On the road

Rainbow over us on our last day in VT

 Robin sent me the above picture she took our last day at Maplewoods, just wanted us to remember where our home (base) was, at least for now. Yes everyone we will be back in VT the end of April, at least that is the plan.

Our goal Monday was to get on the road between 8 & 9, getting out of VT takes such a long time since it is all back roads. By 8:15 we were ready to roll, might have something to do with the 4:30 wake up, some habits will take awhile to break. Our destinations was Glimmerglass State Park near Cooperstown NY, a mere 250 miles away. As I followed Dave I wondered how things inside were riding, VT has a lot to do to their infrastructure, this years heavy rains have left roads patched and bumpy, doubt they'll be much better when we get back in the spring after the winter abuse they will take.

We made a couple of quick stops and arrived at the campground around 1:30, stopped at the visitors center and then took a ride around the camping area. While there are many sites available in both loops we chose one just off the second loop site #36. 

Site 36

It is a large site with a fire pit and grill, only 30amp something we've never hadbefore (at least reliably) so now we'll see how many things we can turn on at once. We've noted a few sites for future visits, I think this will make a nice first days drive no matter what way we are headed, south or west. We haven't decided yet on satellite tv but wonder how long that will last, there are only 2 air channels we can pick up, we'll see what the next few months bring.
 
Glimmerglass State Park has 600 acres and has 39 electric (30A) only sites, a few sites can accomadate 40' but not many. All the sites have lots of space, and there is plenty of space between sites.The park is located at the north end of Otsego Lake, there is a large beach area and judging by the parking lot gets a lot of day use in the summer, there is a place to launch canoes and kayaks near the campsites and a few trails to walk.
The park was once part of the estate of George Clarke who inherited it from his great grandfather Colonel George Clarke the Lt Governor of NY from 1736-1744. The grounds include Hyde Hall Mansion and is considered one of the finest surviving examples of Classical Revival architecture in America, there is also the oldest existing covered bridge in the US. While we didn't see the mansion, saving that for a time when the weather isn't great, we did see the covered bridge, more on that later.

After settling we took a walk around the two loops and then started on dinner, while watching Dave get the charcoal going it struck me, this is our life now. How lucky we are to be able to live life like this, No one pinch me because if this is a dream I don't want to wake up. After dinner and another walk we got a fire going, s'mores for me and a Blackberry Wheat Long Trail for Dave to celebrate the start of our next adventure.  

Tuesday I woke up about 4am but quickly fell back to sleep, it was almost 7 by the time we finally got up. After a slow start to the morning we headed into Cooperstown to Ommegang Brewery, a belgian type brewery, which a friend had told Dave about. While I don't care for beer, aside from Seagrams flavored beer, Dave loves to try different craft beers, after a free tour Dave stayed for the sampling where for $3 he could sample 6 different beers and he got to keep the souvenir shot glass.

In conjunction with Cornell University Ommegang is trying to bring back hops to the area. This area once supplied the US with hops, shortly before prohibition a blight occurred destroying all the hops.






Afterwards we headed into Cooperstown, since we're not baseball fans we were there for lunch and to walk around downtown a bit. Ended up at the Back Alley Pub, french dip for me and a blue cheese burger for Dave, not bad but we've had better, found out too late about a diner in town to try, oh well, there will be a next time. After a short walk on some of the side streets looking at the beautiful older homes and a stop at the grocery store we headed home, there was a lake to paddled on after all.

Glimmerglass Lake, which gets it name from the James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales, is about 5 miles long and it was already 3:30 so we weren't going to get very far but out we went anyway. What a beautiful hour we had, since it was windy we headed into the wind so our return would be the easier part of our paddle. There were lots of Canadian geese, seagulls and a few ducks out on the water with us, we saw a few fisherman on the shore and paddled across Hyde Bay, even if for only an hour it was good to get back on the water.

After our paddle we had to check out the oldest covered bridge in the US, being from VT where we had visited at least 80 covered bridges during our time there we were skeptical about this one.

While there is a historical plaque documenting the bridge it appears to have been completely rebuilt in the 60's. It doesn't appear that there is anything remaining of the original structure, if someone knows something different be sure to let me know.






