The Arch....

7:04 am - Friday - April 27th - St. Louis, MO - 50º F, 87% humidity, wind 3 mph out of the west.....clear blue skies with a forecast high of 71º F.

First of all, it has been nice to be sitting still for a few days after moving daily for 9 straight days.  We are parked in beautiful surroundings.....

....it is quiet and almost pastoral here at the Oakville Elks Lodge.

We were here in St. Louis back in the mid 80's when we had just 3 children and visited the St. Louis Gateway Arch National Park at that time, but it has been over 30 years, and we thought it would be fun to visit again, and spend more time in and around this amazing structure, but I get ahead of myself.

It has been a while since I washed and detailed the Newell.  I think the last time was on our way to the Grand Canyon from Yellowstone at Downata Hot Springs in southern Idaho last October.....it was definitely due.  The weather was delightful so I spent about 2 hours washing and drying the exterior of the Newell, and it came out quite well......

......she's got a smile on her face again, and her ALCOA wheels have a sparkle to them once again!

We were off on our drive over to the Gateway Arch around 1 pm.  It takes a little over 30 minutes in traffic to get there, but visiting on a Wednesday meant it would not be crowded, and it was not.  We found a parking spot ($6) down by the waterfront and then walked up to the Visitor Center to buy our admission tickets ($20 with our National Park Pass).  The Gateway Arch was originally conceived in the early 40's, and finally completed in 1965.  Not one person lost their life in the construction.  There is a theater inside the Visitor Center (Tucker Theater) where you can watch a 30 minute movie (Monument to the Dream.....click on this YouTube link to view a portion of the movie) about the history, and construction of the Arch.....it is totally fascinating......

Very few cars in the riverside parking lot

......our tickets to ride to the top of the Arch were for 2:10 pm, so we walked around the arch for about 15 minutes before heading inside to get on the funky elevator.....

......we were assigned to elevator #5 (Ride to the Top....click on this YouTube link to view how the 'elevator' works).....they are quite small inside, and seat just 5 people each....

Our 'capsule'

......you can ride the elevator capsules up either the south, or north leg....we went up the north leg.  As the capsule ascends the leg, which is, obviously curved, the capsule periodically adjusts itself so it stays vertical to the ground.

The views from the viewing deck, 630' above the ground, are spectacular as one might imagine......

 The Cardinals were playing a 'day' game Thursday

 The old courthouse

 At the top

 The entire viewing area about 100' long, and you must lean over to look out the windows

 The Hyatt Regency hotel is to the right of the old courthouse

 

....by the time we finished with our tour it was closing in on 3 pm and we were both hungry so we stopped by a local Starbucks located in the Hyatt Regency hotel in the picture above.  We both got coffees, and a bagel for moi, and a scone for TLE.

After our coffee we spent some more time walking around the arch and capturing it from different angles......

 My favorite picture of the day

 Big barge being pushed up the Mississippi

.....we were back in the Beetle heading for home by 4:15 pm.  We had a dinner date with Creig and Kay's family at their home at 6 pm, so we were back on our way over to their home by 5:20, arriving there right at 6 pm (rush hour traffic slows things down a lot).  We spent a couple of hours with Creig, Kay, Jessica and Kaytlin (and their significant others....Zach and Steven).  It was such a perfect evening we sat outside eating until almost 8 pm before the evening chill chased us inside.

Left to right: Moi, Creig, Kay, Kaytlin, Zach, Steven, Jess and TLE

One of the benefits of our lifestyle is being able to visit with our relatives across the country on a more regular basis than we did when we were stuck in our workaday lives.  It was truly a pleasure to spend time with Creig and Kay's amazing daughters.

We were home just before 9 pm, and in bed by 10:30.....we'll be going hiking Friday with Creig and Kay.....looking forward to it!  Thanks for stopping by!

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9 in a row!

 7:59 am - Thursday - 04/26/2018 - St. Louis, MO - 48º F, 100% humidity....yes, that's right....100% humidity, wind 11 mph out of the south by southeast.......looking outside I see no evidence of any wind whatsoever.....seems totally CALM.

