Home unsold sweet home

After stops in Elizabethtown, Kentucky and Muncie, IN, we have arrived back in Toledo, Oh. Unfortunately, we were greeted with cold and snow. It is yet another record cold snap here and we are already dreaming of hitting the road again.

It has been a busy couple of days since we returned. We had to drop the motorhome off at the dealer for service and to get an estimate for repairs to the area damaged in our drunk driver incident in LA back in December. It was difficult to leave the coach and head back to the “stick” house. The good news is that the house survived just fine over the winter. We have already accomplished a number of administrative duties and hopefully will complete all our medical appointments and other mundane things by the end of the month and will be able to start planning the next trip.

We have worked up some rough numbers from our trip. We traveled just under 8000 miles in the motorhome and drove an additional 7000 miles in the toad seeing the sights. We were in 22 states and stayed in 33 campgrounds. We also took 4049 pictures.

The numbers are interesting, I suppose, but the most interesting thing has been the pleasure from traveling this country, visiting family and friends and planning routes and places to see based on weather and a fuzzy long range plan. It was truly an adventure on the open road in a great and beautiful country. After five months on the road, we have just scratched the surface and there is so much more to see and do. There will also be many more people to meet and challenges to face. Certainly, one of the essences of a life worth living is one that has adventure and challenges to conquer. At least for now, the RV road trip will meet that requirement and let’s not forget that it is fun!!

We expect to be off the road for at least a month while the motorhome is repaired and we look after the house and sail boat sales efforts. During this period we will be posting less often, but will start regular postings once back on the road.

We would enjoy hearing from those that have read this blog for any part of the last five months. You can leave a comment on the blog or send an e-mail to: cg5350@yahoo.com

Chattanooga part two

Our prime reason for coming to Chattanooga was to visit our daughter, Gretchen and her husband Bo. Gretchen has been spending the last few weeks in a Chattanooga hospital on bed rest due to some complications in her pregnancy. She has been doing a great job of reducing her risks to herself and the baby during this trying period. While we were there, she has been doing fine and yesterday, during our last planned day in town, she got the word that she could go back home due to her stable condition. This was great news, if a little scary. There is nothing like being down the hall from the best prenatal care in the area. But the fact that the doctors feel it is safe for her to go home is also gratifying. We are very happy that things are going so well.

Between visits, we also visited the Chattanooga Aquarium and the TVA water storage facility that is part of the electric power system for the entire Tennessee Valley area. The Aquarium was very nicely done and had great exhibits for the River Journey and the Ocean Journey. Both buildings had a very clear exhibit plan that allowed you to not only observe the many animals and plants on display but learn something about the eco systems as you had fun. It is definitely worth the visit.

The TVA water storage facility is on a huge property which also provides many hiking and exploring trails and several accesses to the Tennessee River and the lower storage lake for fishing and other water recreation sports. Essentially, water is pumped form the lower lake to the upper storage facility on a daily basis and then allowed to flow thru huge turbines on the way back down to the lower lake, this producing large amounts of electricity. One word of caution, if you decide to visit this facility, make sure you have sufficient fuel in the vehicle as the distances inside the facility are deceptively long.