Drive to Betty’s in Abbeville, LA, Nov 30, 2011

No rain this morning, but when Bob raised the jacks, water on top of the coach rolled over our side window. See our newest Christmas decorations.

Traveling across I-10 can be a challenge, first it is a thumpy road-where you feel every road joint. Then all the trucks, and don’t forget the road or bridge construction.

Soon we crossed another state line.

Soon crossed the Mississippi River.

Near Baton Rouge we saw these large white birds in the trees.

Our destination for the day was Betty’s RV Park in Abbeville. Here is Bob trimming some low branches over our rear slide out. Betty helped us back in, then noticed some low hanging branches, so she offered to get a ladder and some loppers if Bob could trim off the branches. She did and then he did. Works for us.

Our first Happy Hour at Betty’s began at 4:30 with about 15 folks present. The room buzzed with lots of friendliness and conversation. Close to two hours later we walked about 60’ to our coach.

In this special moment in time…take time for people

Shopping Day in Gulfport, MS, Nov 29, 2011

Well what can I say, we shopped until we dropped today.  The Southern Oaks Mobile Park is right in the middle of all kinds of shopping.  Sam’s Club, Wal-mart, Petsmart, Bed Bath and Beyond, Michaels, and many many more.

At Michaels found the stretchy cord to make bows for some small Christmas boxes, also found some small suction cups to hand some snowflakes (we bought at Wal-mart) on our windows for Christmas decorations. 

Petsmart provided us some more additions to our one gallon aquarium.  A plant and three ghost shrimp.  So far Red Rob is ignoring his water mates, as in not eating them.  Bob had read that the ghost shrimps might be compatible with bettas and so far so good.  They were only 38 cents each so if he decides they are dinner, then not a big loss.

Here is a photo of two of them.  They are very small, about 1/2 inch long.  They are suppose to be great aquarium cleaners, eats anything that is or was alive, hopefully some of the food that Red Rob doesn’t eat.

We did a great job of shopping at Sam’s.   Restocked on many items we like to buy there, like small sweet peppers, whole almonds, cheeses, herbed turkey lunch meat and a great deal more.

Tomorrow, headed to Betty’s RV Park in Abbeville, LA, about a four hour drive.

In the special moment in time…make new friends

What a Day, Nov 28, 2011

With check out time being noon at the Escapees Rainbow Plantation and only 100 miles to drive today, we started to get ready to go about 11:30.  When Bob pre-started the engine, immediately the STOP ENGINE light came on, and he immediately shut down the engine.  Now what?

He first checked the oil level, yes, it was low as in really low.  We added the one gallon we carry as a spare, it still needed more.  So off to the local Wal-Mart where we bought two more gallons of oil and a gallon of coolant, just in case it was low also.

We ended up adding two gallons of oil and 1-1/2 gallons of coolant before the Stop Engine light did not come on when started.  All in all it was an easy fix, and Bob was reminded that periodic maintenance is at times necessary.

So we pulled out an hour and half later than the check out time of noon, but we did pull out.

Then Bob got to drive through this tunnel in Mobile AL, one of his favorite things, NOT.  He was relieved it was not too long.

Soon we were in Mississippi in one of many small rain showers we encountered on our drive today.

We soon arrived at a Passport America Park in Gulfport just off I-10, soon we were parked in a pull through site at Southern Oaks Mobile Trailer Community.  With tons of shopping in the area, we are staying two nights.

What NOT to do!! May 13, 2011 (Friday the 13th & pump 13)

With our three night stay in Meridian MS coming to an end, we were anxious to get on our way today to Savannah TN, near Shiloh National Military Park.  Plans were to get an early for us start, around 9 to 9:30, then fuel up the road about 10 miles.  Well all went well until we pulled up next to the fuel pump, $3.99/gal, when we heard a strange crunching noise up on top of the coach.  Instantly I said the, “the motosat was still up!!!”

At this point the good news is that when we pulled away from the canopy, all went well.  Bob had dropped some air, thus lowering the coach so he could drive out without further damaging the motosat dish.  It also stowed on its own.

Below is Bob checking out the damage after we parked at the RV park in Savannah TN.

His verdict is not good, several components are cracked, bent or just not where they should be.  Probably need a new satellite dish, everything up on top except the mounting unit.  The most convenient certified repair facility for motosat is in Elkhart IN, that is about a month away.  Until then, our internet will be from RV park’s Wifi and we do have with 2 GB with our DroidX.