We began our 9th consecutive travel day with St. Louis just 157 miles away.  Yeah, I know, another 'strenuous' travel day, right?  Well, it is what it is.....you still have to drive the miles and arrive without incident....that is the trick.

Rain was forecast for our starting location, Lebanon, MO by mid morning, so we decided to roll our wheels by 7:50 am and arrive at our destination for the day before the rain caught up with us.  That's the thing about dry camping......all you have to do is turn the engine over and roll.....you don't have to roll up a water hose, disconnect an electric line, or finish dumping your tanks.....you just start the engine and go.

We were back on I-44 and rolling eastward within minutes.  The route this day was full of big rolling hills....up and down we would go over and over again.....300' up.....300' down for 150 miles until we finally began our descent to the Mississippi River at 450' elevation.  The interesting thing about St. Louis is that from here to New Orleans where this great river empties into the Gulf of Mexico you will only lose 450' in elevation over 658 miles.

We made just one stop with about 50 miles to go at a Rest Area for about 15 minutes to go to the bathroom, and stretch and then continued on to our destination.....the Oakville Elks Lodge on the east side of St. Louis.  They offer just 6 back in RV sites with 20 amp electrical....total cost for four days.....a minimum $15 donation!

Since we had an extremely early start with only one stop along the way, we arrived at the Elks Lodge in Oakville, about 300 yards from the Mississippi, around 11:38 am....the lodge does not open until 2 pm on Wednesdays so we went about parking, and hooking up to one of the 20 amp plugs provided.  TLE called her brother, Creig, about the time we arrived so while we waited for the lodge to open, and Creig to arrive I went about a few chores which included finally stowing the new hose I bought on Tuesday, and removing the brass male and female fittings from the old hose before discarding it into the Elks dumpster.  By the time I finished with that Creig had arrived and we sat talking until the lodge opened.  This is one of the most scenic Elks Lodges at which we have stayed on our journeys.....

There are some soccer fields immediately adjacent to the Lodge....I feel right at home

Once I had made my $15 donation (I actually donated $20) we got in Creig's Ford truck to drive over to his home in Fenton, MO (a suburb of St. Louis located to the southeast of St. Louis), which was only about 10 miles away.  We planned to go out for dinner with he and his wife Kay later in the evening, but first he needed us to help him move his 1996 C-4 Corvette back to his storage garage about 10 miles away......I got the assignment of driving it....I have never driven a Corvette of any vintage before, so I gladly accepted the assignment.....

 TLE took this short video of me driving the 'Vette

.....Creig stores his C-4 in his daughters garage across town when he is not using it.....his garage is full of Triumph TR-6's.....more on that another time.  We arrived at his daughter's garage about 20 minutes later where I backed the 'Vette into the driveway....

.....getting into this low slung beauty is much easier than getting out....at least for me!

Once we had the 'Vette tucked away we then headed back to Creig's home to await the return of his wife Kay who was out getting her hair done, and doing some light shopping.  She returned home about 5:30 pm at which time we headed into downtown St. Louis to a micro brewery called '4 Hands Brewing Company' for some brews and food......

Moi, TLE, Kay and Creig

.....for our first round (we weren't driving) of beers TLE and I ordered two 12 oz. La Belleza's (an Imperial stout brewed with cocoa, cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg, chilies, and ginger)....delicioso!  For our second round we chose their Zellige (Moroccan Coffee Stout brewed with cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cardamon, black pepper and sea salt)......both were scrumptous!

Our two 12 oz La Belleza's 

The food menu

For us to give our top marks to any micro brewery the food must live up to the beer, and 4 Hands' food definitely rises to that level.  We ordered a Chopped salad, Smoked Brisket Nachos, and their Brisket Poor Boy sandwich to share.....OMG.....this place definitely lives up to its 4 star Yelp rating on 229 reviews!

Creig and Kay delivered us back to the Newell by 8:30....what a great day!  We arrived home in a light rainfall....the rain finally caught up with us! 

