5/30/16

Happy Mudding

Hello again and Happy Memorial Day to everyone! Kathy & I salute our veterans and hope you are all enjoying your long holiday weekend.  We have been camped all weekend at the Dallas County Fairgrounds just outside the small town of Adel, Iowa.

Last Monday we arrived in Sioux Falls, SD and setup camp in the fairgrounds. We were excited because on Tuesday we were to go to a mail forwarding service to start the process of becoming citizens in the state of South Dakota. Tuesday morning we awoke and went to meet our new friends, Larry and Rose Marie, the proprietors of “Your Best Address” mail forwarding service. We spent about 3 hours doing all the necessary paperwork to obtain a new mailing address and register all the vehicles. All the while Michael & Sara are waiting patiently for us to complete our business so we can all go explore Sioux Falls. After obtaining our mailbox and registering vehicles we all head over to Falls Park to see the sights and have some lunch. The falls were spectacular and the park immaculate. The pictures really don’t do it any justice whatsoever but if you’re ever in the area, don’t miss seeing the park and be sure to stop in for lunch. I recommend the Ultimate Hot Dog. A large hot dog stuffed with horseradish mashed potatoes, wrapped in bacon and drizzled with their house dressing. Delicious!

Ball of rubber bands in hallway

My lunch

After lunch and touring the falls we headed over to the License Exam center. We were told there are no DMV’s in South Dakota. We enter the building to find the power off. There were thunderstorms in the area but we’re not certain this was the reason for no power. Apparently it affected some 3800 customers that day. We picked up the necessary paperwork and decided we would return the following morning.

By the old pump bldg that is now a cafe

Michael studying the lay of the land

Sara never stops smiling her infectious smile

Click on pic to see it larger

The following morning Kathy & I rose early and again headed to the licensing exam center. We walked in to lights and computers. Hooray! After having our paperwork looked at we were told to take a seat. Within just a few minutes we were called one at a time to the window to obtain our SD license. I went first. For those of you used to dealing with the grumpy people at the California DMV this experience would not disappoint. The lady at my window spent the entire time eating her breakfast as she stumbled thru the process of getting me my license. Any attempt at humor on my part was not heard or ignored. I never figured it out completely. As it turned out I was told the California DMV computer system was down. Now I’m thinking great! Here we go again… Another day we have to return to try and get our license. About this time the lady behind the counter looks up over my shoulder and asks the gentleman on the ladder behind me wiping the dust off the lights and signs up by the ceiling what she should do. I thought it odd because she was asking the janitor a question she should already know the answer to. It turns out he was a supervisor of sorts. He stated to wait as he proceeded into the back part of the building and came back a few minutes later and using some code my lady didn’t know anything about overrode the system in order to get my information into their database and print out my new license. I was now officially a South Dakota resident. Kathy finished up at her window and we celebrated with breakfast at the local Fryin’ Pan restaurant! She told me later she too noticed almost every employee in the building was eating something during the time we were there. Her lady also had a difficult time trying to enter her passport information in the computer as one of the forms of identification. Apparently they were all new to the process or maybe just new employees.

After breakfast we toured the South Dakota Battleship Museum just down the street. The museum is unique in that they have constructed a full-size replica of the outline of the ship out of concrete on the grass of the park in which it resides. The conning tower is the museum part with loads of memorabilia donated by the sailors of the flagship who served on board during it’s time in our Navy fleet.

Kathy & her 16"

Thursday we headed over to Farmington, MN where we spent a few nights at the fairgrounds in that city. Beautiful flat ground with thick green grass and Dakota City which was a replica 1900’s town. Friday was spent at the Mall Of America. I think we went in circles a few times but still managed to see a little over ¼ of the mall. The mall is ginormous with a theme park in the middle and from what I read, a Sea World type attraction on one end. To celebrate having survived the mall we stopped for ColdStone ice cream on the way back home.

 

Friday we left Farmington and arrived at the fairgrounds in Adel, Iowa, about 16 miles west of Des Moines. I was leading as we entered the campgrounds which was already quite full when we arrived. Having long motor homes as well as towing a dolly and cars behind us tends to make choosing a camping site a little harder than normal. Pull-thru’s are perfect because we don’t have to remove the car, remove the tow dolly and hook the dolly on the car before parking.

