Gold Beach, OR

On Friday morning we packed up the Duchess and headed north on Highway 101. The drive was only 140 miles but there was construction in several places so it took us a while to make the journey. We stopped in a rest stop near Brookings, Oregon for a break and to eat lunch. After lunch we continued on to our next stop, the Four Seasons RV Park. This park is located on the Rogue River about 6 miles up river from town. It has new owners (just took over the place last week) who had been commercial fisherman in Alaska before buying the place. It is a small park (about 30 spaces) and we are the largest rig in the park.

We backed into our site #23 and got set up for the week's stay. We went into town and did some grocery shopping and looked around the town (not much here to see). We had rain Friday night and most of the day on Saturday, so we stayed in the rig most of the time and took it easy.

Across California

June 1 to June 8:

We traveled from Reno to Nice, California to spend a few nights at the Aurora RV Park which is located on the Upper Clear Lake. We found out that this lake is one of the best bass fishing lakes in California but there is mercury in the water from an old mercury mine so it is a "catch and release" fishing area. Spent the days taking it easy at the park. One of our bedroom slides did not go out and after calling Newmar technical support discovered that a switch will need to be replaced. We made an appointment with Guaranty RV near Eugene on June 19th to have the switch replaced. Also the night shade that covers the windshield fell down and broke one of the clamps that holds it up. Always something to be dealing with.

From Nice we drove along Hwy 20 to Hwy 101 along which we will be traveling for the next few weeks. We spent several nights at the Shoreline RV Park in Eureka, CA.

During the time we were in Eureka we went south to see the redwoods located along the Avenue of the Ancients. We took one long hike and a couple of shorter one along the avenue. Amazing how old these tree are (some over 1,000 years old) along with how large they are: Up to 350 feet tall with a circumference up to 80 feet.

Another day we travelled north to see more redwoods along with doing a bike ride. We entered the Redwoods National & State Park and stopped at the Visitor's Center.  From the Visitor's Center we drove a few miles north to the Information Center along the scenic drive through the park. From there we took a hike along the Cathedral Trail to visit the "Big Tree" (about 3.5 miles total on the loop).

After eating lunch we rode our bike from the parking area at the Information Center over to Fern Canyon which is located along the coast. Part of the time we were on a single track mountain bike trail before getting on some old logging roads. Fern Canyon is where some parts of Jurassic Park was filmed. We rode through mud, across several creeks and along a dusty road to get to the canyon parking lot. From the parking lot we locked up our bikes and hiked about 1/2 mile to the beginning of the canyon.

We decided to return to the Jeep using the logging roads rather than the mountain bike trail. We ended up having to carry the bike across a tree that had fallen along the road on our trip. You can see how dirty Connie's bike got on the trip. We both were using the full power of the pedal assist on our Rad Power bikes on part of the ride (about 23 miles round trip).

That evening Connie and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary by eating a great salmon meal at the Sea Grill in Eureka.

The next day we visited Patrick's Point State Park and did some hiking around the park. We hike out the point as well as visiting the "tide pools" area of the park along with seeing a recreation of a village of the Native American tribe that lived in the area.

We also stopped at the Moonstone Beach and walked along the beach for a while. The water was cold  (so no pictures of swimsuits). We did see a few people surfing in wetsuits.

From here we will head north along Hwy 101 to Gold Beach, Oregon for a week's stay.

Starting West for 2018

May 17 to June 1:

We finished up spending the winter (two months in Austin and two months in San Antonio) in Texas. Beginning April 10th Connie and I took a long (5 weeks) trip to London, England, then to Ireland and Scotland before returning to London to fly home. We had a great time seeing many of  the sights and learning about the culture & history of these old countries (compared to the USA).

We picked up the motorhome from my dad's ranch in Rosanky and discovered that the power had gone out during the time we were overseas. We ended up having to clean out the refrigerator (throw everything out and then use bleach to disinfect). We also decided to replace our house batteries since the old ones had been fully discharged while the power was out.

We spent a night in the COE park at Lake Georgetown before starting our trip to the west coast for our travels this summer. We stopped one night at the San Angelo State Park before heading to Hobbs, NM to visit with Connie's cousin Brenda and her family for a couple of days. In Hobbs we were able to stay in a very nice city park with full hookups, Henry McAdams Campground, for $11.00 a night.

