Moving North from San Diego

We started north from San Diego,through Los Angeles and all that traffic. Our next stop was Santa Barbara ,Ca. Rancho Oso Campground. What the list of campgrounds doesn't list is what the roads to the campgrounds are like. This one even had Vera nervous. One lane, not one each direction, but only one lane on the side of a mountain. They had mirrors set at the turns so you could see oncoming traffic around the bend. Not that I could do anything about if someone was coming the other way.You can't back up when you are towing a car. The campground was nice. I needed a couple of days to get up the nerve to drive out. Really it was nice and had two pools and a hot tub.

Further north we stopped at Morgan Hill Campground. We were back to the center of the state. We had a winery at the entrance of the campground. We had a little tour and bought a bottle. We saw the first of many forest fires. There was a lot of smoke coming over the mountain. We got a chance to wash our jeep. Five thousand miles can get a car and motor home pretty dirty.
Finally, we made it to San Francisco. We stayed in Redwood city, about 20 miles south of downtown San Francisco. We have a niece who lives in Burlingame,a suburb of San Francisco. She was out of town for the first few days we were there. We went to China town and found a fortune cookie factory we visited 19 years ago. The next day we toured fisherman's wharf area. We got pictures of Vera with Forrest Gump (look alike) outside Bubba Gump Restaurant. It was cold there. They make a fortune selling jackets to tourists. We saw and crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. We toured some old ships and ferries(In San Francisco we have to clarify, this is a kind of boat). When Trish,Vera's niece, got home she drove us to Muir Wood where the giant red woods are. They are awesome. We were guided by Trish all through the city. We went down the most crooked street, and the cable cars.
Lake Minden, just north of Sacramento was our next stop. The center of California was real hot. 100 degrees, or more. We tried kayaking again on the lake there. The smoke was getting a lot closer.
Further up the road we stayed at Redding Ca. We needed to visit one of Vera's nephews,Andrew. Vera hasn't seen him since 1977. I never meet him before. He has a restaurant,bar in Fall River Mills. Population 600 and surrounded with miles of trees. Oh by the way once again, or should I say still with the forest fires. They closed the highway, because the fire jumped the road.( A thirty six mile detour). We finally got back to the Bear Mountain RV Resort where we left the motor home while visiting Andrew.
There were eighty forest fires between central California and the coast ,where we were headed. Change of plans!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fast Forward

I need to fast forward in order to bring this up to date. I'll just skim over some of the places we went. From Carlsbad we went to Albuquerque New Mexico. Our friend, Sister Dolores, lives there. She showed us all the points of interest in Albuquerque, and Santa Fe. We went to "Old Town" in Albuquerque and Loretto Convent in Santa Fe We saw the magic spiral staircase there. All in all we had a great time visiting with her.
From there we headed into Arizona. we toured the petrified forest and the painted desert. Great time and a place for Vera to buy turquoise necklace and earrings.
Moving west we stopped in Winslow Az. Like in the song "Standing on the corner in Winslow Arizona, such a sad sight to see". We saw the giant crater created by a meteorite, millions of years ago. A big hole in the ground.
We headed west to Williams Az. The campground there had a combination deal. We stayed at the campground and took a steam locomotive to The Grand Canyon. About a hundred miles round trip. We had a chance to meet real nice people and relax during the trip. The Grand Canyon isn't really high. It's really low. Which makes it really high!!! But impressive and beautiful.
From Arizona we traveled to Las Vegas Nevada. We spent a couple of days there. We strolled the strip, and saw the sights. We lost about forty dollars. I guess that's not too bad,(Not as good as winning forty, but not bad).
We entered California, and stopped near Calico Ca. There is a ghost town there. It was a Silver rush town back in 18 hundred something. Really interesting.
Our next stop in California was Oceanside ( Paradise by the sea campground) The water was cold and the sand was black. But that wasn't the reason for our stop there. Vera's sister,Jean lives near there. We surprised her at her house. Had lunch at the Elephant Bar, Jean's favorite place for lunch.
Enough for today.

Traveling through Texas

We left Austin,and headed to San Antonio. Once again a great "Care Free " campground. We found a special on the internet.$99 a week. So we stayed a week. We went to the river walk several times. We tryed different restaurants and different food. This time it was Mexican!! We took the boat tour of the river walk. We really did enjoy the river walk. Real pretty and lit up at night.
We visited the Alamo.Remember the Alamo??? It was interesting, but smaller than Disney made me believe.
Also we went to one of the many missions. They date back to the Spanish missionaries. It was very interesting.
We spent several hours in the pool and spa. Cool, clean and relaxing. A good week.
From San Antonio we traveled west to Fort Stockton Texas. It was just a one night stop. I don't remember ever seeing that much dust in air. One of the campers told me that since the first of January until the middle of May they only had 6 tenths of an inch of rain. Talk about dry and windy.
Moving north into New Mexico was a real improvement. Carlsbad Caverns are ENORMOUS!! The city of Carlsbad has a nice park on the Pecos river. We went there and tryed our Kayak, which we dragged around on the top of the jeep for several thousand miles. Then we took the park boat tour. It went up to the springs where the pecos river comes from.
The campground had an ice cream social and movie(Mad Money). We had to make our own ice cream. Ice, salt,cream, vanilla extract,and sugar. It was fun and tasted good. Another night they had a hot dog cook out. Free dinner and we got to meet some nice people.