As I came around the corner I saw what I believed to be 2 pull-thru sites side by side. I turned into the first one thinking Michael would then take the one next to me when I felt the front tires as they seemed to sink down a bit but I was still moving. About this time the rear wheels dropped off the gravel road onto the grass and I was immediately stuck in my tracks. Oh how I wished I had my jeep about this time. I tried rocking back and forth and we even placed wood under my tires but all I did was bury myself deeper. As I was now on the phone with AAA looking for a large tow truck with a winch Michael walks down to the camp host and returns with half a dozen good ol’ boys who have a tractor.  Almost as fast as I can exit the motor home a tractor appears along with enough help do get us out of a very mucky situation. It almost took less time to pull me back out as it did to get into trouble in the first place. I imagine Mallory and Darryl will have a good laugh over the pictures!

So glad she missed them pulling me out

 

So here it is Memorial Day. I am sitting here typing away as Kathy bakes oatmeal cookies and we make plans to move on to Kansas City, Mo. tomorrow. We’re looking forward to exploring the area around Kansas and eating some great BBQ.

Stay tuned for next week’s surprises. Hopefully I won’t be stuck somewhere I don’t belong!                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

A Little Down Time!

05/22/2016

This week has been fairly docile and not as exciting as far as travel is concerned. It’s been some driving, visiting a few attractions but mostly some much needed down-time. Last Sunday we spent the day traveling and stopped at the Little Big Horn Battlefield to see where Custer was killed by the Lakota and Cheyenne Indians. I’ve never been very good with history but hearing Michael tell us makes it so much more interesting. If only he had been my teacher in high school I might not have gotten that D grade. Wait, did I just say that out loud? Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet Candice and Mallory…lol!

So, as I stated in the last post, we were camped in Columbus, MT on Sunday night and left there to spend Monday night in the Sheridan, WY Walmart. The Walmart’s in these northern states are way better than the ones in Southern California. Large parking lots where every night a dozen or so campers in RV’s and a few semi-trucks all converge to catch a little sleep before heading on. The stores are much larger also with a super great selection of groceries and other amenities for us to stock up on.

Crazy Horse Monument

Tuesday was spent driving to Sturgis, SD. It felt a bit weird driving into town not having a few hundred other bikes sharing the same piece of road with us. We did see a lot of bikes while here but not in the thousands like the last time we visited. We were later told that the locals don’t even ride during the Sturgis event. They are either too bust tending to all the needs of their customers or stay off the roads because of all the accidents and/or crazy riders during that time.

We arrived at the Sturgis RV Park only to find no one around. We parked and setup in our choice of spots since there were only 2 other RV’s here before us. With no one around we started meandering and checking things out when another RV pulled in. We met the other couple and were told they were there to work the summer season. He was a retired fireman from Fountain Valley, CA and they had moved to South Dakota a few years earlier.

Deer about 20 yards from our door in Sturgis

Our time in Sturgis was spent seeing the Crazy Horse Monument, wine tasting Red Ass Rhubarb wine at the Prairie Berry Winery, doing laundry and visiting with a “young” old friend we had met the last time here. Wednesday the plan was to go see the monument and tour one of the local caves but on the way we passed the winery and Michael made a comment about buying a bottle of wine for a give-away at our next camping event. On the way back from the monument we took a detour into the winery and never made it to the cave tour.

Crazy Horse Monument is huge when compared to some of the other attractions in the area. A very large collection of clothing, tools, artifacts and history from all the Indian tribes in the area. We started out with a short video of how and why Korczak Ziolkowski, along with his wife and 10 children, are building the monument. Korczak passed away as did his wife after him but most of the children still work on the monument or in the museum.

I promised Kathy we would find a good pizza place when we got to Sturgis and on Wednesday evening we all went out to Pizza Ranch. Sort of like our Shakey’s Pizza back home but with a little more added to the buffet. The pizza selection was quite large and the dessert pizzas were fantastic with bright fruit flavors and a vanilla icing to top them off. I made sure to taste every flavor strictly to obtain knowledge of how to create my own with my new pizza stone.

Thursday was exciting! While I washed and dried the road grime off the motorcycle Kathy and Sara went into town to do laundry at the only laundromat. The girls came back broke…lol! Kathy said it took $26.25 just to wash and dry 7 loads of laundry and then brought them home to hang the heavy stuff around the coach to dry some more. Diesel might be a little over $2.00 a gallon around these parts but washing & drying clothes takes a day’s pay. Sheesh! Thursday evening we were invited to our friends place for home cooked lasagna dinner. Definitely a treat for all of us.

Friday was spent packing and traveling to a little lake called Byers Lake. We are now on our 3^rd day here and it’s beautiful. We are all alone except for the occasional fisherman who passes by on their way to a fishing hole and a large family tent camping for one night and who have already left but it is quite windy.