We then headed north to I-40 and spent one night at a casino along the interstate. We then continued along I-40 for a night in Williams, AZ at the Grand Canyon Railroad RV Park. There was a brewery across the street from the RV Park and we sampled several of their beers before getting a growler of bock beer.

From Williams we drove onto to Las Vegas where we spent a few days seeing the city. I had never been to Las Vegas so it was interesting walking around the town and seeing the casinos, hotels and shopping malls attached to them.

From Las Vegas we drove north to Reno (spending one night in Hawthorne, Nevada) for a couple of days at the Bordertown Casino RV Park. We spent one day driving around Lake Tahoe.

Back in Texas for the Winter

November 16, 2017 to May 2018:

We left the Treetops RV Resort in Arlington and made the drive south to my dad's ranch/farm in Rosanky Texas. We are spending the Thanksgiving holidays with him before heading to LaHacienda RV Resort in Austin for the months of December and January.

February and March 2018 will be spent at the Traveler's World RV Resort in San Antonio. We are planning an extended visit to Ireland, Scotland and England in April before starting our RV travels in May 2018.

This blog will go dormant for the months we are here in Texas and during our travels overseas. We hope to resume posting in May of next year.

Back in Texas

October 31 to November 9:

On Halloween we packed up the Duchess and left the campground in Oklahoma City for a short drive south to the WinStar Casino RV Park. The RV park in located between the casino and golf course with about 150 sites. We took advantage of being a first time visitor to the casino by signing up for a "Players Card". We got our first night of camping free and then $10 off per night for the rest of our stay. We ended up spending 7 nights here for $140, a bargain for full hook-ups in a nice park.

If you put $50 on the Players Card, the casino added another $25 for you to spend. Connie ended up gambling for a short while on three occasions to lose her $50 and we used the $25 to have a pizza dinner at one of the casino's restaurants. The casino itself is 1.5 miles long with 7,400 slot machines along with other types of gaming tables. There are also a number of restaurants located inside the casino but the reviews online for most of them were not very good There is a large auditorium/hall in the casino where Dennis Miller & David Spade were appearing on Friday night and Ringo Starr & His All Star Band on Saturday night (both were sold out).

I used the week here to wash the outside of the rig to get rid of the dirt and grime that accumulates during our travels. Connie cleaned the inside, rearranged some of our inside storage and polished the cabinets/woodwork. By the time we left the Duchess looked great again. We did a lot of walking around the grounds of the casino trying to get some exercise in during the nice days we had here.

On Tuesday (11/7) we left the WinStar Casino for another short drive to Lewisville, Texas. We have an appointment with National Indoor RV Sales & Service to have our annual engine/chassis maintenance done along with some repair work: seal/gasket replaced on tag axle wheel & replacement of a motor that controls a paddle on the front passenger side slide.

We crossed the Red River into Texas and proceeded on to Lewisville.

As we got closer to the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex the traffic increased and we remember why we try and avoid large cities during our travels. We got checked into the campground at National Indoor RV, got set up for the night and then went to Taco Bell to have our "linner" .

The next morning they came and got our rig to start on the list of items we had for them to perform. We had breakfast at IHOP, did some shopping and then back to National RV. The motorhome was in the shop for the entire day and they did not finish all of the items on our list due to the rig in line ahead of us having major problems with their generator. So we ended up spending a second night in their campground.The next morning we went for breakfast at Mama's Daughter Restaurant. We came back to the shop and then walked through all of the new and used Class A motorhomes they had on the lot for sale. We didn't find anything we like better than the Duchess, so we will be keeping her for a while longer. The service manager told us that all of the sales personnel came by and looked at our rig and were impressed at how well the rig looked being 10 years old (build date of December 2007) and would have been "happy" to sell us a new one with the Duchess as a trade in. (:

Thursday afternoon at about 3:00 PM all of the work was finished on the rig.  We hooked up the Jeep and headed south to Arlington where we will spend a week at the Treetops RV Park.

Traveling south towards Texas

On Friday (10/20/17) we left Beaver Lake Campground and headed south to North Platte, Nebraska for a couple of nights stay. It was a drive of 325 miles which is much longer than we usually travel: we try to limit ourselves to about 200 miles a day. However there is not much between Custer, SD and North Platte, so we left as soon as the sun was up. The roads were OK and we quickly passed the state line into Nebraska.

