Day 14 thru Day 18

We're at Tom and Julie's in Altmar, NY now.  I'll pick back up with the blog when we leave.

Day 13

We continued northwest to I-81 and headed on toward Altmar.  It was a nice drive and we arrived at Tom and Julie’s about 5 pm.  It was a beautiful evening.  The scene from Tom's backyard was breathtaking.

Day 12

We left Turkey Swamp with little planning for our next stop.  Yesterday, we decided to change course and head on over to Tom and Julie’s at Altmar, NY.  We were relatively close and in need of a long rest stop anyway.  Our original plan had us continuing up the coast through New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.  But, since we had to head west a little to avoid New York City, we decided to go to Altmar.  Now I’ll have to plan a whole new northeast leg of our trip.

Finding a campground wasn’t as easy as it had been.  We decided to stay at a Passport America campground because others in the area were quite expensive.  But, when we arrived, the office was closed and the gate was, too.  There was no easy way offered to register, so we just kept going.  I found Valley View Farm and Campground a ways off so we headed there.  The only problem was it was way off in the middle of rural whatever and I had to depend on Gypsy (GPS) to guide us there.  She did, but it was the long way around, I’m sure.

We finally reached the campground just about dark.  What we found was a nice little park, but nary a level spot in the place.  We drove around and tried several spots, but no luck.  Finally, the lady that ran the place showed up and told us we could park in the parking area for one of the occupied sites.  No one was in that camper and she didn’t expect them until the weekend.  It still wasn’t level, but at least we didn’t roll out of bed.

The campground was not much more than a cow pasture.

Day 11

We got up and around, had breakfast and headed out.  I stopped and dumped the waste tanks on the way out then stopped at the main gate to pay for our night’s stay.  No one was there, but they had self-pay envelopes, so I picked one up and got back in the RV.  We were about to write a check when I noticed, it said “no checks or credit cards for self-pay”.  All I had was $20 bills and the price was $25.  Hmmm.  Sorry, Delaware.  Guess we owe you one.

We headed on up around Delaware Bay and crossed the Delaware River on US Hwy 40 on the Delaware Memorial Bridge.  From there, we wandered the back roads up through New Jersey.  I’m not sure just how we got where we are now because I more or less let Gypsy lead the way.  Joyce tried to figure out where we were on the Atlas but gave up.  Interestingly, while wondering around, we passed the McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst Joint Base.  I didn’t know we were anywhere near it.  I’d heard of Naval Air Station Lakehurst years ago while in the Navy, but never thought about it except to know it was in New Jersey.  It used to be the Navy's main derrigable base and is where the Hindenburg met its end. 

We kept truckin’ through the backwoods and stopped at a private campground, but couldn’t find anyone to check us in, so we kept going.  It was about 4 pm then.  We finally made it to Turkey Swamp Park up near West Freehold.  What?!  You don’t know where that is?  Look it up.  Google knows.

Day 10

Up and at ‘em!  Well, maybe not so ambitious as that, but we left Kiptopeke State Park and headed up the coast to Lewes Point, Delaware.  There’s a ferry from there over to Cape May and we considered taking it but opted out.  On the way up, we took a side trip to Onancock Wharf Harbor.

While there, we saw Julie's bicycle.

We headed east until we hit Delaware Hwy 1 and followed it up the barrier islands toward Lewes Point.  We took a little break at the Indian River Inlet bridge.

Instead of taking the ferry, we left the east shore madness and headed inland.  We were running pretty late by then so it was just about dark when we pulled into Killens Pond State Park.  Inside the park campground, it was very dark.  We stumbled around a bit finding a spot and hooking up, but then we had some microwave pot roast and hit the sack.  I got up with Ditto about 4:30 am and while outside, I realized I had left one of the rear doors open when I had gotten out the power cord.  I shut the door and Ditto and I got back in and went to bed.  It seemed like it was about the time my head hit the pillow that it started to rain.  Sure glad Ditto woke me up to pee.

Day 9

Messed around this morning, was in no hurry.  Watched as a couple of White Hats made their way toward the geedunk.

