HItch Itch....

(For my sister-in-law, Phyllis.....we are still in Coeur d'Alen, but will be moving eastward Wednesday.....miss you and love you!)

Over the first 12 months of being nomads we moved quickly back and forth across the country, and now in the past 9 months, much more slowly.  I don't think we have completely found our travel style yet, but we are getting closer.  Somewhere in between fast and slow would be best......duh!  When we sit in one place for several weeks (the lone exception being Cedar Key) I start getting the "itch" to "hitch" up the trailer and change my view.  I admit it freely, I have become addicted to changing my view.  Here we are in a very beautiful area of our country, Coeur d'Alene, ID and after a couple of weeks I am thinking about moving again.  Granted, the primary reason for our spending a month here is that I have family nearby, plus we wanted to stay as far north as possible where the weather tends to be cooler on average.  

On the other hand moving at too fast a rate creates a sort of disorientation for me, and can increase our cost of living......the more miles you drive the more fuel you consume, and fuel, in our case diesel, is one of our largest expenses when we move great distances in a short period of time.  Moving a lot, as long as you don't move far, will not increase your fuel consumption too much.  A good example of this is since the end of June we have only traveled around 1,872 miles.....that's about 600 miles a month.....about 1/2 a tank of diesel per month for us.  On the other hand we have been paying to stay in RV parks a lot more, and dry camping a lot less.....the trade off being that when we travel fewer miles we have more dollars to spend on RV parks.  All that being said, until we arrived at our current stopping point we have moved a lot, but not too many miles.  I think that is the balance we are striving to attain.

Here are the numbers.......when we arrived in Cedar Key on December 29, 2012 we had traveled 12,445 miles in less than a year (11 months)....back and forth across the USA 3 times......literally.  Since then we have only traveled an additional 6,322 miles in the subsequent 9 months.  By the time we arrive back in SoCal we will have added approximately another 2,200 miles bringing our total since Cedar Key to a little over 8,500....we'll be there until after the first of the year, so we will have traveled about 4,000 miles less in our second year on the road, than in the first.

Monday I spent more time organizing the trailer, and putting stuff away, and TLE went to do some shopping.  The combination of the dust storm Sunday night, and the intermittent rain made the T-Bird look like it had taken a mud bath, so I spent about 20 minutes wiping it down, and cleaning the soft top so we could put the hard top back on before the rain comes again.

Around 5 we drove into Spokane for one last meal with my sister and mother as we will spend the better part of Tuesday finishing up our preparation for lift off Wednesday morning.  My brother-in-law, Bob, was heading off to a men's Bible study just after we arrived, and our two nieces were at school practicing for the school play, so it was just the four of us for a few hours.  Even though I know we will be back in this area again.....when I'm not quite sure at this point.......it was still a little bittersweet knowing I probably won't see my mother for another year, or more....of course the same goes for my sister and her family.  Every time I think I've got this "until next time" thing down I find out in some cases I don't, and that goes for saying the "until next time" to family members.  That has been the hardest thing about being nomads.......our long absences from family, and especially our children.

We headed home around 8:45, and I don't think TLE and I said more than 5 words the entire 40 minute drive home.  I think we are both feeling that ever present tension between being nomads and spending time with family.  It is a little sobering at times.

I don't want to end this blog entry on a "downer".....I'm just trying to be real, and trying in what may seem to be a somewhat feeble attempt, to convey the emotional conflicts of traveling full time.  I know it may seem like we are just happy go lucky, carefree people wandering hither and yon as the mood strikes us, or the Jello dictates......and that is mostly the case.........but the other side of our lifestyle is the absence of a lot of time spent with family.  Nevertheless, I know that by this time tomorrow (Wednesday) I will turn to look at TLE just after we have gotten on the Interstate and say what I always say....."It's good to be moving again!", and she will reply......"Yeah!".

Thanks for stopping by!

Change can be good....

Sunday, according to the weather guessers marks the end of summer.  The high Sunday was in the mid 90's, and the high for Monday, according to the guessers, will be 71.....and for the 9 days after Monday it will be in the 60's and 70's....that's a change for the good.  Since we returned from Texas it has been ranging from 89 to 95.....certainly not triple digits, but hotter than I prefer.

Around 9 am I got a call from my sister, Hilary, suggesting we meet for lunch in town.....she and her family were coming into Coeur d'Alene to attend an opera at the local college auditorium.  Opera is not my thing, but at $50 per person it is really not my thing.  Nevertheless, we agreed to meet at the Garnet Cafe at 12:30 for lunch.  