Thanks for stopping by!

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You'll get a charge out of this....

6:53 am - Wednesday - April 25th - Lebanon, MO - 51º F, 72% humidity, wind 5 mph out of the north......high clouds with a forecast high of 57º F and rain about mid morning....we will be long gone by then.....no rain forecast at today's destination....St. Louis.

Once again we did not plan to leave Downstream Casino until about mid morning so after I finished writing my daily blog entry we took off on a walk around the enormous parking lot....

.....each lap was about .8 of a mile, so we walked around the lot two times for a total of 1.6 miles.....

.......we covered the 1.6 miles averaging over 3.5 mph burning about 296 caloric units.  While we are moving every day we try to walk every single day just to keep the juices flowing.

By 10:30 am we were ready to roll so I unhooked our electrical and we were on our way to our oh so modest goal of Lebanon, MO.....just 127 miles to the east.  Ultimately we plan to spend a few days in St. Louis, but St. Louis was 286 miles away, and I didn't want to drive that far in one day, so we chose a closer destination.

The drive was quite easy along I-44 which in this section has a lot of gentle rolling hills.  I just set the cruise control on 60 mph and held on to the steering wheel.  We ended up stopping to take a break 3 times in 127 miles, a new record for us.  One of our stops was at a Camping World just east of Springfield, MO.  Camping World is owned by Good Sam, and they are a great resource for anything you might need for your RV.  They also sell RV's, and work on them, but I would never let them work on my Newell.  I've heard nothing but complaints over the years from everyone I have met who has had them work on their RV.

I needed to replace my 50' white water hose as it has been 'done' for a long time.  I wanted to get one just like my 25' white hose, which I also bought at Camping World 6 years ago.  It is still going strong after all these years, and I was hoping they had a 50' version of that hose.....they did!  We picked up a couple of other things (valve stem extenders for my rear dualies, and some tension bars for our cupboards to keep things from falling out after a day of driving).

We were back on the road for the final 40 miles to Lebanon and arrived at the Walmart Supercenter there about 2 pm.  We went inside to order a couple of Subway sandwiches for lunch, and pick up some fruit for the next few days.  Our plan after our late lunch was to get the VW out of the trailer and drive one exit back on I-44 to visit a knife outlet store (Buck, Henckels, etc.), and then directly across the Interstate to a large antique store (Heartland Antiques) which boasted 350 booths.  Unfortunately, when TLE got in the VW to back it out of the trailer she found that the battery was dead as a door nail, so I had to get out my portable charger, turn on the big Kohler genset, plug in the trailer to the Newell, then hook up the charger to the battery to get some charge into it before we tried the 85 amp boost quick start option.  It took about 45 minutes to get the battery up to 56% before we tried to use the 85 amp option and it worked.  The car fired right up and we were on our way to the factory outlet knife store.  As it turned out TLE had forgotten to turn off the XM Radio receiver when we inserted the VW into the trailer in Fontana 8 days prior and it drained the battery.

We didn't find any knives we could not live without, so we headed across the Interstate to Heartland Antiques where we probably spent an hour browsing........we came away with a Mason jar to replace the one TLE broke a couple of weeks ago while we were in Fontana.....$2.50.

As luck would have it there was an automated car wash right across the parking lot from where we are parked where you could get a quick wash for $5, so we ran our filthy VW through the wash, dried her off, and then stowed her back in the trailer before heading inside for the day.  By this time it was almost 7 pm....where did that 5 hours go?

Getting ready to role our wheels in about 30 minutes so I will bid you adieu for now.....thanks for stopping by!

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Pucker time....

8:11 am - Tuesday - April 24th - Joplin, MO - 48º F, 85% humidity, wind 1 mph out of the east by northeast.....clear blue skies with a forecast high we will not experience of 75º F.  Nice to have an almost windless day!

We had decided Sunday night we would not leave OKC until after 10 am Monday.....we were only going to drive a little over 200 miles for the day, plus there was no weather, or wind to outrun.  While TLE took care some housekeeping I dumped our black tank for the first time on our trip, checked the oil, and tire pressures of the trailer tires.  All went smoothly.  

