Homeward Bound

Monday, March 18, 2013

Okay, here's the warning. I am about to whine! We are sitting in a county campground in Salisbury, North Carolina. A lovely, almost empty campground in the pine woods next to a lake. The facilities are really nice. The camp host was very welcoming, but... here it comes...it's 45 degrees, drizzly and overcast! We are not acclimated to this! At least in the desert southwest almost every day the sun shines, and the sky is blue and most days it is warm. The nights get cold, but, we huddle up inside our little house and stay warm after dark. No need to be wandering about in a dark desert, unless we want to see the stars, and then we only need to step just outside. Okay, we're spoiled already, I know.

We woke up yesterday morning to fog along the Tombigbee. We couldn't see the other bank. It cleared somewhat as we left. One of the camp hosts from North Dakota, made a point of stopping us as we left to wish us a safe journey back to Maryland. We have met so many nice camp hosts who go out of their way to look after their guests. We continued on Route 84 for a brief time and picked up I 65 towards Montgomery. Route 84 continues east and dips down close to the Florida border before ending south of Savannah, Georgia. After checking the weather forecast and looking at the time left to return to Maryland, we decided that we didn't want to drive I95 up the coast, and the farther west route would take us to higher elevations and possibly snow or freezing, so we are heading up the middle between the two routes.

From Montgomery we drove on through to Atlanta. Thankfully it was Sunday so we avoided their notorious rush hour traffic. After Atlanta we started looking for a place to sleep. Nothing around but WalMarts and truck stops. Not in the mood for “magic fingers” all night from the reefers and engines idling, we opted for a WalMart parking lot in Commerce. Georgia. We joined three other large rigs on the empty side of the parking lot.

Before settling in we had dinner at Sonny's Pit BBQ. Don't know where the pit was, it was just a regular restaurant. Greg ordered a beer and the waitress asked him for his ID to check his age! Greg looked at her and said, “Bless you!!!” while I chortled. Then she realized that it was Sunday and she would lose her job if she served alcohol on Sunday. So, no beer. But, she made Greg feel good! Guess this life is making him look younger and more refreshed. Who needs a facelift!

We came back to the parking lot, picked a spot among the other RVs and buttoned up. We closed all the curtains and blinds and used our headlamps. That is when we discovered that we were on the party side of the parking lot. There were low riders running around, scraping their rear ends, and vibrating our floors with their huge car speakers. Then the souped up pickup trucks showed up. We started opening blinds to see what was going on. The trucks were inside the group of RVs. Our neighbors from New York were sitting outside their coach watching and enjoying(?) the evening air. One of the pick ups was running around the parking lot without its lights on. The boys finally moved on and the girls arrived in another area of the lot. We finally decided that it must be spring break. We went to bed and it took a while for the noise to quiet down. We were surprised that there was no WalMart security, since judging by the beer cans we saw this morning, this is the usual party spot. Okay, we'll probably try Wally World again, hopefully the third time will be the charm. The first one in Midland, Texas was too close to the interstate. There are a lot of other RVers that use Wally World frequently.

This morning, after a poor nights sleep, Greg walked over to the WalMart store and bought a few groceries while I tried to wake up! Then we stowed and headed out. It was a cool drizzly drive across the rest of Georgia, and then South Carolina. The last two days, since we were driving the interstate and were bored, we cranked up the music. Luckenbach, Texas got us in the mood for The Outlaws, so Greg downloaded the album that we used to listen to when we were first together. What fun to realize that we still remembered the words and could sing along like we used to. After that we went through Steely Dan, Bette Midler, and James Taylor. The miles rolled away under our wheels.

