Our Camping Travels

First posted Aug 1, 2010
Last update Sep 12, 2011

Our Camping Travels

On the road

On the road from our truck

Trailer rear view

Trailer front view

Trailer left view

At my computer?

Frank

Tom

2010

2010		August
Route Camps		Route Galleries

Monday, August 9

Lott Harrell Family Campground Clifton, VA

$0.00 per night

This was our last night in Clifton. The house has been sold and the movers have now taken everything to storage near Denver, Colorado. We have slept in the trailer the last 4 nights because there was no usable beds in the house. We will miss the place that has been our home for the last 19 years. Neither of us have lived that long in any other place for our entire lives. We are not sad because we are looking forward to a new life elsewhere and more traveling across our grand country. Here are a few webcam shots as we leave Clifton for the last time.

Tuesday, August 10

75 miles

Candy Hill Campground Winchester, VA

$ 45.27 per night

We have now sold our home in Clifton and we left for the last time this afternoon at 1:30. As we hooked up the truck we said good bye to the place, but we are excited about our adventures and that we are headed to Colorado to live. We will travel for about 6 months before arriving in the Denver area at which time we will begin the process of looking for another home. In the meantime, we will enjoy ourselves as we tour the country to see more rodeos and visit with friends and family.

Wednesday, August 11

321 miles

Spring Valley Campground Cambridge, OH

$29.00 per night

Today was a long and hard drive of over 300 miles. We started off on a bad leg. Frank forgot to unplug the power, thankfully we back each other up and Tom noticed. Then we discovered we had no turn signal or brake lights. We detoured to a new Camping World in Winchester and a friendly fellow took a look. Turned out to be loose fuses. Then as we were driving our power and fuel mileage was terrible. Last week we had taken the truck to Luray so they could check out why it was running very rough. Turned out to be a defective fuel injector which was replaced. They put in some Cetane booster (same thing as Octane booster for gas). This was to help the new injector to burn in. But it also gave us real problems with mileage and power. We had to fill up en route today and with the Cetane booster gone the engine began performing like it should over the last 20 miles of our trip. We are having trouble readjusting to trailer life. There has just been too much going on over the last couple of weeks for a couple of old biddies like us. Tomorrow, after all, is another day, so we will look forward to the rest of our lives. Think positive and don't squat with yer spurs on! Oh, that's from a different book. Hopefully I can get all the links, photos and stuff working by tomorrow evening.

Thursday, August 12

83 miles

Clays Park Resort N. Lawrence, OH

$46.45 per night

After arriving and setting up camp we drove over to Tom's sister's which is only about 5 miles from here. We had a good visit then went to Belgrades restaurant for dinner.

Friday, August 13
Today we took Tom's sister and nephew and headed for Lehman's Hardware in Kidron, OH. An interesting place that caters to the tourists and to the local Amish. Lots of unusual things like gas refrigerators and other items the Amish might need. Later we had a late lunch at an Amish style restaurant called Dutch Valley and of course we all ate too much.

Saturday, August 14
Today we picked up Tom's nephew Lee and went for a long drive around the region looking at the places Tom grew up around. In the evening we had some heavy thunderstorms that came through. Many of the tenters in the area packed up and left before the rains.

Sunday, August 15
Today we went grocery shopping in the morning. Then around 2 PM we went to Pat's to pick up Pat and Lee. We had lunch at Swenson's, a great burger place. And then headed to Menard's, an equally great hardware store. We returned to Pat's for last minute discussions and then headed back to the trailer to get ready for heading west again.

Monday, August 16

165 miles

Huggy Bear Campground Middle Point, OH

$35.00 per night

As we were packing up and preparing to leave one of the rear stabilizer jacks wouldn't work. So Frank had to pull out the wrench and go to cranking. The good news is that just a few turns and the jacks began working. Most likely the motor was just at the wrong point for its brushes to get started. Today's drive was easier and over good roads. The weather is much nicer too. The temperature was only in the mid 80's and the humidity was lower at around 40%. Frank is regenerating the water softener and Tom is doing laundry.

Tuesday, August 17

113 miles

Play More Campground Bremen, IN

$32.10 per night

We have moved into Indiana and the flat lands. Corn fields abound as well as soy. This evening the clouds have come in. Supposed to have some rain tomorrow. We are beginning to get used to the trailer again. It is amazing how quickly we forget specific things and procedures which have to be done each day. Here are a few webcam shots of our journey from today.

Wednesday, August 18
Today was a relaxing one. We played on the computer and did general chores. In the middle of the afternoon we went to Amish Acres for a late lunch, late celebration, for our 27th anniversary. Our actual anniversary was July 27, but since Frank had just had 2 teeth extracted a few days before that we decided to put off the celebration until now. Delicious food and not too many people there at that time of day.

Thursday, August 19

106 miles

Emerald Trails Campground Crete, IL

$31.50 per night

Today was a short drive but stressful. We had mapped out a route which avoided most of the congested roads in the area, but two of the routes were closed due to construction. Luckily we had our GPS and computer navigation map. Today we headed farther west to the Chicago rodeo area. We were in this campground last year and it is only half a mile from the rodeo site (about one mile by road). We drove into Chicago Heights to pick up meds for Frank, then a grocery store, and then back to the trailer. Tomorrow we will have a leisure day. Supper in the trailer tonight will be turkey, sweet potatoes, rolls and corn on the cob. We have also moved into Central time.