We decided to take a walk over to Calypsos while it was cool outside, and have a bagel.  The walk down Northwest toward the Lake Resort was a little bittersweet as it will probably be our last walk down that street on this visit to CDA.  We both commented how nice it has been to spend a month here in CDA (popular abbreviation here for Coeur d'Alene) and really get to know the town.  We could see ourselves spending time here again in the future, but when that future time will be we don't know.  We are trying not to get into a rut of being in the same place at the same time every year.  There is so much we want to see, and after 20 months we have barely scratched the surface.  The next two years will see us changing it up quite a bit.

We arrived at Calypsos' around 10 am, and sat outside enjoying the still cool air, and the somewhat deserted feeling of the downtown area for about 40 minutes and then began our walk back to the coach.....by the time we returned it was time to turn on the A/C......this last day of heat was going to be a good one.

I watched the start of a couple of NFL games, and then around 12:20 we got in the car and headed over to the Garnet Cafe.  They don't have A/C, so it was a little warm inside, but we did just fine.

My arm wasn't long enough to get TLE in the picture....my sister Hilary on the left, and Stephanie, her oldest daughter, on the right.

I'm glad we went to the Garnet one more time......I've had something different every time, and each dish was memorable.  Sunday I had the Sockeye Salmon.....I cleaned the plate!

After bidding adieu to my sister and niece we headed back home, but not before stopping off at the St. Vincent de Paul thrift store.....TLE acquired 7, or 8 more books to add to her library.  Apparently the 50% off sale was so they could clear out their summer inventory and put out their winter inventory, because the store was once again fully stocked.  I didn't find anything I couldn't live without, so after paying for TLE's books we finished our drive back "home".  

I spent the rest of the afternoon watching football, and TLE read.

We had gotten a call Saturday afternoon from our friends George and Brenda who live locally, and we have known since college asking if we wanted to get together before we left town, so we made arrangements to meet at their home for wine and cheese around 7 pm.  For those who have been following our blog for a while, we courtesy parked in the driveway of their home in May of 2012 the last time we were in CDA (click here for the link to that entry).   Anyway, we headed over around 6:30....had to stop at the store for some crackers, and needed to fuel up the 'Bird, then arrived at George and Brenda's home just before 7.  We sat outside by their outdoor fireplace talking and sipping good wine until almost 10 when the wind suddenly came up.  My Mother had called a couple of hours earlier warning of the storm coming, and it arrived right at the predicted time.  The wind had kicked a lot of dust up in the air.  We decided we needed to head "home" right away as our patio awning was up, and we were concerned there might be problem, so we said our until next times, and rushed home.  Fortunately, the wind was not blowing as fiercely at the RV park as it was at George and Brenda's so we did not lower the awning, and eventually the wind died down, and we just got a little rain on and off the rest of the night.

Monday it will be time to finish putting away the rest of our stuff in the trailer.  I spent about an hour Sunday putting away some of the small stuff in the trailer to make way for the bigger stuff on Monday, so we are almost ready to roll.

I got a message from our friends the McCloud's who have spent the last two months in Lethbridge, AB, Canada with relatives, advising they would be in Acaconda, MT on Wednesday, or Thursday, so we both made reservations at a local RV park, and will meet up on Thursday for one day before they continue south, and we east.  I was hoping our travel routes would intersect and it worked out.......it will be nice to see them after 2 months, and, of course, we will see them again after the first of the year as we head south again.

Thanks for stopping by!

Loose ends.....

With our departure date for Sidney, MT moved up a couple of days Saturday was a day to begin tying up loose ends.  I had sold my Burley Nomad bicycle trailer via Ebay almost 3 weeks ago, and the buyer had not yet picked it up.  Part of the delay was our problem as we were out of town 10 of those days, which combined with the work schedule of the buyer made it difficult to find a time and place to make the exchange (trailer for the purchase price), but Saturday morning at 9 am was the finally agreed upon exchange time.  I would drive into Liberty Lake to the CampingWorld  located just off I-90 to meet John, the buyer.

The Burley Nomad....we had a lot of good times together

After completing Friday's blog entry I put the partially disassembled trailer in the T-Bird trunk and headed 17 miles to Liberty Lake for my 9 am appointment.  Thankfully, John, the buyer, was on time, we made the exchange, and I was on my way back "home".  I stopped off at an O'Reilly Auto Parts store in Coeur d'Alene to pick up some degreaser, and some Mother's Mag Wheel polish.  The degreaser is for my rear facing radiator, which was last cleaned back in late June at the Newell Gurus Mini Rally in Spearfish.  Coming over the several passes between Missoula, MT and Coeur d'Alene, ID I had noticed the engine temps running a little higher than normal, so it was time to clean it once again.   And, of course, it is also time to put a little extra shine back on those ALCOA rims.