I then turned my attention to an issue I had noticed while driving on Sunday.....my oil temperature gauge was not registering a temperature all day.  I suspected a wire had come lose from the temp sensor on the oil pan, so I checked it only to find exactly what I hoped to find.....the temp sensor wire dangling loose.......

The new connector connected to the oil temp sensor once again

.....I carry a supply of all types of 12 volt connectors so I opened up the trailer and found the plastic box containing them, pulled out a new connector, stripped the insulation of the end of the wire, and crimped on the new one.....easy peasy....and order is restored.

I fired up the big 6V92 around 10:10 am and we were on our way to the Interstate on ramp and cruising east bound on I-44 for about a mile.....our fuel gauge was just past 1/2 empty and Oklahoma is replete with low diesel prices right now so we found a station just off the Interstate charging $2.72/gallon for diesel.  We took on 107 gallons at a cost just under $300.  I checked our mileage and found we had averaged 7 mpg for the last 745 miles.....that's the best we have done in quite a while.  Usually we are around 6-6.5 mpg.

We were back on the Interstate within 30 minutes cruising north by northeast.  I-44 is a toll road all the way from OKC to the Missouri border.  Now, to be fair they really keep this Interstate maintained, and in excellent condition as I would hope they would.  We paid a total of $22.50 in tolls for the 200 miles to the Missouri border, and for that cost expect good roads.....

.....as I mentioned above they really maintain this Interstate, and there were several construction zones along our route.....some with the dreaded 'K' rail.  Through this section all trucks must remain in the #2, or right lane which is just barely wide enough.....it can't be any wider than 9.5, or 10 feet..........

Yup....that 'K' rail really is as close is it appears!

......TLE snapped the picture below using her review mirror to show how close I was to this 'K' rail for about 15 miles.....

.....see how close the trailer tires are to the 'K' rails?  All I could do was focus on staying in the middle of the lane.....it was definitely, and officially 'PUCKER TIME'!  Finally the construction zone ended,  just before the final toll booth..... 

.....and just past the toll booth was a toll road Rest Area replete with fast food, truck parking, and gift shops, so I pulled in, parked the Newell and cleared my head for about 15 minutes before we continued to the Missouri border, and the Downstream Casino parking lot.

Finally the Missouri welcome sign appeared, and the sign for 'Exit 1' in Missouri.....our exit.  Within three minutes we were selecting one of about 20 sites available for RV's.......all have water and electric (50 amp) which you can utilize for free for one one day.....after that the daily cost is $30.  I found this site on 'FreeCampsites.net', one of my several sources for overnight stays.  All you have to do is go into the  casino and acquire your 'Q Club' card and you are good to go for one night of free hookups!

So, after 7 days of travel we have now covered 1,517 miles (upper left corner of the Garmine GPS) and are very close to the half way point in our journey to Smuggler's Den RV Park in Maine. 

After hooking up our electric (I didn't bother with the water since we are only staying overnight, and I just topped off the fresh water tank before we left OKC) we walked over to the casino to get our club card, and register for our campsite.  We both got a club card with which you get $7.00 to gamble away if you wish......

......after buying a mocha frappuccino at their coffee shop TLE and I went over to the electronic penny slot machines.  I loaded in $5 of my $7 and began to bet .30 cents at a time.  My balance went up and down over the course of 30 minutes, but I ended up doubling the $5 walking away with $10.83!  I'm not a big gambler, so it's easy for me to stop while I'm ahead, which I did.  TLE was not so fortunate.....she ended up with .12 cents left out of her $5.  We cashed in our winnings and headed back to the Newell for the evening.......

Site #14....all concrete parking lot located a good 1/2 mile from the casino.....nice and quiet!

.....we spent the evening catching up on some recorded shows, plus one show ('Timeless') using our ROKU TV connection....sweet! It was so pleasant outside we left most of our windows open overnight.....haven't been able to do that for about a week now.

