Easing On Down The Road

I was in Hot Springs maybe 4-5 years ago when I first started traveling in the RV. Even back then, I had a quest to see all of the National Parks, Monuments, Battlefields, Historic Sites, etc. What I wasn't doing was my more current quest of Junior Rangerdom. I thought that since Hot Springs National Park was sort of on my way south, I should maybe stop and rectify this particular oversight.

I rolled into Lake Catherine State Park and secured a site way down at the end of the campground. It is a lovely site, right on the lake except for the steam plant right across the lake. It is rather pretty at night when it is all lit up, but it sort of puts a damper on the nature aspect of the place. The lake is in front of me and there are hiking trails up into the mountain behind us.

My site on the lake

And the steam plant across the lake

We've had a terrible wildlife problem here. Every morning around 7:30, a male cardinal starts attacking the RV and my car. I think he sees another cardinal in the windows and mirrors. He is incessant – bang, bang, bang. At first I felt sorry for him – I didn't want him to get hurt. Now, after he has woken me up with his racket and it goes on for most of the day and I've seen the mess he has left all over my car – I guess I have mixed feelings. Silly boy.

We spent our mornings hiking. Nice hikes, steep and rugged hikes. On one hand, it is nice that the leaves are all down – you can see quite a bit farther. On the other hand, it is sort of monochromatic.

I did find a waterfall though

I went into the National Park and asked to be a Junior Ranger. The lady looked at me and said, 'OK – but you have to do every single task in our Junior Ranger book. No exceptions.' I guess they are going to be pretty hard core about it. The booklet was one of the best Junior Ranger books I've seen so far. Lots of info and a lot of scurrying around trying to find answers in the Park. When I went to turn in the book, she started looking at it and said, 'Good thing I'm checking you out – Ranger Bob would have flunked you right off the bat'. I had done every single task except filled in my name on the front of the book. As I said, these guys were tough.

Hydrotherapy Room.  L-R: pressure guns to shoot water at you, Needle shower, Sitz bath where they did Mercury Rubs if you had Syphilis and a big tub where they would put you in the water and send electrical currents thru you. You can just see the corner of the enema table - privacy was not a big requirement back in the day

Steam box and ice box 

Gymnasium

It wasn't all torture machines - this was a very luxurious place

I am a barefoot type of gal – I really don't like to have anything on my feet at all. This has been hard because it has been getting down into the low thirties at night and the floor of the RV is not insulated at all which means it is freezing. I finally broke down, stopped at Dollar General and got me a $6 pair of slippers. What a difference it makes in my quality of life. Of course Dollar General is not known for having the greatest selection of slippers.

And the sun sets again

Free At Last

Meanwhile, back at my new home – the car lot – we are patiently waiting for my transmission coolant housing unit to show up. It was coming from Memphis, which was about six hours away. We found out that we needed a new one on Friday, but it did not show up until the following Wednesday. I spent two nights at the WoodSpring Suites. Sounds really classy but in reality the best thing I can say about it was that it was super clean. The second night, I was fortunate? to get the last room. They did not want to rent it to me because evidently a dog had chewed up the blinds. I decided that if they had a blanket, I could put it up over the window-what can I say - I was tired and cranky. I got up to the room and the bed needed to be made but Pedro, the front desk guy was up there quick as a flash and made up the bed and covered the window. Miko spent both nights curled up under the bed. I don't think she was into the whole living the high life in a motel.

The transmission coolant housing arrived around 11:00 am on Wednesday. I can't tell you how excited I was that I was finally going to leave the car lot and move on down the road. It took Mike, my personal mechanic a couple of hours to install the unit and he tripled checked everything to make sure that it was all good and then I was on the road. What joy!!!!

Ten miles down the road, I'm climbing a hill and I see that the engine is overheating almost to the red line again. I pulled off onto an off ramp(I'm an expert on what to do when an engine overheats now and I know what to do – pull over and call Joe). Joe sends Mike and another guy out to see what the problem is. Turns out, a hose had burst. What are the chances that all this stuff happens all at once – cracked radiator, broken housing unit and a burst hose? Mike replaces the hose and I'm again on my way.

Nasty little slit

I want to take another moment here and talk about how good Crain Buick/GMC in Springdale was to me. I don't know what I would have done if they hadn't taken me in. There was Mike, the mechanic, who really put his heart into getting me fixed up – I know he felt my pain as each new thing went wrong. And then there was Matt, the Service Manager who did everything in his power to make my 10-day stay as comfortable as possible. Lastly, Joe – the Service Adviser – the one who worked so hard to make sure I did not lose it during this whole process. If there was something that needed to be done, Joe would magically make it happen. These three guys went way above and beyond the call of duty. There are good people in the world and I am so grateful that I ran into these guys.