It was only 10:15 by the time I got back home, so we decided to take a 4 mile walk going west along the Centennial (bike) Trail.  It was starting to warm up a little, but we figured we would be back before the heat of the day.  Initially the air was very still, and there was a little humidity mixed in for good measure making it seem warmer than it was.  At the 2 mile mark we did an about face and headed back east, but took a slight detour into the Riverstone complex where there is a Starbucks.  By this time it was heating up, and we needed something cold to bring our body temps down, so we got a couple of frappuccino's and sat in the A/C cooling down.  Mind you the outside air temp was only about 78, but it felt much warmer than that in the sun with the higher humidity and no breeze.

By the time we ventured back outside 30 minutes later the breeze had come up, so we continued our short walk back home arriving just before Noon.  We quickly turned on both A/C's and cooled down before taking showers.  Saturday is college football day this time of year, and there were a number of interesting games on tap, so you know what I spent the rest of the day doing.

However, around 4 pm I knew I needed to get on the radiator cleaning job.  I waited deliberately until late afternoon when the sun would be focused on the rear of the coach.  It is a little easier to get the gunk, and grease off the radiator when it has been heated up by the sun.  The last time we were at my sister's home in Spokane I had borrowed my brother-in-law's pressure washer in order to do the most thorough job possible in the least amount of time.  It probably took less than 3o minutes start to finish, but now I can travel to Sidney, and down to Southern California knowing the engine temps will be lower.  Don't get me wrong, they were not running in the danger zone, but no point in waiting.

I spent the rest of the afternoon inside enjoying the A/C, reading, watching football, and taking an occasional nap.  Now all I have left is to start putting things away, re-organize the trailer, put the hard top back on the 'Bird, and polish the ALCOA's  for lift off Wednesday morning.

Since we left Spearfish, SD on June 29th we have only traveled 1,873 miles, but we have seen and done soooo much.  It has been a wonderful summer, and the memories will last forever.  Over the next 8 weeks we will cover close to 2,300 miles by the time we arrive back in Riverside, CA where we will spend a number of weeks visiting our adult children, and grand kiddies.    One of my children, Sharon, put up this picture on Facebook last night....I guess they got together to watch a fight on TV.....makes me homesick.

Left to right: Chris, Kate, Sharon and Tim

Thanks for stopping by!

Marching orders.....

I always get caught by surprise by Friday the 13th's....I never see them coming, and I guess that's because I'm not superstitious.  I am amused by all the attention afforded the number 13, and especially when it, infrequently, falls on a Friday.  For me it felt more like Saturday anyway.

First thing Friday I needed to finish detailing my Mom's Volvo, which, by the way, I found out is really a 2000, not a 2002.  I wanted to get a coat of wax on it, and some Armorall on the tires.  The wax I use, as you will recall, if the waterless cleaning/waxing system by Firecoat (www.firecoatmytruck.com).  It works wonderfully, and is quick to apply.  By the time I finished it was going on 10 am, and we still hadn't taken our walk.

 Lookin' good Mom

My plan to finish detailing the car early before it got too warm fell flat, but we were determined to walk into town along the Centennial Bike Trail, so we did just that.  About half the trail passes beneath nice shade trees, but the first .75 miles is in direct sunlight going and coming.  We reached town around 11 am and took some time to sit in the shade enjoying the view across the lake.  While we sat there we got to see a pontoon plane land, and then as we began our walk back saw one take off.  TLE had never seen either a take off, or landing of one, so it was a treat for her.  I love this time of year in resort towns.....as you can see, it is not crowded, and the place takes on a serene quality.  The weather is still great, but you know Fall and Winter cannot be far away.

By the time we made it back home we were grateful we had turned on the front A/C before leaving, because we were HOT after a 3.6 mile walk!  The high for the day ultimately hit at least 94 I think.  We took showers, and then headed into Spokane to return my Mother's car, and take her to lunch.  TLE hadn't seen her new apartment yet, so we spent some time upstairs in her unit, and then, at my urging (I was hungry) we headed down Regal to have lunch at a place called Hogan's Cafe Deluxe, a kind of 50's style diner.  My Mom, who has eaten there previously, recommended the Rueben sandwich, and what an amazing recommendation....I wish I had taken a picture of that sandwich.....one of the top 2, or 3 I have ever had.  TLE gave it 4.5 stars.  Yelp gives Hogan's 3.5 stars, but we would give it a solid 4 for ambiance, service, and quality of food.  The order was easy for our server.....we all had the Rueben!