Some of you may wonder what sources I use to find overnight spots to park. Following is a list of my favorites:

1) www.freecampsites.com

2) www.RVParkReviews.com

3) www.passport-america.com/

4) Days End Directory....no direct link available as you must be a member of 'Escapees' to utilize this resource.

I never fail to find a great overnight site whether it involves an actual RV park where you pay, or something free, or as close to free as you can get utilizing these sources.

Thanks for stopping by!

When you shop Amazon, please use our link (below) to access their website.......we will appreciate every purchase you make using our Amazon Affiliate link, and  remember, using our link will not add one penny to your purchase, plus we will receive a small commission which helps defer the costs of producing this blog each day.

Oklahoma!

7:41 am - Monday - April 23rd - Oklahoma City, OK - 50º F, 90% humidity, wind 7 mph out of the north by northwest......cloudy with a forecast high for today of 74º F.

Shortly after awakening Sunday I was checking the weather on my phone and noticed that the winds would be coming out of the north all along our route with the worst of the wind around Elk City, OK at over 20 mph around mid morning.  Elk City was about 130 miles east of us so it was imperative we get back on the Interstate and cover as many miles as possible before the wind got bad.

We were rolling out of the Cracker Barrel parking lot by 8:10 am and up to highway speed on the Interstate within minutes.  Initially there was no wind at all, and it was very overcast......for a while I thought what we saw in the distance was rain.......

.....but it was not......just very low clouds.  As we continued eastward we saw this old, abandoned water tower that was leaning over so much I was surprised it did not fall.  I guess it has been that way for years......

......it soon began to clear, and eventually the winds from the north began to appear.  Most of the day we were going due east on I-40 so the winds were coming from the drivers side of the Newell forcing me to crank the steering wheel hard to the left almost 1/3 turn.....this is the kind of wind I hate, but at least it was steady and not gusting.

 Heading due east on I-40

Ultimately we entered Oklahoma, but there were no signs welcoming us like we saw in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.....just this sign indicating an Oklahoma Information Center and Rest Area 4 miles distant.....

....we finally got our official Oklahoma sign at the rest area.....it was well worth the wait.....it almost seems like the sign is shouting 'OKLAHOMA!'.  As we travel we stop every 60-90 miles depending on what is available, and at least once a day, sometimes more, we get dressed and go for at least 1/2 mile, but mostly for a mile, or more.  This day we walked 1.2 miles....a couple of times around the Rest Area.

The rest of the day's drive saw me fighting the ever stiffening winds continuously.  We took two more rest stops before finally reaching Oklahoma City.  We were here about 9 years ago and stayed at an RV park on the northeast side of town called Twin Fountains RV Resort.  It is right near the junction of I-44 (yes, we have left I-40 after 6 days) and I-35.  It fits our requirements for being 'easy off and easy on', and having very large, long pull through sites.  We hadn't plugged in for a few days, and TLE needed to do a load of wash so we got off the Interstate around 2:30 pm and snagged a site (P-4) which puts us right at the exit for the RV park.....perfect!  Just as 9 years ago we had no reservation at this very popular park, but got a site easily (it is quite full).

Once TLE got the wash going we walked across the street to a local 'health and wellness' school and walked for about 2 miles on their series of walking trails.....

....we walked a combination of their three trails to get our 2 miles of walking.

Around 6 pm we put on our bathing suits and walked over to the Jacuzzi for a good hot soak, and what a hot soak it was!  It was the perfect temperature.  You know how sometimes you in get in the Jacuzzi, or even the bath tub and it feels hot initially, but within a couple of minutes you are wishing it was hotter?  Well, this was was perfect in that I never wished it was hotter.  We soaked for about 30 minutes, which really helped relieve any residual tenseness remaining from our windy drive earlier.

We've now covered almost 1,300 miles on our journey to Maine, leaving roughly 2,000 miles to go.  We're going to slow down a little over the next week, and are planning on spending at least 3 days in St. Louis visiting TLE's brother, Creig (pronounced Craig), and his lovely wife Kay.  

Thanks for stopping by!

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