 We then took a few of the trails around a meadow, walked down to the beach, as we headed back to our site we saw a few deer and  found a disc course. Sure wish our son Tom was with us, he would have enjoyed that.

We rounded out the day with a fire and some star gazing. We haven't been able to see much of the stars since we moved out of the house, many a night in our hot tub we would enjoy the beautiful starry sky.

While we managed to stay up to 10pm last night I find myself up at 5:30 this morning finishing this. Today we move on down the road 140 miles, should be a short travel day to Cayuga State Park near Seneca NY, this sure beats the long travel days we used to put in.

Until next time...

We're done!!

The last week has flown by with work, packing and breaking camp, last run into Burlington for lunch with my girlfriend Carol. Lunch and running around with Carol was fun as usual but poignant at the same time realizing it would be a long while till we could do this again.

Packing is done, the yard has been cleaned up for it's new seasonals who will actually be coming in for another weekend  before the season ends and spending it on this site.

 Over the weekend we had a Halloween celebration,
since we are leaving Monday we didn't do much in the way of decoration and with the forecast we didn't want to have a wet mess to clean up.




Saturday about 1pm I got the call from Dave he was leaving
 the plant and was free for 7 months and one week.
After I got off work Saturday we took a walk around the park
saying goodbye to the remaining friends we've made this summer
 and to check out the site decorations.
We had 4 sites cancel for various reasons this weekend
so there were not as many kids as
 expected but a good time seemed to be had by all.

 These folks one a free weekend, by the time they were done they had a haunted maze to walk through, too bad I had to work,

 Jello shots were served to the adults here :)!!







Our friends Les & Deb were sick so decided not to come out today, we were so sorry not to be able to see them one last time. Mike and Carol came out for an afternoon visit, around 4:30 we all headed to the camp store to say see ya to Robin. I have thoroughly enjoyed working at the store and look forward to coming back late April. After an afternoon of talking we headed into Johnson for dinner, too busy talking to remember a camera, a tearful goodbye and we were on our way home.

We hope to leave between 8 and 9, Glimmerglass State Park outside of Cooperstown is tomorrows destination. Time to start the touring.

Until next time...

Just about ready-1 week to go!!!!

That's what we've been up to, just passing time till we leave. Of course there is the daily life of work and then days off. Took a ride last Thursday just to get out of the campground, it felt like fall was in the air, cool and crisp with clear blue skies. A slow weekend at the store brought about a change in hours, things are winding down. No new ice cream, won't get sold before the end of the season, no hot fudge for sundaes-vendor is out, 17 hours left to work :)

The campground is almost empty during the week, 2 park models and a tenting (homeless but working) family are the only ones here through the week besides us. Not only are we getting a new site next summer but seems like we'll have 7 new seasonal families, our younger friends are not coming back. Busy lives and family obligations preclude them from returning at least for awhile. Though they have promised to come back next year for a few visits and to follow the blog. Our new site is twice the size and will be near the store, a view of the mountains and the ability to watch more of the weekend warrior madness will be nice.

Our site next year

the pad will be longer

dead tree will be gone

I spoke with the folks taking our site next year and they'll take the garden area we put in, yeah! we don't have to take that out. We also bought a wooden deck from one of the leaving seasonals, we had been talking about building one next year and since there was one  already made available we decided why not. Sat down with Robin to square up for the season, working about 300 hours has resulted in a free site including electric and propane, not bad considering we also had  the house sale happening, got my folks moved and dealt with a few personal crisis. We are so ready to put this summer behind us, 7 days to go.


Got woken up Thursday morning at 3:30am to water flooding the bathroom floor and soaking into the bedroom carpet. As we both start to function we see the toilet is filled with clean water, probably had been running since it was used two hours before. We got the shop vac going and sucked up as much water as possible then started with the Shamwows on the carpet. Years ago I wondered why we had so many, now I'm glad we do, after getting as much water as possible initially they have been steadily leaching water out of the carpet for hours. Dave headed to work at 5:30am about 6:15 it was light enough to see outside and I started checking the basement for water. I found some and after emptying the wet stuff out it appeared that water had gotten in the heat duct and some of that was leaking, just a bit if pushed on. So I turned on the furnace to try drying the duct out, later I turned the ac on to help take the humidity out of the inside. Things are returning to normal, giving up a house didn't mean we gave up all responsibilities, things happen that have to be taken care of, usually on a much smaller scale though.