Trader Joe's is right next door to Hogan's so after lunch we had to stop in (right?) to stock up on some wine, and other things TLE likes to buy there when we find one.  As I have said before, their wine prices for their brands are amazing, and the quality is high.  While we were in Trader Joe's I got the call I had been waiting for from the Sugar Beet Harvest folks telling us when we needed to report.  Steve told me we need to be in Sidney by 9/22 (next Sunday) and ready for training the following day, so we will be pulling up anchor a couple of days early on Wednesday, instead of on Friday.  Our time here in Coeur d'Alene has passed quickly, but we have had a great time.  We'll spend the next few days packing up and getting ready to move.  By the time the Beet Harvest begins we will have been on the road for 20 months.

We dropped Mom off at her apartment around 3 and headed back to Coeur d'Alene.  We spent the rest of the day staying out of the heat, and reading.  Since we were both still full from the Hogan's Pastrami sandwich, we decided to forego dinner.  We caught up on a few recorded shows still in the queue, and then toddled off to slumberland around 11.

Thanks for stopping by!

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy.....

The weather lately has reminded me of the John Denver song from 1974.  I haven't thought of that song for years.  I remember one Christmas morning back in the mid 70's we were at Mammoth Mountain Ski Area in California taking our first ride up the chairlift on a beautiful crystal clear sunny morning around 9 am, and the ski crew had this song blaring over the outdoor speakers as we got off the chairlift at the top of Chair 9.  There was not a breath of wind, and it was one of those magical moments I will never forget.  As we headed off for our first run of the day I could hear these words and the melody gently echoing off the mountain sides as we carved our turns slowly down the hill feeling the warmth of the sun coming at us through the cool, crisp, still air that morning.

Since we returned from Dallas we have had clear blue skies with a lot of sunshine, and a little bit of heat.  It has been in the high 80's, and low 90's meaning we have had to turn on the A/C around 1 pm every day.  Looking at the forecast it appears this last gasp heat spell will end suddenly Monday as temperatures plunge about 20+ degrees into the 70's and 60's.  The temperatures in Sidney, MT (our destination for the sugar beet harvest) have been running 10 degrees cooler than here, and will also drop similarly.  

After writing Wednesday's blog entry I had breakfast, got dressed and drove into Spokane to see my mother, Virginia.  She has a 2002 Volvo  S80 2.9 which she asked me to detail for her before we left town.  We visited for a while, then I pulled her car out of her garage, put our 'Bird in its place, and then drove her car back to Coeur d'Alene where I spent the afternoon mostly trying to clean a few years of brake dust off the chrome wheels.  I think they turned out pretty good, don't you?  The rest of the car did not take that long because she keeps it garaged.  Of course when my Mom says "detail", she is really talking mostly about making the chrome wheels look pretty again, and I am happy to do that for her.

By the time I had gotten home it was after 1 pm, and right smack dab in the middle of the heat of the day, but  I was able to park her car in a shady spot here in the RV park, so at least I wasn't standing in direct sunlight all afternoon.  Nevertheless, by 4 pm I was ready for a shower and a nap.

I can't believe that in just a week's time we will be pulling up stakes and heading 700+ miles east to Sidney, MT.  We have a tentative arrival date of September 23rd, so we'll be leaving Coeur d'Alene by the 19th so we can spread 700+ miles over 5 days of travel, or about 150 a day, which is our preferred rate of travel.  We know where we will be staying now so it is just a matter of starting to put things away, clean up the exterior of the coach, then top off the diesel tank.  We've still got over 1/2 tank, and haven't spent any money on diesel in the past 5 weeks, so we'll top her off, and should be good until after the beet harvest when we begin our trek to Southern California to spend time with our kids and grand kids.

Thanks for stopping by!

The waiting game.....

Wednesday we had no big plans, but decided to walk over to Garnet Cafe for breakfast again....we still had about $22 left on the gift certificate.  We knew the temperatures would get into the low 90's so we started our walk 1.3 mile walk over around 8:45.  Being a Wednesday the cafe was not quite as crowded, but it was bustling nevertheless.  We were quickly seated by our server, and within a few minutes had our orders.  This time I had the Hayden Omelette with bacon, avocado, mushrooms, onions, etc.  Just as it was on our first visit, the food was remarkable, extraordinary.

You can tell the chef really takes pride in the food that comes out of the kitchen.  Along with the omelette came a large slab of sourdough toast....obviously homemade.....I didn't even put anything on it, except for the butter that had already been applied in the kitchen.  Very, very good sourdough. 