It has blown so hard even the birds fly backwards or walk where they want to go. Yesterday, while placing an antenna on the roof of our RV I was almost blown off by a gust of wind. It has been blowing since we arrived and doesn’t appear to be going to stop until after we leave tomorrow.

Tomorrow is Monday and we leave for our reason to be here in the first place. It has been 22 days but tomorrow night we will be in Sioux Falls, SD to become citizens of this state. We will purchase a local mailing address, register the vehicles in this state and turn in our California Driver’s License for a South Dakota license. More on all that in the next post!

Stay tuned for part two of this trip next week! 

A Wet & Dreary Week

05/15/2016

The week started out bright and sunny with highs around 55. The days have been breezy but it hasn't been "rock the coach" windy yet. We spent last Monday touring Zion National Park. The scenery was spectacular and the pics do it no justice whatsoever. The day was beautiful and warm. Kathy did fantastic hiking the trails and even had the rest of us trying to keep up with her on the trail to Weeping Rock! Her recent back surgery has made a positive impact on her health.

  

Tuesday we woke up and pointed the rigs towards Prov, UT to spend the night in the Lakeside RV Park. It had plenty of green grass and lots of trees which meant we didn't have satellite so no TV for us this night. After arriving at the campground we ran over to American Fork about 20 minutes away to go pick up a couple of holsters I'd ordered online from StealthGear. I really like the IWC (inside waist concealed) hip holster but the IWC abdominal carry holster is going to take some getting used to. A quick stop at Walmart to replenish supplies before returning back to the coaches and a few hours of trying to watch over-the-air digital TV. I could only get one channel to work without losing the signal so it was old reruns for the night.

Wednesday morning dawned bright and sunny so we left the Lakeside RV Campground and headed towards Pocatello, Idaho where we found an OHV (Off Highway Vehicle) staging area we were able to setup camp for the night. It was situated back off the main road about 3 miles in the hills and had picnic tables, nice vault toilets and a parking lot large enough to pull into without having to unhook the car and tow dolly. That's a big thing when you're total length front to back is 64 feet!  We had a few visitors in the late afternoon who came in and unloaded dirt bikes to go riding up in the hills. One guy I talked to told me they were able to ride so far back in the hills they were up in the snow and pine trees. It sounded like they had a very large area to ride in. He had grown up in Orange County, CA and we discussed some of the "then and now" scenarios. I told him he should just stay in Idaho. It was less traffic and crime than what he remembered. We had a steak dinner with corn on the cob BBQ'd by Michael and Sara before watching a little TV and turning in for the night.

Camped at OHV site

Look close....The little white specks are sheep!

Thursday morning we awoke to the blaring of sheep off in the distance. I walked outside to see one lonely cowboy with his dog tending the flock about 1/4 mile away up on the hillside. We had breakfast, loaded up and headed down the highway for Dillon, MT and an RV Campground called Countryside RV. A very clean, quiet, well-kept RV campground just south of Dillon. We arrived with the wind and got settled in before it started raining.

Friday morning we woke to cloudy skies and cool temps. I haven't worn a heavy winter jacket since January but I sure needed one today. We were headed to Bannack, MT. Bannack is an old mining ghost town and complete with most of the original buildings. It was a very interesting place to tour and with the help of our History buff Michael, we learned way more than if we'd gone alone. Sara carried the tour information and kept us informed of who, what and why for every building we entered or saw. That afternoon we headed into Dillon for lunch at Sparky's Garage. An old mechanic's garage turned into a diner. Inside were road signs, gas signs, 5 gallon oil cans with the bottoms cut out for hanging lights, an old truck where the bed was made to seat people at a table with benches and what we thought was an old Nash Rambler perched over the bathrooms. It was a mechanic's shop turned sports bar! The food was pretty darn good too!

Kathy in the window

Old carriage

Sunday we packed up and headed for Itch-Kep-Pe Park in Columbus, MT for an overnight stay. Along the way we encountered rain and snow. It was a miserable nasty day to travel but needed in order to get where we want to be. The park has over 30 spaces for RV's to park overnight. It is full of trees and situated alongside the Yellowstone River. We went all the way to the back and found 2 long pull-thru's that were fairly level. We walked around in the sprinkling rain down by the river and back so we could get some pics of the area. We had a quick dinner, watched a few hours of TV and headed to bed early. Note: When we know we are going to have days coming up that we will be boondocking without hookups Kathy prepares the meals ahead of time so all we have to do is heat things up. It makes it easier to fix dinner and clean up is easy.