The weekend came and lots of things needed to be done, going through and packing up stuff to get in travel mode. By the end of the weekend the basement was for the most part packed, our yard is being deconstructed and the garden is coming out. Friday I decided to try my CIA cheesecake I've been making for years, with a pot roast in the slow cooker the smells coming out of the rv were driving us crazy while we installed cargo racks on the Ridgeline to carry our canoe. Pot roast came out delicious but we had to wait until Saturday to taste the cheesecake. Saturday we headed into Huntington one last time for this year, dinner was being held at our friends Les & Deb's home. We spent a few hours talking before Mike and Carol showed up, Carol had just come in from FL where she had been visiting her mom. Dinner was chili and cornbread, thank you so much for having us over and for the leftovers you sent home with us. The evening was tinged with sadness as a large part of all of our lives was changing, for more than 15 years unless one of us were busy or out of town every other weekend we would gather on Saturday. Holidays, birthdays, anniversary, hot summer days and cold winter nights were spent in the company of these crazy friends. No tears were shed because they all plan to come out our last afternoon for one last visit.

Dinner!!

Deb & Les 

James- Les & Deb's son (like one of our own)

Carol & Mike

Forgot to take a picture of the cheesecake before it was cut but got one this morning, this is what's left after 8 pieces have been served, still enough for 4 more slices. I got the recipe many years ago from a chef at the Culinary Institute of America back in the early 80's. I've served this many times over the years and everyone was excited to have it again, the recipe makes enough for a 10" springform pan and has to be made at least 24 hours ahead.

 

I'll be taking a slice down to Robin today, one way to keep from eating too much more. 

14 hours left of work, a week from now we will be on our way. First stop Glimmerglass State Park near Cooperstown NY, since we're not big baseball fans doubt we'll visit there. Decided on the area because I thought that would be far enough for one day, we plan to spend 2 nights and then move on over to another state park in the finger lakes We hope to make a day trip to Corning NY to revisit the Corning Glass Museum, there was so much to see the first time we were there it's a place well worth a second visit. Just hope all the rain in the west doesn't affect travel plans but we'll deal with it if we have to. 

Until next time...

22 days to go

We have come to the conclusion that surgery here will not happen, it'll take a month just to get to a surgeon much less to surgery and then the recovery time will put us past the closing date here. Last weekend was a work one for us so Dave got the paperwork for his leave and will be sending it in in the next day or two, with the vacation time he has left looks like we'll be leaving here on 9/23. We have plotted a slow course to IL by way of state campgrounds the whole way, most only have electric, since we'll be moving every couple of days that won't matter, we have reservations at Lake Shelbyville for a week, it is a COE park with full hookups. Reservations are needed for about 10 or so sites, only 3 were left and since I wanted to be guaranteed a spot and it would be over Columbus Day weekend we went ahead and made reservations.  We'll probably take a walk in spot when we get there when we arrive on a Tuesday, but since this is a family visit I didn't want to take any chances.15 days and 1400 miles, the  Finger Lakes, Lake Erie, some Ohio state parks, an Indiana state park then arriving in IL on 10/8 where we'll spend a week. After that we have our longest travel day up to WI to camp with our friends, then on to CO, AZ and Corpus Christi by 12/16 (5400 miles) for a 6 week stay.

Lately our days are either filled with work (Dave) or getting ready to leave. Last weekend was a very slow one here-probably the slowest since Memorial Day, with all the kids going back to school I think folks were focused on other things. This weekend though is going to be crazy, all but one site is filled and we've kept that one site empty on purpose, you never know what might happen. Friday we are going to a dinner with the seasonals, since some are leaving this weekend we all wanted to get together one last time. Saturday we have our friends from Huntington, I'm sure by the time they leave my sides will be hurting from laughing-always happens when we get together. We gave the task of coming up with headstone names, for the Halloween celebration here, to our friend Les. He had us laughing away with the names he has come up with, quite a  list and it will be hard to choose from them. After the weekend we'll start going through and getting stuff ready to travel :) sure looking forward to hitting the road.