As we were walking over to the cafe we noticed the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store was having a 50% off sale on EVERYTHING in the store, so on the way back home we stopped off to see what was what.  Apparently this sale has been going on for a few days because the store looked like it had already been picked bare.  Not to be deterred, TLE headed for the book section......you can't pass up .50 cent books....no, you certainly cannot....TLE came away with TEN paperback books.  There was really nothing more for me so we continued our walk home.

We have been anxiously awaiting a phone call from the sugar beet harvest folks as to our arrival date in Sidney, MT, and were told Tuesday we should hear by Wednesday, but so far we are still waiting for a firm date.  We have been told we should plan to start arriving by 9/23, so unless we hear otherwise we will probably be departing no later than the 19th to give ourselves at least 4 days to travel 700+ miles.  But, for now, we are playing the waiting game.

Every two years I have to renew my Fire and Casualty insurance license for California.  In order to do that, like many states, I must complete continuing education courses, and since said license will expire September 30th it was time Wednesday to get that done.  Theoretically I am required to endure 24 hours of such education, but doing it online takes much less time....that's all I'll say....nevertheless, I was able to complete the requisite CE hours on Wednesday, so all that remains to be done is transferring money to the State of California to renew my license.  I think this will be my last renewal.  When September 30, 2015 comes around I may hang up my insurance spurs for good.  That's a long ways off, so I'll think more about that another day.

Once that was done I stood up and let out a little cheer that caught TLE"s attention back in the bedroom where she was making short work of a paperback....not sure if it was one of the new ones, or not.  I asked her if any books would be leaving the coach, and instead of answering me she asked if any of my large collection of t-shirts would be leaving.....okay, you've got me there.

I spent the rest of the day reading a book, and then around 6 pm got out the BBQ to grill some chicken breasts TLE had been marinating most of the afternoon.  She added broccoli and squash, and we had an amazing dinner. While we ate we watched a recording of the "So You Think You Can Dance?" finale from Tuesday night, and then watched live the finale for "Master Chef".  For once in my life I batted 1.000....I guessed in advance the male and female winner of "SYTYCD", and Master Chef....time to buy a lottery ticket, huh?

It was a nice way to end the day....thanks for stopping by!

Back to the here and now...

As you can imagine, Tuesday was a day to recharge our batteries, if you will.  We went to bed pretty early, and I was up by 6, which is pretty normal for me, but after writing yesterday's blog entry, wiping off the 'Bird, and then spending some time outside setting up our patio awning, and bringing the chairs and other stuff back over from the trailer I was ready for a nap.....wow, that was some "run on sentence" huh?  My brain and body were still tired, so I napped for about 2 hours then spent the rest of the day reading as by the time I woke up from the nap it was after 12, and it was getting hot.  We are in the middle of the last gasp of summer up here in the northern climes, and the next 6 days will be in the high 80's and low 90's, then the temps drop off the table to 70's and 60's.  By the time we arrive in Sidney, MT Fall will be taking hold once again.

Before I took my nap Hilary sent me an e-mail asking if we were interested in coming to their home for dinner, which, of course, we always are.  She wanted to hold a small birthday celebration for TLE (she stayed 50 years old again for another year on September 9th).  She says when she turned fifty on 9/9/1999 she was done counting birthdays and would remain 50 years old from that point on......she's not fooling me......I know she's really 39......:-)

There was not much to the rest of the day except I was supposed to meet the gentleman who bought my Burley Nomad bike trailer on Ebay in Liberty Lake at 6 pm to exchange the trailer for the winning bid, however, as we were pulling into the CampingWorld parking lot (our meeting place) I got a message that he could not be there until 6:30...well, our dinner date at my sister's home was for 6:30 so we'll have to rendezvous at another time.

My brother-in-law, Bob, BBQ'd flank steaks that had been marinating all day, and my sister Hilary prepared fresh tomatoes stuffed with bleu cheese, and fresh green beans.  We drank a little champagne to celebrate the beginning of another year of life for The Lovely Elaine, then settled down to dinner on their deck as the sun was setting and the moon was rising.  My niece, Stephanie, who is quite clever, suddenly said "I hate this nice weather!" which got us all to laughing....she was being facetious, of course.

For dessert Hilary brought out Plum Tarts a la mode......as Chef Ramsey would say, "they were restaurant quality", and if he had been there to actually say that I would have heartily agreed.  We sat and talked about world events, cabbages and kings until almost 11 pm when we bid adieu to my mother, sister and family, and headed for our "home" in Coeur d'Alene.

Thanks for stopping by!