After leaving the park we headed to NAS Oceana to see how things had changed.  They had.  The area outside what used to be the main gate was now the biggest Navy Exchange complex we’ve ever seen.  I went in to see if they had any GPS that I might be interested in.  Amazingly, they didn’t.  But, the building reminded me a lot of the Springfield Mall with shops of all kinds, a food court, etc.  This whole thing was sitting almost smack dab where our old Navy housing apartment was back in the 70’s.

We went on the base, through the zig-zag of concrete barriers and past the gate security.  It’s funny, but back in my day, the gate security was mainly concerned about whether or not you had auto insurance and wasn’t wearing blue jeans.  Today, all I needed was my ID card, but there was no way I was going to drive a truck loaded with fertilizer through that gate.  At least, not very rapidly.

My old squadron, VF-41, has since been decommissioned, but our hanger is still there.  It felt a little strange driving around the base seeing some familiar sights but many strange ones.  They have a real nice Navy aircraft park with about a dozen different planes on display.

We left NAS Oceana and headed over to Corvette Court where we lived for a few months.  It looked much the same.  A guy that was living there came out and talked with us for a while.  Looked like he had just mowed the lawn and it looked nice.  The little tree the boys were playing under when lightning struck next door was gone as was the chain link fence that ran down to the street between the houses.

We checked out Dodge Street where Bob and Judy Gee lived, but we weren’t positive which house.  One looked familiar, though.

From there, we drove up Shore Drive to the Oceanview area where we lived immediately after I returned from Vietnam in 1968.  We lived in a little duplex on Pleasant Ave.  That whole area is now big new tightly situated beach homes and apartments.  Movin’ on up!

After Oceanview, we drove over to the Norfolk Naval Station to see what carriers were in.  Sadly, only the USS George Washington was there in dry dock and it didn’t look too pretty.  So, we left there, stopped to eat and then headed for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel.   Crossing the bay, we decided to spend tonight in the Kiptopeke State Park just across the bridge/tunnel  on the Virginia Eastern Shore.  It’s been a full day.

Day 8

Nice slow day, only about 3 hours driving time to the Virginia Beach area.  I wanted to stay at Fort Story (Cape Hatteras) campground, but when I called, they said they were booked up.  So, here we are at Dam Neck Navy Base.  It is a nice, rather new, campground with just a smallish sand dune between us and the beach.  It was hot today, but a front has since moved in and the wind is blowing in off the ocean quite cool.  In fact, I’m going to have to close the door.  Ought to sleep cool tonight.

Joyce fixed some chicken breasts for sandwiches right after we arrived.  We were all three starving.  After dinner cleanup, we took a stroll through the park and planned on going out on the beach.  But, to get to the beach was actually quite a walk and neither Joyce nor I was up to it.  We’ll check it out tomorrow as we leave.  However, this cool front is just that, cool and the high tomorrow is predicted to be below 80 and cloudy.  So, no sunshiny beach here.

Day 7

I checked the Internet and found I had not used the recommended amount of bleach for the amount of onboard water.  I should have used ½ cup instead.  Oh well, an extra day of treatment won’t hurt.  So, I added more bleach and filled some more empty water bottles at the spigot.  Phew!  The water really smells of bleach now.  If any bugs survive that, they’ll kill us for sure.

I was hoping to make it to Virginia Beach tomorrow, but it’s just too far for us.  So, we’ve opted to stop at the next Corp park along our route.  Appropriately, it is Kerr Lake, or rather, John H. Kerr Reservoir.  It was a short 3-hour drive so we took advantage of the free time this afternoon and took sorely needed showers.

Now, we’re just sitting quietly in a crowded but also quiet campground just doing nothing.  Well, I am writing this and Joyce is poking around on the Internet…and the water is still swimming pool water.  I’ll drain and refill the water tank tomorrow.

Day 6

We left out about 11 am, our standard departure time.   We dropped down on Hwy 23 to US Hwy 58 and headed east.  I remember taking this route once heading west coming from Virginia Beach.  But, that was about 40-45 years ago.  Funny, it didn’t look the same.

