Attention all interested parties: I somehow, somewhere, during an epic bike ride, lost my phone. I have been using that phone exclusively to post on the blog. Not really sure if there is a work around without a phone. I will get a new phone as soon as I can but until then don’t be surprised if davejennyjournal is silent for awhile. We did have an epic hike this morning. Jenny took some pics. We move tomorrow to Colorado. I’m using my iPad to publish this. Looks like this might be the workaround. I’ve got to have WiFi for this to work.

Curt Gowdy day 2

We had to run the heater last night. We have had afternoon thunderstorms both days. It's raining now. As is usually the case our cell coverage is so bad at the campsite that we've gotta go somewhere to get connected. I had a good ride this morning. We were going to hike some this afternoon but rain was imminent. We will hike some tomorrow morning. This place has no waste water dump station. The nearest dump is at a penitentiary in Laramie. Rv camping is an adventure.

Curt Gowdy SP Wyoming

I'm not entirely sure if that's the same sportscaster Curt Gowdy but I suspect it is. I got my bike fixed in Cheyenne today. That's great news because the park is covered in trails. Jenny and I took a short exploratory hike this afternoon. Elevation is 7000 feet. 59 degrees forecast tonight. More tomorrow.

Lake McConaughy State Recreation Area Nebraska

This park is near the town of Ogallala. We entered the mountain time zone this morning.  I think we were only in the central time zone for 2 days. Lake McConaughy is the largest lake in the state. If you live in Nebraska this is the place you come if you want water based recreation. For some reason the soil is sandy and the lake is surrounded by sandy beach that you can drive on. We did. I'm glad we had a Sabaru because it was pretty dicey. We did drive to the dam to see the water shooting out of the power plant. Tomorrow we drive through Cheyenne. You might remember that I'm having issues with my bike. I have been in contact with a bike shop there and I'm going to drop the bike off and hopefully I'll be back in business. This is our last one night stop over. We should be staying a few nights at most campgrounds for the next few weeks.

Mormon island SP Nebraska

The Mormons used to layover here on their way to the Salt Lake Valley. We drove through Omaha and Lincoln and we are now in Grand Island. It was called an island because the Platte River split into several channels here before coming back together, forming a, kind of, island. In the last 3 days we have driven 700 miles with corn fields on both sides of the road  horizon to horizon. Just getting it harvested seems impossible. The corn harvester (a combine) mows down the stalks, rips off the cob, removes the husk from the cob, strips the corn kernels off of the husk, deposits the corn kernels in a bin and ejects the rest of green stuff on the ground. A basic corn combine with no extras costs $500,000. We move further west tomorrow. Oh, almost forgot. We visited a prairie museum this afternoon and I took a few horse related pics.

KOA west of Des Moines

Nothing blog worthy happened today. We drove in the rain on I 80 most of the way. There was an exit for the Herbert Hoover museum. A few days ago we drove through Ronald Reagan's boyhood home. We are in John Wayne's hometown now, and we are also in Madison Co. Iowa. There are bridges all over the the county. Get it? The Bridges if Madison County  was written about this county and the movie was filmed here. But alas, it's still raining and there is a possibility the bridges have been washed out. A possible tragic ending to the story. We are in a commercial campground because we needed to do laundry. It's been done. More I 80 driving tomorrow.

Palisades day 2

In our quest to keep our frustration levels as high as possible we have elected to camp in parks that have no cell service. That means we can't use our hotspots to get internet. We have reached a point  where all of our reservations for the first part of this trip have been used. Today we got in the car, drove to a scenic viewpoint in the park to get coverage, and did some planning. We are now good for the next 3 weeks. We need to move every day for the next 4 days. Thats not ideal but we have reservations at a park near Cheyenne WY on the 29th. Below is a selfie mugshot. Do you think I need a haircut?

Mississippi Palisades SP Illinois

We are across a highway and 2 sets of RR tracks from the river. You might recall my absolute passionate hate for the trains that ran up and down the river while I was trying to sleep during my Mississippi paddle. It's deja vu all over again. Our drive took us near Chicago. At one point there were 16 lanes of traffic, all moving rapidly. After we got out of town the corn fields started. The amount of corn grown in this country is mind boggling. There were literally 100s of square miles of corn. We were driving  in a Valley of green. We're not even in Iowa yet. We are here for 2 nights. We've got the site for 3 nights but we have reservations at a park in Wyoming in a few days and we've got to get moving.

HD

Tippecanoe last day

There was paddle boarding on the Tippecanoe river, a long bike ride with a hike and climb up to the top of an abandoned fire tower and a surprise visit of a couple pony's pulling buggies. Not sure what that was all about but it was part of our day. Tomorrow we drive through Illinois, dangerously close to Chicago, and end up at a state park on the Mississippi river. We will have been away from home 1 month tomorrow and we still haven't crossed the Mississippi river.