Now, not being of the sissy sort, I am heading into the mountains of Arkansas. There is no need to baby my engine, no need to break in these parts gently. I am going to really put these new engine parts to the test. I am heading to Lake Fort Smith State Park which is only a measly hour's drive away. Nobody had mentioned to me that I have to go over a mountain and then even worse down a mountain to get to the park. The drive up the narrow twisty road wasn't too bad, it was the drive down into the valley that got to me. I practiced my mountain driving skills but my brakes still smelled a little bit burny by the time I got to the bottom.

Miko and I really needed to spend some decompression time after our ordeal and this was the perfect spot. We didn't talk to anybody for a couple of days, there was no online presence, total solitude. We hiked – actually a rather grueling hike up and down the hills, it was a little bit rough on this winter body of mine. We saw armadillos – weird little creatures who have no idea that anybody is anywhere near them. We also saw a snowy owl and several hawks. Mostly we just sat and eased on thru the days.

Waterfall for the day - Arkansas desperately needs water, it is very dry here

This little armadillo wouldn't even bother looking up at us

Lake Fort Smith #13 - you can sorta see the lake thru the trees

A most glorious Arkansas sunset

A Foray Into The Hills of Oklahoma

After spending a week in the car lot, I need to do something. I'm so tired of just sitting around – time to do the tourist thang.

Saturday, I head over into Oklahoma – I'm only a couple of miles from the border, so it isn't that long of a journey. I drive about an hour and a half to Tahlequah which is the Cherokee National Capitol. There was a lot of interesting things about this place, but they became very near and dear to my heart when they told me that they were dog-friendly – not just the grounds, but Miko could come into the museum also. How cool is that? Or as my mechanic in the car lot where I am living now said to me – 'Cooler than a pocket on a shirt'. The museum itself told the story of the Trail of Tears, where the Cherokee and many other First Nation tribes were driven off their land in the eastern United States and forced to travel to Oklahoma 'Indian Territory'. It is one of the saddest stories of our nation's history. I wandered over to the Cherokee village which they have built. It is representative of a typical Cherokee village in the early 1700's. I took the tour which was fascinating as they talked a lot about the Cherokee culture and how they lived.

Miko in the museum

A Cherokee winter house made out of clay and river reeds

Major take-aways – the Cherokee were a Mater-lineal group where all property and children belonged to the women. They were not nomadic and built villages with stockade walls. Education was highly valued and they were often more literate than their white neighbors. There have been many notable Cherokee but Andrew Hartley Payne captured my imagination. He was the winner of the International Trans-Continental Footrace in 1928. He ran 3,423.5 mile route from Los Angeles to New York City from March or 1928 until May of 1928. Just a little over two months it took him to run across the United States. Amazing. There were so many amazing facts – I highly recommend checking out Tahlequah and the Cherokee National Museum. Alas, they have partnered with the National Park Service, but their Junior Ranger program has not been completely set up yet, so no Junior Ranger for me.

Sunday was a lovely day, temperatures were in the low sixties. Miko and I wandered over to Oklahoma again to go to Natural Falls State Park, home of one of the tallest waterfalls in Oklahoma. My first waterfall of the year – how wonderful it this? Everything is pretty brown - I suppose that is to be expected with it being January and all.  I think Miko really had a good time – she has been sort of cooped up at the car lot for the last week and it was really nice to get out and do some hiking. I spent quite a bit of time at the bottom of the falls, just sitting and becoming one with nature. I've always wanted to use that 'becoming one with nature' in a sentence about me.

This park had multiple different ways to view the falls - high, low and in between

I was just so thrilled to see green in the month of January I had to take this picture

I also did a bit of shopping, replenishing some supplies.  I bought a beaded placemat to hang on my wall - I think it is pretty.  So far I have not really put any personal touches in the RV.  It's a start.

Don't Fence Me In

I've been on the road for almost a week now and haven't made a lot of progress, both in my travels and my blogging. What can I say – I've been busy. I'm making up for it with this blog. It is going to be super text heavy.

It was difficult getting out of town this winter. Let's start with the car crash in the beginning of January which totaled my beloved Mini Cooper. Of a lesser note, it also fractured a couple of bones in my hand, not bad enough that I needed a cast, but bad enough that I should wear a brace for the next few weeks. I'm thinking that I sure would not want to be a car owned by me – it seems every two years some major hurt happens to a car owned by me.