Playing catch up

Boy do we have a lot of catching up to do. Our next to last night at Branson we were supposed to go to a dinner show followed by an outside show. The outside show was cancelled due to a tornado warning. When we got back to the campground the campground the sirens went of, telling us to take shelter. They had an underground shelter. It was scary and so many thoughts go through ones head. The tornado missed us and things turned fine. The same storm headed east and messed up our home in Jersey(lost some siding and roof shingles). But life goes on. Our last night at Branson we went to the Broadway show. It was excerpts from different shows.

Next we went to Weatherford Texas. Weatherford is outside of Fort Worth Texas.We visited Laurie and Lou there. We had lunch and dinner with them. They are our nephew and neice. Lou is pastor of a new church. It is an old church building that is being refurbished. It will be a lot of work, but it should be worth it.

While we were there we stayed at West end campground. What a campground!! The owner had six dogs that ran as a pack. Friendly during the day, but you didn't want to go out at night. There were chickens running all over and roosters crowing at three in the moring. While we were there we went to the Fort Worth zoo it was nice, but we had enough animals at the campground. Visiting the zoo brought back memories for Vera. There was a lot of school kids ther on field trips. Vera has been there and done that many times.

Our next stop was Austin Texas. To bad it was just onr night. It was a great campground. Care Free Campground of Austin. Care Free is a new chain of Campgrounds. We recomend them.

I don't like heights

The next day we traveled from Louisville Ky to Dexter Mo. It was a pleasant and uneventful trip. But.... The following day (Wednesday) we traveled west on Mo. route 60, heading across Missouri to Branson. Half way across 60 we hit a detour due to an accident ahead. The detour was forty miles long(just a little out of our way). There wasn't a quarter of a mile that was straight or level. I'm telling you every inch of it was up and down on a very narrow two lane road,with no shoulder. Did I mention this was all in the beginning of the Ozarks? We finally got through the detour. After turning south on Route 65 we realized that was nothing compared to the last thirty miles to Branson . The road goes straight up and down, followed by straight up and down. All of this was right on the edge of the mountains (thousands of feet down, well maybe...) When I say we finally got there I mean finally!! Branson has a lot of shows, and has a lot to keep you busy. The only problem is they built it on top of the mountains. When I ask people why, they just laugh.... I really don't like heights!!! I saw Vera laughing . I thought she was laughing at my being scared of heights. I found out she was laughing because she was nervous too.
We have already seen a 50's at the hop show and Andy Williams show at the Andy Williams theater, followed by a late night snack at the Andy Williams Grill. Are you beginning to see a trend here?
Tonight (Saturday May 10Th) we have reservations for The Shepherd of the Hills show . Before that we are going to the Son of the Pioneers dinner show.
Also this afternoon there is a TORNADO watch. Did I mention we're not real crazy about tornados?

We were late for everthing.

It is May 9th. God ! have we been bad at keeping this blog up to date. We arrived in Natchez ( actually the campground was on the La. side of the Mississippi River. Well at least half was ON THE SIDE of the river, the other half was still under the river. But that really wasn't a problem. Natchez is a quaint town. We visited Grand Village, an indian museum and village. By the time we went to the Antebellum Homes tour they were closing. We just took a car tour of them. We found ourselves in the same situation when we finally reached the Frogmore cotton plantation.It is the only active cotton gin in the country that people can tour.But we were late again. After all the riding we took a walk through downtown Natchez. We bought some books in a neat little book store. It reminded both of us of "The Little shop around the corner" from the movie "Youv'e got mail". We had dinner at a place called Pig Out Inn. Good food, fast service, full bellies. After we got some nice pictures of the river and river boat.
We spent the next day driving up Natchez Trace ,one of the most comfortable drives I've ever enjoyed.
We stopped at Tupelo Mississippi. It's Elvis's birthplace. We saw his two room house( bedroom and kitchen). It might have been a three room house if you count the out house. It was interesting to see how the king of rock and roll grew up. We went to the hardware store where Elvis bought his first guitar. We fell in love with the town. We were told if you ask a southerner a question, you get a book. Wow is that true. Barbara, the owner of Antique alley, was so friendly. She was preforming in the town playhouse in Gypsy. Really great people...and therefore great town.
The following day we continued up the Natchez Trace Parkway to Nashville. We spent the next day touring the Opry Hotel. The atrium was enormous, boat ride inside, water falls inside, and beautiful plants inside. It is beautiful. That night we went to The Grand Old Opry. A great show. I think Vera is in love with Brad Paisley.
Our next stop we were bouncing between Kentucky and Indiana. One side of the river is central time and the other side is eastern. We had a good excuse for not knowing what time it was. We saw how they made The Louisville slugger baseball bat. We visited a munitions and armament museum. Then we toured a lumber making plant. We saw the process from tree to finished board. They make finish trim work at this plant.
Next we are headed for Branson Mo.