Tippecanoe day two

That rhymes. The  presidential election of 1840 gave us the ditty "Tippecanoe and Tyler too". Don't know if that is taught in history anymore. William Henry Harrison was running as the candidate of the Whig party (today's Republicans). He was famous because of his victory at a battle with native Americans near the Tippecanoe river. His running mate was John Tyler. Harrison won by a large margin. Having an election slogan is still in use today. Today was a chill day for the most part. See photo.

Tippecanoe River SP Indiana

Our trip to Phoenix USA Inc. went fairly well, except for the early get up. It took a couple of hours but our problem was solved to my satisfaction. The issue was that the frame around one of the drawers in the bedroom was pulling apart and the drawer was askew. The tech fixed that problem and reinforced the other drawer (we only have 2 drawers). We are back in  business baby. Although, there is one more problem I am trying to solve. I have ridden my Santa Cruz bike pretty hard for the last 2 years. It needs some parts replaced. The little bike shop in Beaufort had that bike for over 3 weeks before we left and they claimed they couldn't get the parts. We took it to a bike shop in Elkhart and they said the same thing. The pandemic is having an effect maybe. I'm afraid I'm going to be on a ride out in the middle of the desert somewhere and have some sort of breakdown. I can still ride but I'm not comfortable abusing the bike like I normally do. Different Subject. This campground has no cell service so we will be winging it for the next 3 days. If there is a pic with this post, its the Tippecanoe river.

Elkhart Indiana

We are staying at a commercial campground called "Elkhart Campground". That is a very descriptive name but in my opinion, it lacks pizzazz. Elkhart is the epicenter of RV production in the U.S. Not only are most RV's produced here (80%), but most RV components are also made here. We got here early enough that we were able to visit the RV hall of fame and museum. I didn't know that RV's have been around for a very long time. There were some RV's that were specifically made to be pulled behind a Model T. They didn't have a microwave or refrigerator or really anything else but you could sleep in them without getting wet if it wasn't raining. Our appointment at the Phoenix plant is at 7 tomorrow morning. I think that means we will have to set an alarm. Not sure how that works. After the work is completed on the MP 2 we have to drive 80 miles to another SP in Indiana. I think we are almost in the central time zone. Whopee!

Maumee day 3

Not much going on today. It was brutally hot. I know most of you don't track dew point but today's was 78, which is borderline dangerous. Of course I had a good, sweaty, work out this morning on my bike. We did make a Walmart run because, well we don't need a reason, there was a Walmart close by. It rained this afternoon so things aren't as unpleasant as they were this morning. We will be in Indiana tomorrow. We do have an issue with the MP 2. Nothing significant really but we will be diverting from our due west course to visit Elkhart where the MP was built, to have our issue looked at. That will be on Tuesday. The pics are of our shopping trip and our utopian campsite.

Maumee Bay day 2

Today, we tried to find the RV utopia. We did the search on our bikes. This park has a golf course, a lodge, 2 restaurants, a bar, a conference center, a large beach on Lake Erie and a

beach on another lake, a nature center, the 1 mile+ boardwalk through the swamp, several miles of paved bike trails and, this campground. The campground is somewhat unique in that there are no loops to drive around. All the campsites are on cul-de-sacs. There is a traffic circle at the end to do the turn around. There are several of these. Well over 100 campsites.  I suppose all of that stuff could possibly be considered utopian. We did our bike ride fairly early due to the forecast high temperature. Part of the trail was along a seawall bordering Lake Erie. There was a kite flying club in a field near the lake. They were, without a doubt, the most serious kite flyers we have ever encountered.

Maumee Bay SP Ohio

We are on Lake Erie, near the town of Oregon Ohio. The drive took us through Cleveland (also known as 'the mistake on the lake') on I-90. Jenny read a review of this park during the drive that claimed this place was an example of a RV utopia. Say what? We were excited to see what the hell that was. We drove around some after we got here and I'm still not sure. Lake Erie has a history of toxic algae blooms. Farming run off is the issue. I took a picture of the water at the swimming beach. There is a long boardwalk that wanders through a swamp, that historically was huge, on the edge of the lake. We hiked on that. The shallow water is completely covered in Duck Weed. That's the green in the picture. We are going to spend the weekend here.