I'll be glad to get away, then the buying will slow down, trying to get everything the last few months that we didn't have already has been a bit expensive but necessary. We gave up satellite radio so getting the i-pod and i-phone set up to play in the trucks, figuring out the best way to communicate while in separate vehicles has been a challenge.  I've set up the Ridgeline with a Jabra Cruiser 2 so I have hands free for my I-phone and access to our music files.  Dave doesn't know it yet but I've gotten him a Jabra Talk to use in the GMC along with the i-pod he'll have access to our music also.  I think trying to hold walkie talkies and drive would be crazy, now to just get Dave on the same page. This lifestyle change is requiring us learning tech stuff we never thought we'd use, I remember some of our other cars coming bluetooth ready and never using it. Once I get used to the bluetooth I'm sure I'll kick myself for never having used it before.

Thursday we had another micro burst rainstorm settle over the campground for a good half hour, rivers were running down the road, with in minutes lots of  sediment and rocks had settled over the storm drains, Soon thereafter the rain left and the sun came out and campers started coming in.  We had  Shelli and George and some of their kids come in for an overnight stay, they are a full time family so after dinner we took a walk around and spent some time talking with them. They are in the area for a family reunion so were heading off to boondock at the reunion site on Friday morning, their home base is Mesa AZ so we have made plans to try and catch up for a longer visit when we are in Phoneix. They don't blog but do have a website where the right about some of the places they've visited.

Friday the parade of campers started, some of us sat around and watched our quiet empty campground get filled up with weekend warriors. Of course there are the returning campers we've gotten to know so we had to take a walk and visit with them. We have been working with Lori and Mat and their dog Abigael, last time they were here Abigael wasn't quiet ready to be Dave's best friend, if he wasn't looking she would finally take a treat from him then run back to her mom. Last night she heard us coming up the road, her tail was wagging just as fast as it could and as soon as Dave got there she was ready for a treat and a pet from him, that just made his weekend.

Our personal cards came in the mail this week so at our goodbye seasonal dinner Friday night I handed them out to all of our neighbors, hopefully they'll let us know their out there if they check out the blog. We had a great dinner of  fresh corn on the cob, pasta salad, fresh cucumbers from the garden, smoked chicken and strawberry shortcake.It has been fun getting to know all of them and look forward to spending the summer with them again next year.

                    Earl if you're going to stick your tongue out when I take a picture it will get posted. Where was the camera though when Brent was eating the dog biscuit.                                                                                                                       

Once again the weather man has played a trick on us, our beautiful weekend has turned into a cloudy and at times rainy weekend, reminiscent of Memorial Day, thankfully though no snow. Our friends Les and Deb came out early Saturday for a great visit. Unfortunately our friend Mike got called into work as he and Carol were on their way here. Mike works for the hospital as one of the top guys in the maintenance department and will lots of times be on call. Seems some pipes decided to burst and he was needed, we really did miss seeing them but they were also bringing the Switchback Roasted Red. Dave hopes to save a few bottles of it to share with our son David when we make it to AZ for Thanksgiving, think we just need to hide them and forget about them for awhile. While we were sad they couldn't make it we enjoyed our time with Les and Deb very much, we've know them since 1995 and have so many shared memories. Les is retiring soon, they will be putting their house up for sale next year, when it sells they will decide what they want to do and where they want to go. It shall be interesting to see where they are when we get back next year. After a dinner of smoked beef and pork ribs, mac salad, baked beans and the never ending supply we seem to have of corn on the cob, we decided to enjoy a game of spades. Over the years we have played numerous games the girls vs the boys, we always sit at the same place since Dave loves to mess with Deb's head as she goes just before him. Well last night he couldn't mess with her too much, the cards went in our favor and for that night we played well, Deb and I do have a habit of underbidding. 

Thank you to all who take the time to read my ramblings, I know it's our journal of our time here but soon it we will be out and touring places we've not seen before. Most nights when as I go to sleep it's hard to believe that we are about to head off on this great adventure, some one asked me what I was feeling these days. There is the thought can we really pull this off and the what if (fill in the blank) happens but then there is the flip side, if we can pull this off how much richer our lives will be and so what if (fill in the blank) happens we'll deal with it. So the butterflies abound as I go to sleep at night and we look forward to the next chapter. 

22 days to go!!!!! :)

And Dave knows about the bluetooth,

Until next time...