It was a fairly relaxing drive today.  We didn’t get lost and the GPS remained civil.  Joyce did complain of the fresh water smelling.  I smelled it and, sure enough, it had that familiar rotten egg smell.  Time to freshen up.  So, we stopped at a grocery and I bought some chlorine bleach.  A little dab will do ya.  I drained the water tank and hot water tank while back on the road.

We stopped for the night at  Goose Point Park on Phillpot Lake.  It’s a nice Corp of Engineers park that had been recently redone.   

I added about ¼ cup of bleach and refilled the fresh water.  I’ll let it sit overnight then drain again and refill.  In the meantime, drinking, cooking and teeth brushing water will come from a bottle or directly from the faucet outside. Otherwise, it’s like drinking from a swimming pool.

Day 5

Well, that didn't work.  Oh, the GPS worked fine after the overhaul, but our route plan didn't.  My goal was Salt Fork Creek near Wytheville, Va.  However, along the way, we were looking for a place to stop for lunch and a rest when we spotted a sign for Kingdom Come State Park and since we'd always heard of Kingdom Come, but never been there, we decided to stop.  Of course, it was a lot further off our route than we planned, but it was worth it.  Now we can say we've been there.

There was one small problem.  After leaving Kingdom Come my will was not done, but maybe His was.  We got lost.  Here we were in the middle of Kentucky coal country - where many mines have closed and left a lot of folks in dire straits.  Folks who some reminded us a little of Deliverance, although we saw no banjo players.  The GPS did not break down on me.  It just plain ol' lied.  We were tooling along up a narrow valley.  It was beautiful but kept getting narrower with steeper sides.  Finally, the GPS gave up.  It didn't crap out, it just didn't know where it was.  The road finally came to an end at a played out coal mine loading conveyor.  So, we turned around and headed back out.  Gypsy finally got her bearings and led us out.  We made it out to civilization but had lost too much time to make it to Salt Fork as planned.  So, we're at a private campground in Big Stone Gap just past Appalachia, Virginia.  What a day.  I'm bushed.  Oh, yes.  For anyone keeping score, it’s Jessie Lea RV Park.  Nice park.

Day 4

Well, there goes the quiet.  A tree trimming crew pulled in around 9 am and set up shop right behind us.  They’re trimming trees now and another truck just rolled in with a big wood chipped.  Things should be getting real noisy shortly.  Get we’d better get breakfast and morning chores done and get out of here.

We were headed for a campground just over the line into Virginia, but I started having trouble with my GPS and realized the campground was too far for one day.  So, after dinking around with “Gypsy” for a while, I gave up and we settled on the Levi Jackson State Park near London, Ky.  It’s another nice, well run campground and busy, too, like the one at Ft. Knox.  So, what going on?  There are even a lot of kids camping here…on a school day.

After we got set up I found a way to reset my GPS back to factory settings.  So far, so good.  If it still has trouble, I’ll have to find me a new one.  I’ve gotten to where I really depend on it for locating campgrounds so I’d hate to have to make this trip without one.  Ain’t technology wonderful?

Tomorrow I plan to camp at Stony Fork Creek Campground near Wytheville, Virginia.  I had to load GPS coordinates for it since none of my campground data had it listed.  So, tomorrow should be a good test of old Gypsy.

Day 3

Woke up early this morning (early at least for me).  The sun is bright and everything is very wet from dew.  I took Ditto out for her walk and she got a surprise.  Right across the road were two horses munching on the grass.  At first, I thought they may have gotten loose, but then I saw the hobbles they were wearing.  As we walked along the road past the horses, I noticed Ditto had gotten on the other side of me so I was between her and the horses.

Good morning!

I’m not sure yet where we’re heading from here.  My original plan had us stopping at Fort Knox.  Pumpkin has a few cargo carrying weight to spare and I thought I might just top it off with a few gold bullion ingots.  But, that would mean we’d have to carry that excess weight a long ways.  That would be a waste of diesel.

Okay, went to Fort Knox after all.  The Army has a FamCamp (family campground) at nearby Lake Carlson, so that’s where we landed for the night.  It’s a bit crowded, but it’s quiet and well kept.