Pymatuning day 2

This will be our last day here. I did a bike ride this morning. The trails were overgrown with alot of poison ivy. When I got back I washed my legs with soap, so far so good. Our nextdoor neighbor told us about a tourist attraction at the dam spillway. People go there and feed the carp. 300,000 people every year. Those people throw a ton of food in the water resulting in a God awful number of extremely fat fish. It was bizarrely gross. We had 3 slices of whole grain bread that was getting old that we tossed into the maelstrom. They seemed to enjoy it. One more thing. There are alot of Amish here. They are occupying the park's cabins. I wouldn't mention it except that all the Amish kids are riding around on a weird looking scooter bike. I have included a picture. We head further west tomorrow.

Pymatuning SP Pennsylvania

Today's move was not the smoothest of the trip. We drove into Bemus Point NY to see Jamie's childhood home and to visit with his parents. That went great and it was today's highlight. We got back on the road a little after 1 and headed for Pymatuning SP. Did you know there is one in Ohio and another one in Pennsylvania? Neither did we. Google maps & Garmen didn't either. Anyway, on our way to the wrong park we encountered a completely closed road that required a 180 degree turn. I'm alittle embarrassed to say that I went around a telephone pole in someone's yard while she was mowing on her riding mower. I hope she doesn't have nightmares, I most assuredly will. This park is on a lake. We are only here for 2 nights. Not sure what we'll do.

Quattro mile creek day tres

Just keeping my spanish sharp. We were short of clean clothes and in need of a food infusion so we did laundry and  grocery shopping today in a town near here called Youngstown. There are some chores that must be attended to. We did do an hour hike around the park, part of which was along the shoreline of Lake Ontario. All of the Great Lakes eventually drain into Lake Ontario. This year has been a wet one up here and all the lakes are near record volume. That's one reason the falls and the Niagra River were so dramatic. One bit of trivia-Lake Ontario contains 20% of the worlds fresh water. Tomorrow we head west. We will be back in Pennsylvania at a park who's name is unpronounceable. I saw this sign and was very impressed that some how New York bears or maybe raccoons can read. Andrew Cuomo should be proud.

4 mile Creek day 2

Today we were tourists. We drove to Niagara falls SP, the oldest state park in the country (1875) and hit all of the viewpoints. We were going to do the "Maid of the Mist" cruise but it looked like the boat was a can of human sardines. It was sort of funny that you had to stand in line six feet apart but they wanted you to squish together on the boat.
Too much togetherness during the era of social distancing. I'm a proponent of anti-social distancing. We have one more day here. We need an administrative day

Four Mile Creek State Park NY

We are camped on lake Ontario. The water looks really cold. We fiddled around here for a while and then headed toward Niagara falls. We are here for 3 days so we didn't want to spoil all the fun on the first day so we stopped at the whirlpool. After the falls, the water flows through a gorge as it heads for lake Ontario. The word 'flows' is somewhat misleading. It is the scariest water I have ever seen, and remember we have rafted The Grand Canyon. Its flowing at over 25 MPH. Class 6 Rapids at least. Anyway, we did some hiking at the gorge. A hike that included a 400 stone step stairway descent to the river followed by a 400 stone step  stairway back up to the rim. Knee rehab. That adventure was followed by a important trip to an adult beverage store because I was having to mix gin with coke. Don't try it!

Letchworth State Park New York

This park surrounds a canyon formed by the Genesee river. The canyon is 500 feet deep in places. The park is supposed to be the Grand Canyon of the east. It has also been voted the best State park in the country. It's a nice park and the canyon is pretty but I'm wondering who thought it was Grand and who voted in the best state park election. We are here for only 1 night. Our original plan was for a 4 night stay but we had to be out of the diseased Carolinas for 14 days before we could enter NY. Today is the 14th day since we left NC and entered VA. After we got set up here we drove along the Canyon rim and stopped at the view points. That came to an abrupt halt when the sky opened up. We did see some of the sights, did a little hiking and took some pics. We move to a park near Niagara Falls tomorrow.

Kettle Creek last day

We decided today, to drive into the nearest town, Renovo, to absorb some of its ambiance. There is a gigantic brick building in town that has 3 sets of railroad tracks running beside it. The building is boarded up and the RR tracks are rusting. We think the source of Renovo's economy was lumber and coal. There are around 4000 people still living there and we have no idea how they make a living. We drove around some more and visited a scenic overlook at the end of a long uphill slog. After lunch it was a 3 1/2 mile loop hike near the campground. It's New York tomorrow.

Kettle Creek day 2

We got to thinking last night that we have been on the go pretty constantly since we left so that maybe a chill day was in order. We tried but it didn't work. The ranger yesterday gave us a map. We used that map to plan a scenic drive. We did that after lunch because we chilled out in the morning. After we got back I hiked a trail behind the campground. 50 minutes up hill and I don't think I was near the top. Anyway that was our chill day. We are here all day tomorrow and then it's New York. These pics were taken on the drive.

