Home at last!

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Maggie driving the motorhome. Looks serious doesn't she.
Beware of crossing panthers. This was taken outside of Naples, Florida.

Dec 3 – Well, we finally made it home late last night. WHAT A TRIP! Of all the things we saw home seems to be among the best. We logged over 18,000 miles on the motorhome and 7,700 on Maggie’s, our tow car, in 8 months on our tour of North America.

I thought I’d give you a couple of final photos. These are rare sightings to be sure. We had never seen a sign warning us of panthers before.

We look forward to seeing you all again and sharing highlights of our trip and catching up on what’s happened in your life.

Happy Holidays to you all.

Still in Florida but heading for home

Nov 30 – We all went parasailing. It was pretty windy and they didn’t really need to move the boat for us to fly high. It was so windy they didn’t want to send anyone up by themselves so we all went tandem. First Val and Gary went then Maggie and Val went. Lucky Val got to go twice. Check out the photo.

We are currently in Tampa. We’ve been here for a few days. Some friends told us about this place called Lazy Days and that we just had to go. It’s 150 acres of RV park, pool, spa, tennis courts and more. It’s also a RV dealer and repair facility; reportedly the largest in the country. We were told that they sell 350 new and 250 used RVs in the average month. In January, their biggest month, they expect to sell over 600 new coaches. Believe me, that’s a lot.

A couple of days ago Gary received a phone call at 0530 to verify an attempted purchase from a firm in England. He said WHAT? He also said NO and immediately called their credit card company and told them about the call. As it turns out, while we were in Key West, someone got their credit card info and began charging. The creep attempted to charge about $1800 but did not succeed on most. They won’t be liable for any of it but the credit card company turned off their credit card. Arggghhhh! The upside of this is that Maggie will be paying for everything for the rest of the trip.

We’re leaving in the morning headed northwest. We hope to be home in about a week. We look forward to seeing all our friends in the San Antonio area again and sharing some of our favorite stories from our trip.

Key West, Florida

Nov 25 – Happy Thanks giving everyone! We have reached Key West, in the Florida Keys, the southernmost point of our journey. We left Maggie’s relative’s place and drove to Patrick AFB, on the coast by Melbourne. We needed to do some laundry, dump our holding tanks at their RV park and get some groceries before we headed out for the Keys. The drive was good with the exception of Miami traffic. It was pretty bad. We took a bypass route about 2 o’clock and it was still lots of stop and little go driving. We arrived at the campground after dark and could not check in for the night.

The next morning we checked in and got a spot right on the water at the end of a row. That meant we only had one neighbor and extra viewing space. It’s really something to look out the front window across the ocean and see small islands everywhere.

Last night we went to Mallory Square. Every evening they have a sunset celebration; kind of an excuse to get together and drink. They have lots of street artists entertaining the crowds with their talents. We saw jugglers, escape artists, unicycle jugglers, tumblers and several people sitting around singing and playing their guitars. Most of the acts were pretty good. One of the jugglers managed to get Gary to participate in one of his routines. Gary’s the one in the hat. There were three cruise ships in port that night so there were lots of people there. They also had those cut-out things you can stick your head into. I included a photo of Gary and Val as a Calypso couple.

Today we’re all going parasailing! Whoopee! Afterwards the campground is having a potluck Thanksgiving get together so we’ll be there stuffing our faces and meeting more people from all around the US.

Sunny Florida

Here we are enjoying the Fabulous Florida weather.


Here's a Manatee!


Nov 19 – We made it to Florida and are parked in a tropical park like setting at one of Maggie’s relatives. He has several acres, including an island, on the St. Johns River in central Florida. He has very large fountains, boat docks, diving boards, green houses and a really cool house and garage.

The weather here has been fabulous. It’s been in the mid to upper 70s and clear skies every day. Today we visited a place called Blue Springs. It is a spring that puts out over a hundred million gallons of crystal clear water per day. The water is 72 degrees and is home to many manatees. It was the first time we had seen these gentle giants in person. We had someone take a picture of us while we were there so you could see that we are still here and having a great time.

The Carolina's

Here's Gary and Val's version of the Cialis bathtub commerial.


Nov 15 – The Outer Banks were great. We visited Kitty Hawk, where the Wright brothers flew the first airplane; see photos. We also walked on a large tall sand dune and a few beaches. The wind was blowing really hard and the waves were big and crashing hard on the beach. We didn’t stay outdoors too long.

One thing I forgot to mention in my last entry in North Carolina was a place called Dismal Swamp. It’s like its name implies but through it they have a man-made canal that runs up the coast. It was dug by slaves many years ago and is still in use. It’s the only one of its kind. It looked funny to see sailboats parked at the docks in the jungle/swamp.

Another thing I didn’t mention was when we were staying at Gary and Val’s friends in Virginia Beach Val got up early one morning and their dog wanted outside. So, Val opened the door to discover they have an alarm system. Not only did she wake up everyone in the house but half the neighborhood too. All’s she could say was “sorry”. It was funny once things settled down.

We’ve been in South Carolina, outside Charleston, for a few days. We’re camped at a Navy recreation site on Lake Moultrie. The motorhome is backed up to the lake shore and we’re surrounded by big trees covered with Spanish moss; very southern. The weather has been great; mid 70s during the day. We’ve seen some great sun downs.

Today we toured Charleston; the old sections were pretty neat, lots of history here. We hate to leave but we’re heading south tomorrow.

Virginia - We're out a there

Nov 10 – Well, we entered the state of Virginia Oct 10th and left Nov 10th. We had a great time visiting all our families and friends. The last weekend in Richmond Maggie’s family had a bon fire and we all stood around the fire trying to keep warm: it was 38-40 degrees. Gary had another way to try and stay warm; drinking. He had a few beers and several Jell-O shots and really enjoyed himself. All of us had to take all the clothes we were wearing and put them in a plastic bag since they were full of smoke.

Our last stop was with some friends of Gary and Val named Carl and Mary Lou; they live in Virginia Beach. We spent one afternoon driving near the beaches. They had a friend that has a private collection of 60 airplanes as well as an airport and lots of other WWII memorabilia. I included a couple of photos; the one larger green airplane was one that Hitler used while he was in power. There were lots of other, smaller, planes and all were in excellent condition and are routinely flown.

On our way south we drove over a couple of draw bridges: I included one in a photo. We are spending the next few days camped at a Coast Guard station on the Chesapeake Bay. We’re about 40 feet from the water. It’s really nice.

Tomorrow we’ll be going to the “Outer Banks”, a chain of islands off the coast of North Carolina. The Wright Brothers made their first flight from one of the islands. Cape Hatteras is also there. We hope to have lots of photos from that excursion.

Still Outside Richmond

Nov 4 – We’ve been having a good time visiting Maggie’s family. We spent about a week with her brother and now have the motorhome parked in her mother’s front yard. Next we’re headed for Virginia Beach, VA to visit friends from when Gary attended the Naval Postgraduate School.

We did find time to do a little sightseeing in Richmond. We drove down Monument Avenue which has statues of several influential people from the area. We took a couple of photos. The guy on the horse is Robert E. Lee. The trees here have turned and are bright shades of yellow, red and amber.

We are all looking forward to the remaining stops down the east coast and Florida but December is in our sites and we all are looking forward to getting back home.