully empty).  The view pretty much sucks, but it is cheap, ($10 a night) and close to daughter Erin's house ...actually only 3 blocks.  Oh, I forgot to mention that one edge of the park butts up to the railroad tracks so we are about 80 feet from the thundering iron horse lugging ethanol tank cars!!!

Visiting Erin's family is a lot of excitement and fun.  Never a dull moment with 4 kids, 3 cats and 3 dogs in the house.  We have introduced them to Settlers of Catan, and that has spawned some really late night gaming.  It has been great to see the grandkids again.

We have had really nasty weather here, with hot and humid days, lots of rain and severe thunderstorms.  We bailed out of the RV one night after midnite for the possible safety of Erin's basement.  80% chance of rain today too.  Lots of little lakes at the RV park.

We are getting close to Matt's arrival from Colombia South America!  He is flying up here in 8 days.  Excited to see him, and we have planned an Alaskan cruise with him and his girlfriend Nohora also from Medellin, Colombia.  We are pumped, as we have not done a cruise for several years, and it should be great fun with Matt and Nohora.

                                A fellow "RVer" (somewhat permanent) at the Gowrie RV Park