Today the drizzle and the boring interstate made us glad to stop a little earlier. We stopped at Dan Nicholas County Park in Salisbury, North Carolina between Charlotte and Greensboro. We are one of about a half dozen campers scattered through the wooded campground. After hooking up we took a walk around the lake and checked out the attractions. Everything was closed today, but it is a great family park. They have a wildlife exhibit, where we saw a pair of bald eagles, a barnyard petting zoo, a railroad, a place to pan for rocks and minerals, a water play area, and a lakeside area with paddle boats. We saw a few ducks and geese, and a squirrel climbing in and out of a trash can finding popcorn and then dropping it on the ground for the ducks. We walked back to our campsite and then spent the next few hours riding out thunderstorms. The temperature was still in the 40's so we escaped the tornadoes this storm spawned in Tennessee.

Tomorrow we will head toward Richmond to spend one more night on the road before we arrive at Kaylin and Eli's for a visit with them and the rest of the Maryland family and friends!

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

This morning finds us in the James River State Park campground. Forget Richmond! We couldn't take the interstate anymore and got onto Route 29 outside of Greensboro, NC and drove into Virginia. It was a lot more interesting and good dual highway, so we were happier! Late afternoon we took a detour from Lynchburg and went east to Appomattox and then north to this park. After a 7 mile dead end drive along the James River we arrived at an empty campground, except for the host. Without a tent to hike in to the river spots, we wound up in the woods. The wind was blowing and it got close to freezing last night, so no tent camping was okay. Greg managed to blow a circuit breaker on our campsite power pole running the electric hot water pot, the hot water heater and the electric space heater at the same time, so we are still warming up the RV. We bought a space heater recently when we realized that when we are hooked up to electric, using the campgrounds power that we are already paying for saves us using the propane that it takes to run our on board heater.

After posting this and heading out, we will be at Kaylin and Eli's and visiting family and friends for the next week and a half, so I probably won't post until we are on the road again. We haven't decided where yet. We will go south a month and then north to Atlantic Canada for the summer. Last night we started to research our reservations for the ferry to Newfoundland in July. Stay tuned!!!

 

James River State Park - one other trailer and 25 turkey vultures

“Sweet Home Alabama”

Friday, March 15, 2013

We had a slow start yesterday morning. Took showers, had breakfast, posted the blog, and Greg experimented with finding a way to get water from our five gallon jug directly into our onboard water tank. A lot of RVs allow you to just pour it in. Ours doesn't. It has to come from a hose hookup. After some research on the web he found a way use the winterizing valve suction to get a third of the jug of water in. After that it slowed down, so he needs to experiment with the Water Bandit that we use to attach the hose to the campground faucet if there are no threads on the water faucet to screw the hose on. The experiment continues. If we can find ways to get jugs of water into our tank, it will facilitate longer boondocking in the future. Water and our holding tanks are our biggest limiting factor. Our electrical use is minimal and the solar panels supplement it.

We had to backtrack to the office and pay for the night in order to leave. That process was slowed down by a guy who wanted to know if he could use trap lines in the state park. He was not too happy to be told no, and screeched off in his pickup truck. The park had signs posted to warn you not to walk in the woods because of hunting. Guess he thought he could trap as well. This IS Mississippi after all.

We left the park after discussing how far to go that day. We decided to continue following Route 84 that we had picked up in Texas. It is a mostly rural road and across the state of Mississippi was dual highway. We decided to see how long we wanted to drive and then find a place to stay. We reached the Alabama border after an uneventful day and found an Army Corp of Engineers campground on the Tombigbee Waterway that flows from the Choctaw Wildlife Management Area.

Nice level concrete parking pads and gravel sites. Greg said, of course they were nice. They were built by engineers! The riverside sites were taken. There is a fishing tournament, but we still got a space across the road with a view of the river. Shortly after we got settled a barge being pushed by a tugboat cruised by. Later another and then at 10:30 pm Greg commented that there must be a train nearby. We realized it was another tug and barge pushing hard against the current going upstream this time. We ran out and watched it churning up a big wake fighting against the strong current. It had a bright spotlight on the front to illuminate ahead and a spotlight on each side lighting up the riverbanks and the campers as well! The Tombigbee is part of a series of rivers, dams, locks and canals throughout the south that facilitate transport of coal and other products. After looking at the map, it looks like this particular waterway eventually flows into Mobile Bay, but it is difficult to see where these barges may be originating. Because the Mississippi River has been so low, and closed from time to time to barge shipping, we are guessing that these other waterways may be used more. The flow seems to be nice and high from what we can observe.