There was very little traffic on the roads until we close to North Platte where we encountered a large number of cattle trucks. We arrived at the Holiday RV Park in North Platte and got set up for the 2 night stay.

We found out that North Platte is home to two of the nation's largest meat processing plants. There are a number of cattle feed lots in the area as well so we now know why so many cattle trucks. North Platte is where Buffalo Bill Cody built a ranch to stay at when he was not traveling with his Wild West Show. We drove by the ranch but the house was closed for the season.

The largest railroad yard in the USA is located in North Platte. They handle up to 15,000 railroad cars a day at the yard which can mean as many as 200 trains passing through the town on a busy day. During WWII it is estimated that up to 6 million men passed through North Platte on their way across the country as part of the military. We visited a nice memorial that celebrated those who have served in the military during the 20th century along with the USO ladies who handed out drinks and food to the soldiers who passed through the town during WWII.

Sunday morning we left North Platte for another long day's drive of 275 miles south to Dodge City, Kansas. We pulled into the Gunsmoke RV Park and got set up for our one night stay. We took a quick drive around the town (there was very little open since it was Sunday) but did not see Matt Dillon or Miss Kitty so we went back to the campground for the night.

Monday morning we continued our drive south for 200 miles to Enid, Oklahoma for another one night stay at the Ashley Lane RV Park. We again got set up for our one night stay and took another quick drive around the town.

The park has a working oil well on the premises and there was a Prevost motorhome parked next to it (maybe it how they afford the Prevost).

 On Tuesday we made the 100 mile drive south to Oklahoma City where we will be spending a week. We pulled into the Roadrunner RV Park and got set up for our 7 night stay. This park was hit by a tornado in 2015 which destroyed over 60 RV's and injured 18 people (luckily no one died). They have rebuilt and added on to the park. We were in the new part of the park with a nice pull through site.

While we were in Oklahoma City we visited the Oklahoma City Memorial Site which honors those who were killed in the bombing of the federal building in April 1995. We walked around the memorial and learned some of the history from the rangers on site. The gate/wall at one end of the memorial has the time of 9:01 on it while the other end has 9:03. The bombing occurred at 9:02 in the morning and killed 168 individuals including several children who were at a day care facility located at the site

After visiting the memorial we walked about 1 mile to the Myriad Botanical Gardens and strolled through the plantings. Being the fall most of the plants were not in bloom, but it was still a nice place to see. We walked back to the memorial site and ate our lunch.

After lunch we drove up to the Oklahoma State Capitol buildings and took a tour of the facility. The state is in the middle of a 5 year restoration project on the capitol, so a lot of the building is "under construction". Much of the artwork usually located in the building has been put into storage to protect it from the dust and dirt of the restoration project. There are several working oil wells on the grounds of the capitol making it the only capitol facility in the country with this feature.

After our tour of the capitol, we visited the Anthem Brewing Company and sampled a few of their beers (we did like a couple of them).

Another day we drove to the Boathouse District and rode our bikes along the river for about 1.5 hours. The hike/bike trail is paved with a number of bridges along the way over drainage areas.

After finishing our bike ride we drove over to the Stonecloud Brewery where had one of their stout beers which we both enjoyed.

On Saturday we drove about 20 miles south to Norman, Oklahoma the home of the University of Oklahoma. We visited the Fred Jones Museum located on the campus which houses over 4,000 items dating from several hundred years BC to modern artists from the 20th century. After finishing up touring the museum, we walked around the campus and then over to the football stadium. It was homecoming weekend and there were a number of tents set up around the stadium welcoming returning graduates. Oklahoma played Texas Tech that evening (we did not stay for the game but watched a part of it on TV) and beat them 49 to 27. The campus was one of the prettiest one we have seen in our travels around the country.

Heisman Garden located outside the stadium

Reading room in campus library

On Sunday we visited the National Cowboy and Western Museum located in the norther part of the city. We spent about 4.5 hours touring the museum and did not get to see all of it. If you are in the Oklahoma City area this is one place we would recommend you stop and see.

On Monday we cleaned up the rig, did some grocery shopping and then attended a "chili dinner" at the park's event room. We met a couple, James and Melinda, who have been full-timing in a 24 foot Class C motorhome for over year now and love it. James is a retired air traffic controller and he is going to teach for the next several months at the Oklahoma City training facility.

Tuesday morning we packed up and made the 125 mile trip south to WinStar Casino RV Park where we will be spending a week.