Category: Personal

Day 2387

Tuesday April 16th 2024

Day 8 of our trek north

Dear Journal:

It is a few minutes after six when I roll out of my bed this morning, and although it is not light yet there is a beautiful pinky-orangy glow to the east as the first signs of dawn come into focus. Mister Sam met me in the galley of the coach for his morning treats, after which he headed to the top of his post for his morning nap. The cat post gives him a birds eye view through most of the coach windows, as you never know when a rouge squirrel could come into view. The outside temperature on our thermometer was 50ºF (10ºC) and the temperature inside of the coach was 64ºF (17.7ºC), better than I would suspect for the middle of April. I snapped this photo through the side window, I don’t think that even Walmart is ready for me and my pajamas in the parking lot snapping pictures.

Today we will leave the Walmart in Bowling Green and cross I-75 on OH-6 and head to Pemberville where I hope I will be able to park in the American Legion parking lot for the day. We will unhook the towed and our first stop will be to visit with Miss Betty, then we can return to the coach to prepare for dinner, but after dinner I’m planning on some night time driving, just enough to take us north through the city of Detroit and then to a Cracker Barrel for the night. It appears to be a little more than an hour away and it seems prudent to transverse tonight instead of waiting till noon tomorrow. We expect to finish our trek north tomorrow in Goderich and would like to arrive early to get parked and settled in.

Second day with black coffee, and I personally like the taste of a good dark roast coffee, strong but not bitter. It’s now 4:08 according to my laptop and it still thinks we are in Arizona, so every time I open google maps there is our flashing dot in Superior AZ. The sun has risen here in Bowling Green, and already I can feel the warmth through the coach window. An omelet for breakfast with a second cup of coffee, Mister Sam is watching birds from the coach window, the quiet morning is shattered by a team of mowers cutting the grass on the Walmart property. Now that is a true sign of spring on the east coast, as there are not a lot of lawn movers in the desert, and as crazy as it may seem I’m looking forward cutting some grass in a few days.

Today is a special day, in fact any day we can spend with the Ward family is a special day. It is still hard for me to fathom the loss of Butch and it has not even been a year since his passing, he was such a lovable guy, his smile was infectious and he was always smiling, he was also a schemer always planning his next event, whether it was a trip to his favorite restaurant of having friends stop by. I remember last May when we stopped to Butch & Betty at their seasonal campground he worked to get us a site closer to his, in amongst the seasonal sites as opposed to the transient site area. And the year we first met Butch at the campground in Florida he was always planning a cornhole or pickle ball event that would end up at his site for a “Brandy Alexander” at his site. The man was infectious he was always smiling and was always on the go, whether biking, playing, or working the man was like that damn Eveready rabbit. So today we are taking a detour into Pemberville for the day, first and foremost will be a visit with Miss Betty, it has been less than a year since the loss of Butch and we will stop and visit every time we are close until they don’t want to see us any more. We will also be stock piling the best pizza sauce that we have ever had, and will spent the evening with Betty’s family breaking bread and enjoying a glass of wine.

We arrived in Pemberville by 10:30 and found street parking very near our destination, we disconnected the towed and made our way across town to enjoy an visit with Miss Betty. we talked about her difficulties as well as her plans for the months to come, there will be a number of challenges in the weeks and months to come, like returning to the campground this spring, the opening of their trailer which will bring a flood of memories. I went to Subway (I guess it’s been a while since I have been to a Subway, the whole menu has changed) and picked up some sandwiches for lunch, we enjoyed some potato chips from a couple of local (Ohio based) companies.

We later gathered at Brian & Linsi’s home for dinner, barbequed burgers and chicken, I have to mention Aunt Jackie’s pumpkin cookies, and in true Ward family fashion family and children coming and going all evening. We over stayed but it is always hard to pull yourself away from a Ward family event, there is so much love and appreciation, as well as good natured fun, these events are always entertaining. We pulled ourselves away around 8:30, fired up Thunder re attached the towed and we headed north, with tonight’s destination being a Cracker Barrel restaurant on the north side of Detroit. This moved us through the lighter evening traffic with less difficulty, we made our destination before 10:30 and this Cracker Barrel was far enough from the highway that it was a quiet night.

Day 8 Stats: 106 miles (170.5 kilometers), solar harvest 172 amp/ hours $0.00 camping ($25.00 breakfast), no fuel purchase today.

Day 2386

Monday April 15th, 2024

Day 7 of our trek north

Dear Journal:

The clock radio in the bedroom reads 3:14 which sounds like a terrible time to get up until you add the three hours of time zone changes last week, then it seems like a more reasonable time to get up. The clock radio is the only clock that hasn’t been changed yet, that is because it is the biggest pain in the butt to change, in fact I could be having a wee internal battle about changing it at all. Miss Laurie has been updating the microwave clock time as needed and I have been updating the main clock that we use when traveling. I mean how bad is it when you look a purchasing a clock that one of the things that I check is how easy is it to change the time?

And speaking of time changes why is it that my iPhone updates with in moments of crossing a time zone and my iPad takes days? And don’t get me started on this laptop!

The coffee is ready now and being that is Monday morning there will be no Irish blessing for me this morning, I had to start weaning of the blessing sometime, and a Monday morning seem like a good time. Because today will be a shorter travel day we are just ordering breakfast now, Biscuits and Gravy with bacon for me and Miss Laurie is having the pecan pancakes. Our departure time today is ten o’clock and our destination is a Walmart in Bowling Green, Ohio,

Breakfast was good as usual. and I do like the order ahead and pick it up option, as we get to watch the news while enjoying breakfast. This Cracker Barrel had a lot of traffic noise last night, but I was so tired that I slept through most of it, in fact I did not even hear the waste removal truck this morning that apparently Miss Laurie did. Our departure time is near nine o’clock and our estimated time of arrival is near one o’clock this afternoon, a short day just under 200 miles (320 kilometers). We traveled northeast on Interstate I-69 to Fort Wayne Indiana the took the by-pass I-469 eastward to US-24 which ran us to the Ohio State line.

US-24 turned out to be a four lane freeway, a larger highway than I was expecting. There is a lot of standing water here in northwest Ohio, I seen people trying to mow their lawns around water puddles, we seen lots of daffodils as well as lots of dandelions in bloom. There are no leaves on the trees although the trees have a green hue as many are at the bud stage of spring, I did not see any farm land being tilled yet for the year and temperature is above normal right now.

This travel week has worked out almost perfect for us, with higher than normal spring time temperatures, we have been able to keep pace with clear sunny skies and have not seen any rain since last Tuesday afternoon in New Mexico. A review of the forecast shows that the next weather event is slowly catching us and this area will have rain by Wednesday, just after we have left the area. Our next highway is OH-6 a well maintained two lane highway with a double nickel speed limit, it will take us through a couple of small villages before bringing us to the Walmart in Bowling Green. This is a reasonably new Walmart and we have stayed here a number of times over the years, we picked a spot in the northwest corner of the lot near the retention pond that is full right now with a few Canadian Geese right now, we are a long way from the store but that’s ok.

The GPS says we are only 4 hours from Goderich but it will take us a couple of days to get there, as tomorrow will be a visiting day and we will only advance a few miles.

Day 7 Stats: 195 miles (314 kilometers), solar harvest 278 amp / hours $0.00 camping, no fuel purchase today