After running around furiously (I have a time table to follow – like get out of Minnesota before I freeze), I end up buying a Ford Focus – same car that caught on fire a couple of years ago, except this is a manual instead of an automatic. I have to get the tow bar and supplemental braking system installed so I can tow it behind the RV.

I left on a Saturday, which was important because there was a major snow storm predicted on Sunday and ended up in Osceola Iowa at Lakeside Casino where I always stay my first night on the road. This was of note because I think it was one of the few times that I stayed there and there wasn't a blizzard or high wind warnings out. I woke up to an extremely dense fog, got gas and headed out.

Past Kansas City, near a town in Missouri called Nevada (said Ne-vay-da) all of a sudden I notice the RV coolant indicator heating up. It is climbing higher and higher. Just as it reached the red zone and the 'Reduced Engine Performance' light came on, I pulled over and shut the engine off. Roads in Missouri are usually not built with much of a shoulder. Those semis going by were really rocking the RV. I turned the engine back on, it was a normal temperature and started off again. This time the temperature climbed much faster. Time to call Roadside Assistance. They had a couple of guys come out ( think guys that looked like they belonged in Duck Dynasty) and they put four gallons of coolant in. They could not see any leaks and thought the wind had just blown the coolant out. Sounded a little fishy, but what do I know?

Proceeded on down the road, into a torrential rain storm. Got a little lost and finally got to the park I was staying at and settled in for the night. Have I mentioned that Miko seems to have developed a new nervous trigger (besides her travel in the RV phobia) which is rain storms. Lovely, soothing rain on the roof sets her all a-tremble. The next morning, I looked at my coolant and it looked low so I put another two gallons in. At this point I figured I needed to get this looked at, but I'm in the middle of Nowhere, Missouri.

I get as far as Arkansas, engine is heating up again. I pull over into a hotel parking lot and start making phone calls. First I call RV places but they tell me that they can't work on it because it is an engine problem, they only work on RV stuff. I then call Ford dealers because I have a Ford engine. Nope, they can't work on it because I'm too big for their bays. I find a place called Truck Service of Arkansas and give them a call. Yes – they can work on it. Yay!!!! I pull in, get in line (they are first come, first serve). After about an hour, they tell me – Nope, we can't work on your rig – you are a gas engine, we only work on diesel engines. What am I supposed to do now?

I call and call and finally find a guy who takes pity on me. Bless his heart. Joe actually said when I told him my story, as an exclamation – 'Oh Good Gravy' How can you not like somebody like that? I end up at Crain's Buick/GMC dealer – nicest people ever. After they diagnosed the problem – cracked radiator - They dealt with my extended warranty people which helped a lot. The warranty paid for a couple of nights in a hotel, so Miko and I stayed at La Quinta. First room's sink would not drain, the second room's ceiling would drip when the guy upstairs took a shower.

Crain ordered a new radiator which took a day to get here and then when they opened the box, it turned out the radiator was all bent up. So they had to order another one. At this point the RV is up on blocks. I spent last night in the RV, behind the locked fence with the three rows of barb wire up on top. It actually wasn't too bad, I guess I felt pretty secure here. If I can't get out, I figure no nefarious creatures can get in. They think they will have the radiator replaced today, but I'm not so hopeful. We shall see.

Update: Radiator is in (YAY!!!), but they have found that something called a Transmission Coolant Housing unit that is cracked. They have ordered the part from Memphis but it will not be here before next Tuesday. So I guess I am living in the car lot until next Tuesday at the earliest. These guys at Crain though have been so wonderful to me. They have me hooked up to electricity, they have filled my tanks with water – they have given me a key to the gate – I cannot say enough about how great their customer service has been. Although I don't quite understand why they haven't ordered a name plate on my chair in the customer lounge – I mean I've been sitting in that chair for almost a week. :-)

My nightly view - can't see the barb wire, but it is there

What Did You Have ForBreakfast OR Spiritual Health, Brawny Machines And A Little Dash Of Bix

I was raised on Kellogg cereal. Is there any other type of cereal? Looking at the map, I see Battle Creek, ancestral home of Kellogg's. How cool would it be to do a factory tour? I must say, I'm rather disappointed that there are no factory tours to be had. I did find something called Kellogg's Discovery Center which was interesting in it's own way. Back in the olden days (1800s) people thought fresh air and sunshine would make you sick. Fresh vegetables would kill you. In NYC, a guy on a street corner ate three tomatoes. People thought he was trying to commit suicide. Dr. Kellogg was all about health and exercise. He created a sanitarium where he could put his ideas into practice. He invented many machines that are still in use today in many gyms.