Saturday morning- We decided to stay tonight as well. Spring is coming here. The temperatures have been in the 70's, the sky is clear and the sun is shining. There is grass coming up and the birds are busy! Our campsite has juncos, blue jays, robins, a red headed woodpecker and bluebirds! One sat on a branch a few feet from the window while I was eating breakfast, and stared at me. I haven't seen bluebirds since Kaylin was in high school and we used to go to Lynda Bell's for Log Cabin Science. There were always several in the big tree at the end of the farm lane. Kaylin and I would stop to watch in the big old red pickup “Big Al”, named so, because it was an Alyeska Pipeline Oil Company truck from our days in Alaska. Lynda bought it from us and renamed it “Big Red”. Bluebirds have become scarce because their favorite nesting spots are old fence posts, which are disappearing with urbanization, hence the drive to put up bluebird boxes.

A few more barges have gone by. I slept in and missed the bass boats roaring out at dawn for the fishing tournament. Greg was up, (of course!), and saw them. We'll take a hike this afternoon and get a little exercise. Too much sitting in the RV driving down the road. I can go from day to day never stepping outside if I wish. My home and my vehicle are one. Roll out of the bunk, get dressed, eat breakfast, climb in the passenger seat. Stop and eat lunch at the dinette, climb back in the seat. Stop for the night, make dinner, climb back in the bunk, with a few bathroom breaks in our own bathroom, “rinse and repeat”! So, today I am “forcing” myself to sit outside! Greg put out the awning and in between phone calls I am typing away. Tomorrow we will head out on Route 84 again and see where we stop for the night!

The Big Piney Woods and the Muddy Mississippi

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Our drive out of the Texas Hill Country yesterday was pleasant. We enjoyed our stay even though we didn't see much of it. We will go back in the future when we can avoid the spring break crowds! We continued on back roads and skirted south of Austin. Then we continued east. Gradually the hills flattened out again and we saw lots of ranches, farms and small towns until we reached the town of Crockett. Guess who that was named after? We were traveling on the Camino Real, the early route taken by the settlers and Mexicans coming to claim this part of Texas as part of Mexico. I find Texas history a bit confusing. What part belonged to whom and when, and who fought with whom for what part?! Anyway, Davey Crockett traversed this route on his way to fight and die in the battle of the Alamo in San Antonio.

The nearby Davey Crockett National Forest is named after him, (of course...) and we climbed a bit into the Texas version of more hills. The lakeside campground was closed due to the drought of the last few years. There are so many dead trees that it is unsafe to be in parts of the national forest if the wind is blowing. Trees are falling down. We found out that dispersed camping is still allowed in other areas, as long as you stay away from the areas slated for prescribed burns. After determining that we could dry camp near the trailhead for the Neches Overlook, we took a dirt road off the paved route and found a private spot away from the few tenters there. The wind was not blowing, and the trees in that spot looked safe, so we backed into a previously camped in area off the dirt road.

Dispersed or dry camping, or boondocking is allowed on Bureau of Land Management Lands, National Forests and some other public lands. As long as you abide by the rules, meaning; staying just off a roadway and not too close to water sources, and pack out your trash, you can stay for 14 consecutive days. We've boondocked twice on BLM land at Quartzsite, AZ, but this was our first national forest experience. It was lovely to be back in the pines with no neighbors and lots of quiet.