 

Christmas-Dr's

Not much going on the last 10 days or so besides working and waiting for Dave's

This past weekend was our weekend off so Friday we got out some of the Christmas decorations we packed, strung up the icicle lights around the front of the rig, then found a few things we kept from the house but  aren't taking with us and put those out.

Us

About a half dozen sites were decorated and someone one a free night of camping, I think it was the folks behind us as their place was set up as a winter wonderland.

our neighbors

We also enjoyed an evening around the campfire good friends, lots of laughter and s'mores, doesn't get much better than that.

Faye & Carol

Robin & Arjay, the campground owners, left on Sunday morning for a get away to Old Orchard Beach, ME for a few days. This left a few chores not covered so Dave and I offered our services, Dave got garbage detail and I got the Little House (bathrooms) as our chores. As Dave was getting ready to head to the barn for garbage detail we heard one of Robins' brother in laws starting to make the garbage rounds, while Dave ended up getting out of his chores I couldn't convince them to do the Little House. Around noon all the weekend warriors were gone so I headed to take care of my chores with a little trepidation, we'd had a lot of campers in over the weekend. I am happy to report we had very considerate guest this weekend and the bathrooms were not trashed, 45 minutes later my chores were done for the day. During the afternoon we spent some time with some of the younger seasonals we only see on the weekends, lots of questions on how we can manage to make this lifestyle change at our age and what are plans are this winter, looks like we may have some of them following along. There were also discussions on how to make the campground a better one, one of my plans this winter is to see what is working in different places so I can bring some ideas back.


Packages have been arriving which means we must be getting closer to departure date, even if it's still up in the air it can't be too much longer. Among other things we've received our new Weber Q grill and our Pressure Pro tire monitoring system, ordered some personal business cards which should be here soon, a few more things and we should be good to go.

 At this point we don't know if Dave will have surgery before we leave or not, seems instead of the surgeon he saw a nurse practitioner, he won't be able to see the surgeon until 9/30 and who knows when surgery would be. We are looking into another orthopedic surgeon, waiting to hear if they can get Dave in and operated on before we leave. We are also thinking of getting his bone spurs taken care of while on the road this winter, just wish we could get some of our questions answered by a surgeon. Worse case scenario we would have to curtail our walks and hiking would be out of the question this winter. So we shall see.

Until next time...

Bone spurs-Pig roast

Hard to believe as slow as our life is right now that another week has passed on by, though it does seem in reflection we were a bit busy.

On Monday Dave got into the doctors to see about his heel that has been bothering him for quite some time now. After x-rays it's been determined he has bone spurs on the heel of his right foot. He was put on medical leave for a week and told to start a regiment of ibuprofen and ice 3 times a day, and to limit his activities. Fast forward to today (Sunday) aside from overdoing it a bit Saturday his heel is feeling better than it has in quite awhile. Between now and his doctors appointment he only has to work 3.5  12 hour days. He has an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon on 8/20 and we're hoping he can get in to have the spur removed soon thereafter, we're hoping this won't hold up our departure date. Seems like we just paid of the last of our doctors bills and now we'll be having another one-always something.

Wednesday evening we headed  back to Huntington-where we used to own a house- for dinner with our good friends Mike & Carol, of course there was the inevitable spade game afterwards, which the girls won of course. I was the designated driver that night, wasn't a fun trip home because of all the road fuzzies, you know those little mists that hang right on top of the wet road making it hard to see the line markings at night. Was glad to get home and find I had remembered to shut all the windows.

Thursday was the day our dentist had been able to squeeze both of us in, looks like we'll have more doctors bills next year when we are here. Dave has to have a few things taken care of and I need a 3/4 crown so more dollars out the window :(

Friday was the start of my work weekend, this is pig roast weekend so lots of folks were coming in. Once again we have some co-workers of Dave's in the park, they have the coveted sites 2 & 5. These sites are the largest and have the best views in the whole campground, we spent a month on site 5 last year and never wanted to leave. My 3-8 shift went by quickly, most of the campers got in before we closed, made a reservation for another co-worker to come in just for Saturday night and took more reservations for next weekend. Next weekend is Christmas in August here so Dave and I will be getting out the lights and a few decorations we held onto and get the RV decorated for the event.

getting the motor going

See you at dinner time

Saturday by 11am they had the pig roasting away in the pit and the pit bosses were on duty.

almost dinner time

My 3-8 shift went by quickly helping with set up and then take down of the dinner, ice cream scooping, brisk ice and fire sales kept me busy the whole shift. I got home around 8:15 and we took a short walk around to say hi to Dave's coworkers and their families. Dave was limping pretty bad so knew he had overdone it, by 9:30 we were home, icing his ankle and ready for bed.