Discovery Center parking lot - evidently this was Not the hottest ticket in town

Some of Dr. Kellogg's inventions

Some of the machines we could try for ourselves. 

This foot vibrator was very relaxing although I could feel it all the way up to my fillings

One day, one of his patients at the sanitarium came to him and said “Dr. Kellogg, you owe me $10. I was eating this dry hard toast that you gave me and I broke my false teeth”. Dr. Kellogg immediately started working on an alternative to the toast and came up corn flakes. Ta-da!!!!

Dr. Kellogg also was a 7^th Day Adventist and Battle Creek is where this religion came to be. I spent maybe a half hour in the Discovery Center and then I got a tour of the Historical Adventist Village which took about an hour and a half. I was really curious about what the religion was about and asked my personal tour guide to give me a quick run-down on their basic beliefs. They believe in good health practices, the trinity and when you die, you just go on mouldering in the grave until the second coming when all true believers will rise up out of the grave. I must have asked a lot of questions about the Adventists because my tour guide gave me a book all about the Adventists which should answer any other questions I might have.

Spent a few days in Indiana at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. I spent time last year here, but I stayed in the Indiana Dunes State Park where there were hookups. This time I'm in the National Lakeshore where there are no hookups at all. That would be fine because I am pretty self-sufficient, but it has been raining for the last couple of days and my solar is having a hard time keeping up. Miko and I just sort of vegged out – did a couple of hikes, found some ice cream but basically just putzed around.

Sometimes lily pads aren't all that pretty

My next big challenge was getting from Indiana around Chicago. I absolutely will not drive through Chicago which means I always end up going the long way around . I was hoping to stay at Starved Rock State Park where I had stayed at previously. The problem was that it was Sunday of a three day weekend and all the weekend warriors had taken every available camping spot. I ended up in the Quad Cities – Davenport, Rock Island, Moline and maybe East Moline? I had decided to stay at the Illiniwek Forest Preserve and as I drove up – it was packed. Not with campers but with a Renaissance Festival – jousting, flute playing, much hilarity. Illiniwek was a lovely park. On one side was the mighty Mississippi and on the other side was a huge bluff with some beautiful hiking/mountain biking trails. Miko and I would go hiking every morning up on these trails for a couple of hours.

Miko in a gnarly tree trunk

Moline is the home of John Deere. I, again wanted to do a factory tour, but you had to reserve a spot 48 hours in advance which was not going to happen, given my tendency to not commit to a plan. I did the second best thing though which was to go visit the John Deere Pavilion. I learned how John Deere got his start – he was a failed blacksmith who came to this Midwest area from Vermont to try to find work to pay off his creditors. New England soil is hard and rocky while Midwest soil is rich and damp. Farmers in the Midwest would have to stop every few feet to clean the muddy mess off of their iron plows. Mr. Deere fashioned a polished steel blade that cut like butter through the dirt and thus, the John Deere company was born.

While that was interesting, the great thing about the Pavilion was that there was so many interactive displays. I got to go into a simulator and operate a back hoe. I couldn't quite get the hang of driving a bulldozer. I built gears that twirled. I hand cranked videos (although some little kid butted in and wanted to play also – I guess I was in the children's area, but still....). I also got to climb into a few cabs of various John Deere machines.

If you squint real hard, you can see me driving me a big honkin'   machine.  So big it doesn't fit all the way in the picture

Davenport is also the birthplace of Bix Beiderbecke , a famous jazz cornetist. He came up in the late twenties/early thirties. I knew nothing about him except his name, but some of my friends in the music biz thought he was the bee's knees. I really dislike the type of jazz where everybody seems to be playing a different melody at the same time, but Bix seemed to be more of the big band type of jazz which is way cool.

Pretty prolific guy

They wanted you to feel like you were actually listening to Bix as he played at Hudson Lake

I also tried to go on a chocolate factory tour, but even though the building's operating hours stated they were open, all was dark – so no factory tour. I guess factory tours were not to be for me.

Wisconsin has a bar on every corner - Davenport has a chiropractic office on every corner

I spent four days in the Quad Cities. I am learning to slow down. I am learning that I don't have to be doing something touristy every single moment. I still have a long way to go, on this slowing down stuff, but I think I am beginning to get a glimmer of how this works. My time on the road is winding down - I'm sad that I have to go back.  My time was way too short but I'm also thrilled to head home and reconnect with all that is near and dear to me. 