This morning we left our peaceful site and got back on the road to cross over into Louisiana. The environment got greener and wetter the farther east we drove. We stayed on the back roads and thought we would disperse camp again in a Louisiana national forest, but we passed them all too early in the day. There are some other public lands in the eastern part of the state, but we were having trouble accessing camping information. Backroads mean poor cell coverage and thus no web. Our paper sources weren't very helpful either, so we made the decision to keep going over to Natchez, Mississippi and see if we could get into Natchez State Park. We still didn't know if we would run into more campgrounds full of spring breakers.

We crossed back over the Mississippi River during rush hour and found the campground just as the office was closing. The ranger told us to go find a campsite and pay in the morning, so after a good look around we took a space in the less crowded campground that isn't on the lake. There is just us and one tent on our loop, so it is quiet. I expect that last night will be the last of our boondocking for a while. Now that we are back east there are very few places to boondock on public lands, though we may wind up in some more truck stops or WalMarts again!

A week ago we were driving through Joshua Tree National Forest headed for a boondocking camp at Quartzsite, Arizona. Two weeks ago we were camped on the Pacific Ocean at Montana de Oro State Park in California! We just turned over 10,000 more miles on the RV during the four months we have been on the road. A year ago we hadn't even considered selling the house and traveling. Life takes some crazy twists and turns when you step out and take risks! 

Looking Back from Luckenbach, Texas

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Today marks four months on the road! I am sitting in the Armadillo Ranch Campground in Luckenbach, Texas enjoying the warm breeze and sunshine. Spring is coming. The birds are singing and I am watching the cars and motorcycles roll on past the camper! They are traveling to, and we are a short walk from, the famous Luckenbach Dance Hall, the third oldest in Texas, and the one made famous by Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and the Outlaws and many other country singers who have come here to perform. We hadn't planned to be here, but we are enjoying our two night stay.

We left Pancho Villa State Park on Sunday morning. We followed Rt 9 east to El Paso, TX. It ran along the border with Mexico, so we saw border patrol frequently, and actually saw a fence in several areas. There were also sections where we saw lots of water bottles in the desert on the side of the road, from illegals crossing, and bottles hung from the fence and rock cairns (small rocks piled up) to mark places to cross.

Reaching El Paso we managed to come in through a small suburb that led us directly to I 10. We drove through El Paso along the Rio Grande, just a ditch here, and looked at Juarez, Mexico across the river and the border fence. Juarez looks poor and is huge. We watched it for many miles along the interstate. It stretched off to the horizon. Finally the road pulled away from the border and we headed out into the desert again. The wind was still blowing and at one point we sighted a dozen dust devils (dust tornadoes) in our field of vision.

We had a long afternoon driving across the bleak desert. Our goal was to reach Monahans Sandhills State Park on I 20 west of Odessa and Midlands. The sun was getting low as we reached the park and we discovered that it was full! It began to dawn on us that this was spring break and we were skunked. This was the first time we showed up without a reservation and were unable to get into a park.

There was nowhere else to camp for miles around. We continued on to Odessa/Midland. We were now deep into the Permian Basin oil and gas country. There were oil wells and fracking equipment everywhere. The wind was kicking up the dust and everything was bleak, dusty and industrial. The two campgrounds there wanted $35 a night just for us to sleep for eight hours and move on. We checked out two truck stops that welcome RVs. Both were packed with trucks and the one space we could find was only a few feet from the freeway on ramp where the trucks would be entering the interstate. We decided to try the WalMart parking lot. Arriving there we found a few other RVs and decided to stay. We drove over to a deli for dinner. It was already 8 pm and I didn't want to cook. We buttoned up for the night, and closed the shade on the skylight to block out the parking lot lights and went to sleep.

Greg woke me early. We were already time confused from a three hour change in two days. We left Pacific Time in California and entered Arizona which is always on Mountain daylight savings time. Then we drove into New Mexico and went back to Mountain standard time. While we were there we changed to daylight savings time. Partway into Texas we changed to Central day light savings time. All these changes necessitated going forward in time, so we are still adjusting to a three hour time change in a brief amount of time! We also wanted to get out of the WalMart quickly. New record for me getting up, dressed, everything stowed and me in my seat- 30 minutes!