Friday, August 20
We spent most of the day in the trailer relaxing and playing on computers. We frequently wonder just how we managed before we had the Internet. The same thing can be said about air conditioning.

Saturday, August 21
RODEO DAY! Warm and muggy. The temperature was only in the mid 80's but the humidity was near 60% so it was uncomfortable. However we had a good rodeo and lots of good friends to see again. Galleries should be coming on Monday.

Sunday, August 22
Another day at the rodeo. It was a bit cooler and less humid today so the weather was more pleasant. We decided to stay for the awards ceremony and to get the $10 awards dinner which was great. Roast beef, mashed potatoes, green beans, pork chops and salad. We didn't get back to the trailer until 10:30 so after showering we both went to bed early.

Monday, August 23

123 miles

Kamp Komfort Campground Carlock, IL

$17.00 per night

We have left the Chicago area and are headed southwest toward Kansas City and our next rodeo in 2 weeks. We have passed more corn and soy beans in the last few days than one can imagine. We can see why this part of the country is frequently called "Americas Bread Basket". Very nice little campground, except it is sandwiched between an Interstate and a railroad track.

Tuesday, August 24

86 miles

Double J Campground Chatham, IL

$35.00 per night

We are just south of Springfield Illinois, the home of Lincoln. Over the next couple of days we will do some touring of the local attractions. Yesterday, Frank had a gout attack in his left foot, apparently from the roast beef at the awards dinner Sunday evening. It is now under control with medications and is going down fast. It should be completely gone by tomorrow morning.

Wednesday, August 25
Today we toured the famous Dana-Thomas House in Springfield. This is the largest house Frank Lloyd Wright designed. We had a fantastic tour guide who has been giving tours since the house was opened for tours in 1991. This was an interesting coincidence because that was when we first moved into Clifton. While taking the tour, Frank received a phone call from the person buying our house. The call was to let us know the sale of our house in Clifton had closed. As Frank's sister keeps telling us, we are now homeless. Unfortunately, the Dana-Thomas house did not allow interior photos so we only have a few shots of the outside.

Thursday, August 26
We went to see the famous Abraham Lincoln Museum in Springfield. While a very nice facility we found about half of the exhibits to be poorly done and somewhat tacky. The museum consists of 2 theatres and 2 major exhibit areas. One exhibit covers Lincoln's early life up until he was elected President, the other part was the White House years. The first part appeared to be aimed primarily at school children and we found many of the descriptive displays poorly written. Many of them were actually hard to understand due to poor grammar and word misplacements. One particular exhibit had sort of a timeline, but parts were in reverse order to other parts. The text on the signs over dramatized what they were talking about. The second section of the museum was much better with the tour going through sort of a White House affair where each room talked about a particular faze of Lincoln's Presidency. On the other front, the first theatre show, talking about the library and how it is used for study was full of gimmicky, added very little value to the museum and very obviously was aimed at elementary school children. The second show, called Lincoln's Eyes, was much better and offered an interesting insight into Lincoln's life and the Civil War. The entrance fee was $18 for the 2 of us, in addition to a $6 parking charge. We will not visit this facility again. In our opinion, it wasn't worth the entrance price. We have no photos because photography was not allowed in most of the facility.

Friday, August 27

109 miles

Mark Twain Cave and Campground Hannibal, MO

$ per night

We moved across Illinois and are now in Eastern Missouri, camped near the cave Mark Twain used as his inspiration for when Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher got lost in the cave in "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer". The Internet here is about the worst we have experienced. The campground has Hugh's Satellite which is generally useless and our own Verizon account is not much better.

Saturday, August 28
We went on a tour of the Mark Twain cave this morning. Our tour guide was a young lady who spoke too fast but was easy to understand. The cave is nicely lit which made Frank's photos easy to take. This is posiblly the best private cave we have toured. Unlike many of the other water created caves, this one was created by slow moving water rather than driping or fast moving water.

Sunday, August 29

193 miles

Beacon RV Park St Joseph, MO

$29.57 per night

After crossing Missouri and settling down in camp we drove to the nearby Pony Express museum. Very nice facility and interesting history. Most people don't realize that the Pony Express only existed for 18 months before shutting down, partly because of the completion of the transcontinental telegraph

After doing his exercises and while walking, Frank noticed a very large old lead telephone cable running beside the campground. These lead cables can be found in smaller sizes in a few places but this 750 pair cable is very rare. The last of the lead cables were installed around 1962 so this cable is around 50 years old.

Monday, August 30

94 miles

Prairie Band Casino and Resort Mayetta, KS

$15.75 per night

We're back in one of Tom's favorite campgrounds. We will be here for 10 days but on Thursday, we will take the truck, some computers and of course the camera to Kansas City for 4 nights to attend a board meeting and the rodeo. The trailer will stay here. Frank began working on judging the IGRA member association websites, a task he has to do each year as part of his position of Webmaster for IGRA. The weather was hot and humid today, with more expected over the next few days.

Tuesday, August 31
Today was our first full day back at this great Potawatomi Indian Casino and Campground. Imagine, full hookups, water, electric and sewer plus cable TV and Internet all for $ 15.00 a night. People could live here for a long time and enjoy it. Tom did laundry today, while Frank worked on judging IGRA Web SItes. We went to dinner at the Casino's Buffet tonight as it was steak night.

2010

Highlighted days indicate new campground location