We received a comment from my sister and our son suggesting something about a checklist in our future.  I bet they are correct!  You know we have one, but after 5-1/2 years we think we don’t need to use it.  Were we wrong!

Also received an email from some good friends with encouraging words saying “Anyway, it's all just stuff, and you can fix stuff.”  So true!!  

Vicksburg, MS, May 5-10, 2011 and a few days prior

With plans to leave Grand Gulf Military Park (Port Gibson, MS) on Thursday, we took some time on Wednesday to do some local sightseeing.

The photo below was taken 24 hours later, the water had risen over a foot.

The residents of this home were just about done moving out, the first time since 1973, due to the rising waters. You can see the water in front of their home.

No problems for us with the flooding when we pulled out on Thursday, nice easy drive to Vicksburg to the Ameristar RV Park, and yes, it was high on the bluff overlooking the flooding Mississippi.

We enjoyed visiting the Coca-Cola Museum where the product was first bottled in 1894.

A ca 1900 Soda Fountain Machine. These could sell from $900-$3000 when new in the late 1800’s.

On Saturday, we visited Vicksburg National Military Park. In 2006 we had been here on a rainy day, so today’s visit was very pleasant. We also had a mission, to find where the Third Battery Ohio Light Artillery had been, you see Bob’s great, great, great uncle was in that unit.

Found it!!

During the siege, one of the 6 pounder’s was moved closer to the Confederate lines (at the top of the hill in the photo below), so one can speculate if his 3 gr uncle was here or not, but he was for sure in the area of the photos above. Needless to say Bob was in his glory trying to imagine the past.

This is the USS Cairo on display at the Military Park. The Cairo was an ironclad ship during the Civil War. It was the first ship sunk (1862) by a enemy torpedo, or as we know it today, a mine.

This is the Cairo’s Bell, when it was raised after being under water for over 100 years, some air bubbled to the surface, air that had been trapped in the bell when it sank. Do you think that air may have trapped some sound waves??

Later in 2011 the USS Cairo will be featured on a new quarter coin collector series, American The Beautiful.

Our walk at Grand Gulf, April 11, 2011

I sure wouldn’t want to have been in this site when this tree fell.  It was huge. 

This area is where a ‘Gun Emplacement’ was during the battle of Grand Gulf.

 

By climbing this observation tower you can see the Mississippi River

and see Bob hanging on very securely, he does not like heights.

Here I am showing Bob that I did not need my hands when going down the tower!

Within sight of our RV site was this sign.

So we are parked very close to where some of the action was on April 29, 1863.

Travel to Grand Gulf Military Park, MS–April 8-10, 2011

Our stopover in  Livingston, TX provided some time to get our mail and restalk our groceries.  It was great to personally go up to the Escapees Mail Forwarding Service outside mail request window and get our mail, you see I miss getting our daily mail.   Since I am going to be leaving on Wednesday for a 2-1/2 wk trip to Sacramento, it was time for Bob to learn how to do the laundry.

He was a willing understudy, so hopefully I will not come back to a washer full of dirty clothes.

With an early 8:30 start from Livingston, our drive today was to be around 6 hours to Grand Gulf Military Park, about 10 miles from Port Gibson, MS.  All was going as planned until we saw a sign, well, as good as you can see a sign going at 60 mph saying that one way of the upcoming Y had a bridge of with had a clearance of 12’ 3”!  Yikes, we are 12’10” (from the original brochure). Now neither of us really saw what the sign said, so after some unpleasant discussion, we took the right hand arm of the Y, went a few miles, still questioning each other.  Bob did turn around, he is getting good at turning around in a wide section of the road.  So back to the other arm of the Y and within just a few hundred yards saw the warning sign about that 12’3” bridge, so he turned around again and headed back to where he had just come from.  This low clearance bridge detour added about 45 minutes to our drive.  (Route 63 east of Jasper.)

This is the Mississippi River bridge at Natchez, MS.

We ended up driving about 40 miles on the Natchez Trace.  What a nice peaceful drive.

We arrived at the Grand Gulf Military Park around 3:30 pm.  We had the choice of any site in the park, so with hoping to get online with both internet and Directv, the upper campground was chosen.  The camp host said to use first gear and keep on the gas pedal all the way up, Bob did great, here he is roaring up the hill.

We found a site where we could pull into, face the woods, but still get online,  looks like Bob will have a nice site when I am gone.

Side Note:  On November 14, 2010 we first entered Texas and stayed in Pecos TX and on April 10 we left Texas, total of 147 days.  Guess you can say we spent our winter in  Texas.