Kettle Creek State Park Pennsylvania

We are about as far in "the middle of nowhere" as you can get in Pennsylvania. The major town near us is Renovo. We will need to hang here for 3 nights so that we can legally enter New York. The state park is in a 300,000 acre state forest. Its real hilly. We talked to a forest ranger and he gave us some ideas for exploring. Some of these pics are a result of his suggestions. More tomorrow.

Shawnee SP last day

Tomorrow we were supposed to move into NY, but we would have been less than 14 days out of the Carolinas, so governor Cuomo wouldn't let us in. We are moving alittle closer to the border but we will still be in PA. There is a 9 basket disc golf course here. We did that this morning. We then found a Walmart. Jenny thought it was creepy. It was a really old store. Nothing was where it was supposed to be. All walmart's can be described with an adjective, creepy describes that one. This afternoon I rode the trails. They are snowmobile trails. That must mean it snows here. Yesterday we found a one lane covered bridge. That was exciting. Pic below. We will try and post something tomorrow.

Shawnee SP day 2

This morning we visited the Flight 93 Memorial. To be completely honest it dredged up some memories that I didn't really care to relive. The visitor center walked you through a timeline of all 4 of the hijacked flights. The hijackers were in control of flight 93 for 35 minutes. During that time the passengers were able to make phone calls and they learned of the attacks on the World trade center. A vote was taken and the passengers took back control. The airplane impacted the ground inverted at nearly 600 miles/hour. The voice recorder and flight data recorder (which are in the tail) were found 20 feet underground. After the FBI investigation was completed, the coroner told them to fill in the crater. It is now a sacred spot, the final resting place of the 40 heros who took back control of the plane. As you enter the Monument there is a 90 foot tower that will eventually have 40 wind chimes hanging in it. They are still working on that. We left the visitors center and did a mile hike around the  Monument. The actual impact site is marked by a large boulder. The debris field covers 40 acres. The names of all the passengers are inscribed on marble slabs and the slabs are lined up on the final  flight path. There is a lot of symbolism in the way the Monuments designers arranged things. As are most National Monuments we have visited, this one was extremely well done. We are here another day I think. I'll have to ask Jenny.

Shawnee SP Pennsylvania

We drove through Virginia, drove through West Virginia, hit a sliver of Maryland and ended up here, in Pennsylvania. This SP has a 400 acre lake and something like 2000 acres of land. I think we are near Altoona but I know we are near the 911 flight 93 crash site Memorial. We will probably visit that tomorrow. A few days ago we received an alarming photo taken by our next door neighbor in Habersham. That is the sidewalk in front of our house.

Happy 4th, Shenandoah NP day 3

Today is our last day here. We got up early and got a head start on the mob. The hike was a 5 mile loop, a good portion was along side a cascading creek. It was excellent. Tomorrow we head further north into Pennsylvania. One observation about our stay here. Probably 1/3rd of the people staying in the campground are from India or Pakistan. We have never seen that anywhere before. There is probably a flight from Mumbai to Washington Dulles that brings them in. We are not to far from Washington. Anyway, we feel good about our visit to this park. We have seen quite a bit of the Skyline drive and hiked a few miles in the backcountry. Below are some pics taken on today's outing.

Shenandoah NP day 2

Today's adventure was a 6 mile out and back to the 2nd highest waterfall in the park (87 feet). We decided to go early so that we could nab a parking spot at the trailhead. When we got there there were maybe 10 cars. When we got back 4 hours later there were probably 100. There is a 10 person limit in most of the buildings so, consequently there are long lines everywhere of people waiting to get in. The crowds remind us of Acadia in Maine. That's not a compliment. This is the 4th of July during a pandemic. Anyway, our hike was excellent. I took the pic of the flower and Jenny under that tree because that is a Mountain Laurel. That looks nothing like the Texas Mountain Laurel all of my Texas relatives are used to nor does the flower have that distinctive grape smell. More tomorrow.

Shenandoah National park

Just a quick post. We drove 55 miles to get to the "Big Meadows" campground. A bunch of it was on the Skyline drive (35 mph) it took a while. We are near 3000 feet elevation and it is way cooler than it was at the river. That's good because the campground has no electric. It has no water either. We can run the generator and our water tank is full so I should stop with the negatives because it is really pretty. We are exploring a little around the campground this first day. There is a lodge with a restaurant and lounge. This being 4th of July weekend, things are going to get crowded. The campground has no cell so we will have to go to the lodge to make any calls. Probably do some hiking tomorrow.