I am holding off on making anymore plans until we talk with the doctor and find out if we can leave when we want to. For now I am enjoying every ones adventures, some of them maybe coming east this fall, hope we can meet them. While we are not traveling right now, living in the RV has been so much more relaxing than having a sticks and bricks house, we have the benefits of living in a small town but none of the headaches-yard maintenance, property taxes, huge house upkeep, and all the other stuff that goes with owning a house. From time to time when working I get the question "are you the owner" and while this is a wonderful campground I am glad to not be the owner, again we get the benefits of living here but none of the ownership headaches. Tough life but someone has to do it.

Until next time...

Good People - Goodbye

It's so nice to know there is still honest and good people out there. Friday I went to the grocery store for the campground and us, as I was checking out I couldn't find the campground cash. I went to customer service and no one had turned it in, I was getting really mad at myself just seemed like the start to a bad day. As we were driving out Dave asked me if I wanted to go to customer service again so we turned around and I went back. As I was talking with the young lady at the front desk a older lady came up also, she asked if any one had lost something, when I told her she proceeded to hand me the cash I had lost, she was a Christian after all and it was the right thing to do. Being so thankful I then made sure she and her grandson had lunch on me, once again I was reminded of how many really good people there are out there. 

Pat & Dick

 

Robin & Faye-we'll miss you Dick & Pat

Later Friday we said goodby to some of our new seasonal friends. Dick & Pat are originally from VT but live in GA these days, since mid May they have been living here too to be close to family for visiting.  We found out Thursday they would be leaving this weekend due to health reasons, so plans were hatched to surprise them with an afternoon and evening of visits. Around 3 Dave and I and another couple headed over with some drinks and snacks, after a few hours of talking and enjoying the company of these fine folks we headed home and soon saw some more folks bearing food and heading to Dick & Pat's for their goodbyes. We hope to stop in GA on our way home from the coast this winter to visit them, Dick has a military background and can get us into a Famcamp near them. Pat and I promised we wouldn't say goodby but instead see ya next year, we wish them the best as they head home to get better. I told Dave earlier this summer they are who I want us to be when we grow up, they've enjoyed their life, were fulltimers for awhile and are still lead an active life.

Saturday I pulled an extra shift covering for someone who was away, the skies were cloudy and the temps have cooled down looks like we're back into the cool rainy pattern again :(  So with a cool day I never scooped any ice cream and we left the slushie machine off, it's not worth the electric $$'s it's costing to run the machine. Don't know quite what is going on but no one seems to be participating in the activities this year, it'll be interesting to see how activities are handled at some of the places we visit this winter. 

After work our friends, Mike & Carol, from Huntington came for a visit,  this has been a hard week for them as they lost one of their cats a few days ago, we know what they are going through so we decided on a quiet evening instead of heading out somewhere. We took a quick walk in between rain showers to say goodby one last time to Dick & Pat. Dinner of smoked turkey and fresh produce from the local farmer who stops by every Saturday afternoon, was held inside, since there was to be no fire we settled in for a game of spades. It took a moment to figure out where everyone was suppose to sit, there is a certain order to our playing after all these years, as Carol would say it isn't natural if we're not sitting in the right places.

Sunday was a day of making sure Dave stayed off of his feet, his achilles heel is acting up again,the  tendonitis  was acting up probably something to do with him up and down the ladder while cleaning the front of the RV Saturday-but it sure is pretty and shiny.

Now we're into another week of working, our days off this week are Wed & Thurs, next weekend is the pig roast here at the campground so I know some of the work days will be busy getting ready for it. Hope we have good weather and turnout, haven't heard the cost but I know last years was well attended. Sure hope I remember to take pictures with my new Iphone that I still have quite figures out yet.

Until next time...