Grand Rapids Part II

The more I travel, the more to-do lists I have acquired. The biggest waterfall in every state, every national monument, park, historic site etc. I think I'm also starting to collect Frank Lloyd Wright houses. Grand Rapids has the Meyer May house which was a treat. I felt sort of cool when they asked the tour attendees who had visited FLW houses and which one and I was able to tell them about the Rosenbaum house in Florence Alabama.  Rosenbaum House    They had not heard of it. The Meyer May is a lovely house – I think it was actually more livable than most of the FLW houses I have been in. As always, there was the lovely art glass. Interesting fact – there was one plain glass picture window and that was the fanciest window of the time. Back at the turn of the century, making large plate glass windows was difficult – the art glass windows were much cheaper to make.

Not a good picture, but you can see the art glass

Frank designed everything in the house - even the kitchen sink

In Michigan, there is a large chain of stores called Meijer. They are like Walmarts (but I think they pay their employees better). They originated in Grand Rapids. Frederick Meijer created the Frederick Meijer Gardens which is the second most visited site in Michigan ( after the Henry Ford museum over in Detroit). While they have quite extensive gardens, the main draw is the sculptures. I was quite pleased that I was able to actually name some of the pieces and/or artists. I am a most cultured person evidently.

There was an exhibit celebrating Auguste Rodin's 100^th anniversary of his death. Seems sort of macabre to celebrate somebody's death – perhaps a better word would be remembrance. They had several of Rodin's sculptures on loan but they also had two actual Rodin sculptures in their collection.

I ponied up the $4 for a tram ride through their sculpture garden because if a tour is offered, I will always take it. You always learn something. Now, if I can just remember what I learn. Oh well.

Leaves are finally beginning to change

This is Eve, one of the Rodin statues

A Keith Haring - tram was moving too fast to get a good picture

Leonardo Da Vinci wrote out the plans to create this large horse for the city of Milan, but it never happened.  Fast forward to modern days time and somebody (don't remember the details) took the plans and created the horse.  It is massive.

Let's Throw In A Little Culture.....Finally

Grand Rapids, Michigan

I get sort of confused where I am in the world sometimes. I wake up in the morning, wondering. I have a mantra that I try to do each day – what year is it, what month, what day, what day of the week and where the hell am I? Sometimes it takes me a bit to figure out all of these details. Grand Rapids was a little difficult for me because we have one in Minnesota- no, wait, I'm in Michigan.

Grand Rapids has the Gerald Ford Museum. I love presidential libraries – as I've said before – a presidential library makes even the most evil, controversial person seem like a nice person. I have to say that this museum did that for Gerald Ford although I have a sneaky idea that maybe he really was a nice guy. At least his reign was short enough that we didn't really find out the truth, but maybe we did. His most controversial action was the pardoning of Nixon, which at the time, I was horrified at. In hindsight, maybe he was right to pardon Nixon – yes, Nixon got away with it, but on the other hand, we, as a nation, could move on. It cost Ford his whole political future, and that says a lot about the man. He was willing to sacrifice his future to do what needed to be done to help us all heal.

All Oval Offices pretty much look the same

Each seat in the cabinet room had a name tag such as President, Vice President etc.  This school group all sat down and were loudly announcing their positions in the Cabinet

Most of the museum was about his early years as an Eagle Scout and fabulous football player. Both Green Bay and Detroit wanted to draft him, but he chose to go to Law School instead. I always enjoy the presidential museums when they talk about the First Ladies. Betty Ford was also a person of integrity. From being a fashion model to a spokesperson for recovering people everywhere to a breast cancer survivor. She was an amazing person.

The week I was in Grand Rapids was also Week Three of ArtPrize Nine – a juried art show. Art was scattered all over the city. It is a very walk able city and it was great fun to wander around looking at all the different art. There were 1300 different pieces of art and people are allowed to vote for their favorites. When I was there, the top forty out of the 1300 had been selected so I concentrated on looking for those forty. Funny enough, three of the forty were all horse related – just up my alley.

One of the top forty

Last Dance On A Hot Planet by Sally Duback  - I just liked this one

Art was everywhere - even in the river

Pretty intense orange guys

One of the finalists

It was made out of glass and steel and had a red glowing belly

There is a four story place called The B.O.B. that has many bars.  This was not any ArtPrize art - this was just on a wall - crushed beer cans - very cool

This was made of raised screws

Here are the raised screws that we could touch

I think this one was called Lincoln and was made totally of Lincoln pennies - couldn't get a picture without people in it

This one won one of the grand prizes of $200,000.