School House

Michael & Sara on the Merry-Go-Round

Tonight we are at a Walmart in Sheridan, WY before heading off to Sturgis, SD tomorrow. Gonna be funny seeing Sturgis without a million other bikes around. This should be interesting..

Our First week On The Road

05/08/2016

Well, we did it, but not without issues. We spent the last week before leaving on our trip tying up loose ends, having dinner with friends and family and making sure we were ready to travel. Or more to the point, making sure the coach was ready to travel. We were absolutely rearing to go!
     We took the coach in to have some major service performed. I wanted the transmission, engine and rear axle serviced. I also had a smaller list of things I wanted repaired but if they didn't get done we would get them taken care of when we returned in July. The shop did all the major items but neglected to even try to get to the secondary list so once again we are traveling without a/c in the cab. This time it's not so bad because we are headed north but when we come back at the end of June it's gonna be one of those times I have to fire up the generator to run the whole house a/c to keep Kathy cool. She isn't good in the heat.
     The second issue we ran into was on payday. Kathy got paid but I got nothing. I'm still waiting. We went into the CalPers office and found out nothing but they were nice enough to send a message to Sacramento asking them to look into it and stated I would hear from them the next week. It is now 9 days later and guess who I haven't heard from? Kathy and I both knew after working for the state for so long that either one or both of our paychecks would fail to be deposited on time so we set money aside to make sure we could survive until we got paid. The State of California never lets us down. They seem to fail every time!
     We decided to head out anyway and deal with it on the road. What else could we do? I can make a phone call from anywhere. We left on Monday morning, stopped in Barstow at the hospital to visit my oldest daughter and headed to Mohave Valley, AZ for a few days.

Me at the wheel

Kathy, Candice and I

Friends put us up in their back yard and we had a great visit! Spent time with a few other couples in the area we knew from past camp-outs and a few new couples we just met. The temp was in the 80's and 90's so we didn't stay long. Our intention was to head towards Flagstaff, AZ for a few days to check out a possible camp site but were told by our friends we would be running into rain & snow and that the roads we would be camping on would be very muddy. We decided to take a day trip to Flagstaff in the car on Wednesday to check out the camp areas. We also decided we should head north up through Utah when we left in order to try and avoid the rain and snow.

Michael & Sara checking out the site

Ashurst Lake boat ramp

All was going well until we stopped for a bathroom break and Kathy rolled the window down in Michael and Sara's car. It wouldn't roll back up. Michael & I spent the better part of an hour removing the broken motor and then figuring out a way to keep the window in the up position. I ended up riding the 3-4 hours home holding a screwdriver pushed through one of the access holes and wedged against the outside of the door to keep the window in the raised position. It was a long ride home.

Michael & I dissecting the car door

My riding position back from Flagstaff

     On Thursday we headed out towards Mequite, NV and spent the night in the Casablanca Casino and Resort parking lot. It was windy and looked like rain so this was a good stopping point. We had dinner in the casino and the next day we went in for breakfast before heading out towards Bryce Canyon.

A beautiful canyon drive 

More of the scenic canyon

Mtns in the distance as Michael is passed by a car

We made reservations at the Red Canyon Village RV Park for 4 nights figuring from here we could tour Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park. The weather wasn't looking promising when we arrived on Friday but on Saturday morning we decided to take a chance on Red Rock Canyon and maybe Bryce Canyon. We ran into sprinkles of rain at first but as we went on the rain turned to hail and then snow. We made it all the way through the canyon stopping at all the turnouts and taking pics. We even saw a small herd of antelope by the side of the road. As we were leaving the park the snow was evident on the roads. The temps have been around 45-50 for highs and down below freezing at night.

The tunnel into Bryce Canyon

Bryce Canyon Entrance

Michael, Sara & I

The Natural Bridge

Us!

Small herd of antelope grazing

Sara, Michael & Kathy

Us again!

Hoodoos!

Hoodoos in Red Canyon

    

Lunch!

   Today is Sunday and because the rain percentage was predicted to be high, we decided to hang out in the RV park, do laundry and make today sort of a rest day. We will go to Zion tomorrow and then leave here on Tuesday to spend a day or two in the Salt Lake City area. I need to stop by StealthGear to pick up the holsters I ordered and the timing is perfect. I called last Friday and they were just shipping them out so I had them hold onto them and said I would be in the area to pick them up this week.