We watched the sun rise over the west Texas plains as we drove. At Big Springs we left the interstate and headed cross country to San Angelo and on to the Texas Hill Country. We saw oil wells and lots of wind turbines. That was a nice surprise! There is definitely enough wind to power them and we were glad to see an alternative to the oil wells. At Mason on the outer edge of the hill country we stopped for lunch at Cooper's Pit BBQ. Okay, we didn't know what to do to order, so we had to figure it out by watching the people in line in front of us. You stand at the large outdoor grill under the awning and look at what is cooking and point out what you want. They had beef brisket, pork chops, chicken, goat sausage, ribs, and other sausage. Greg pointed to a pork chop and I had the man cut me a slice of the brisket. He dipped them in juice/sauce and took them inside to weigh. We picked out cole slaw, potato salad and blackberry cobbler from the cooler and paid. Then we took it all out to the picnic tables where we found paper towels, BBQ sauce, hot sauce, a jar of Jalapenos, whole unpeeled onions and white bread. He showed us where to find a knife and fork. We finally discovered that a couple sheets of butcher paper were our plates. It was really good, but I have to say, a whole lot pricier than we expected. I think we got the “non-resident's discount”! There were no prices listed anywhere, so we weren't sure.

Back on the road we enjoyed the ride down to Fredericksburg. The terrain was hillier and we were seeing trees. It's been a while since we've seen them! There were cattle and ranches and small towns to drive through. When we finally arrived in Fredericksburg we were in for a shock. The quaint town was crawling with tourists. We decided that it must really be spring break because otherwise we would not have seen so many families and small children on a Monday. The night before at WalMart we had checked on the internet for sites available at the state parks in the Fredericksburg area and they were all full. We drove slowly through town and decided there was no place for us to park. Plus, neither of us wanted to fight the crowds on the sidewalks. There was a private campground outside of town that we were hoping had room. We passed two full private parks on the way. We really wanted some hookups and some time to regroup and rest after our long hectic drives from the last few days.

Armadillo Ranch had a spot for us. The owner told us that is it indeed spring break and this area gets people from out of state as well as Texas. We decided to stay for two nights. The ranch is in a rural area, with cattle next door and a llama across the road. We are camped in a pecan grove. She encouraged us to walk down the road to the Luckenbach Dance Hall and catch the free outdoor concert, so off we went! We crossed the creek and found the town, which is just a few wooden buildings; the old dance hall, the outdoor stage, the bar and gift shop, the restrooms, and the hat shop. We bought two beers and sat at a picnic table in the grove of trees and enjoyed the concert. A married couple accompanied by someone on bass was playing guitars and singing, mostly their own songs, but a few classics too. There was a rooster and two hens roosted 15' up in a tree. Every time the couple started to sing the rooster started crowing. When they stopped, he stopped. Must have been distracting for them as the chickens were only 40' from the stage!

We wandered around during the band break and took pictures and decided to head back to camp. We crossed back over the stream and saw a group of snapping turtles. Next to our campground I stopped to talk to the curious calves and young cattle gathered at the fence to see what we were up to. (Greg didn't talk to them. He didn't have a grandfather with a farm!) The llama across the road came over to its fence to see what the excitement was all about. We settled in for the evening and could hear the music from the concert in the distance.

Today we busied ourselves with odds and ends that we needed to tend to before we head out again. Greg did some maintenance while I did some hand wash and we both ordered things to be sent to Kaylin's to pick up when we arrive. We are stretching out our food and clothing, so we will not buy much or stop to do laundry. We arrive in Maryland a week from tomorrow. Here's hoping the weather is good. We are really enjoying early spring in the Hill Country!

JUAREZ, MEXICO

Coopers BBQ

"You can have my pork chop when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!"