Day 2

Up and at ‘em…at about 9:30 am.  Actually, I was up at 6 am and walked Ditto, but I went back to bed after that.  Now that we’re up for real, I walked Ditto again so she could chase squirrels.  It was still dark at 6 AM so she had been cheated of that little life’s pleasure.  As we (Ditto and I) returned, I noticed a weird orange stain running down the front of the RV above the windshield.  A huge stain.  I got out some spray windshield cleaner and my squeegee and tried to clean it, but it wouldn't come off.  I hope it will come off later when I get a chance to do it right.  Sure looks awful, like someone sloshed orange Kool-ade on it.

Well, we’re off track.  Can you believe it?  We wound up heading more southerly than my plan.  It’s amazing what a 1-2 hour late start can do to shift the entire plan.  We angled southeast instead of northeast.  A rest stop in Maysville, Ky.  They had a nice city park.  We parked under a tree and watched an old black man slowly working on a smoking pipe while sitting at a nearby picnic table.  I didn’t watch for long, as I soon dozed off.   So, tonight we’re camping in Wrangler Camp on Land-Between-The-Lakes.  It’s a horse camp with several horses and a mule or two in among the camps.  Needless to say, Ditto is very interested.
  

The campground is mostly wide open to accommodate large horse trailers and large 5th wheel campers.  Big dually pickups abound here.  Luckily, it’s a cool cloudy day, so shade is not needed.  That gave me the opportunity to set up my Dish TV satellite and catch up on the news tonight.  What?!  No news?!

Oh, when we first arrived and were assigned a camp spot, we found a squatter on the site.

It was a woman traveling by bicycle.  It sure looked like a lot of stuff to pack on a bike, but she managed to pack it all up the next morning and wave as she pedaled off.  Actually, the campground keepers knew she was there but just forgot to reflect it on their map.

Day 1 - And they're off!

We got away late (surprise, surprise).  My drop-dead departure time was noon.  We left a little after 1 pm.  Joyce said that was “our” noon.  Anyway, we headed east on hwy 60.  I was hoping to get to the Mississippi before stopping for the night, but between a late start and just plain tired, we didn’t make it…by a long shot.  As we approached Van Buren, there was the sign to Big Springs park.  That looked good to me, so that’s as far as we made it our first day.  We got parked at about 4 pm and I laid down for a nap.  I got up about 7 pm.  Joyce was reading.  We kept up that horrific pace until about 10 pm then I went to bed.  I don’t know when Joyce came to bed, but I guess she did as that’s where she was this morning.

Big Springs camp

    

 

Oh, photos...We're operating off minimal data allowance while traveling and I don't want to use up all my data posting pictures.  Instead, I plan to upload photos when we have WiFi access somewhere.  I'll add them to the appropriate post and notify via FaceBook of any photo additions.

Getting excited

Last day home.  We still have to load clothes and last minute kitchen stuff, but we're both ready to see Springfield in the rear view mirror.  It's not that we don't like Springfield.  We do.  But, Lil Pumpkin is getting lazy and out of shape (like me) and needs a good exercise run.  So, our plan is a 6500 mile jog into Nova Scotia.

We're going to head almost due east to Virginia Beach area for a little sentimental tour of one of our "homes" there and then head north up the coast.  I plan to stay as close to the coast as is feasible without having to face big city traffic.  I know, I know.  That's a real trick and I may have to head a little west now and then for a traffic respite.

So, the plan is to drive clear up to Prince Edward Island and see as much of the scenery up there as our eyes can hold.  We're going up in the most colorful time of the year as the leaves turn.  That's good.  But, it also means it will be more difficult to find camping sites.  Those campgrounds that are still open this late in the season are likely to be full.  We could wind up overnighting in a convenience store parking lot.

Another problem with the time of the year is the weather.  So far, it looks good, but one never knows when a cold front might move in and freeze us out.  Oh, we have a furnace to keep us warm, but if it gets too cold, our water tanks and pipes might freeze.  If it does turn too cold, that's where Key West could come into play.

See ya on the road.

Tick tock

We're counting down to our Nova Scotia trip.  I hope I don't jinx it by mentioning it.  Seems something always jumps up in the way with our last attempts at hitting the road.  But, Joyce has her new hip and is doing well.  My back is...well, it's a Kerr back.  Need I say more.  The biggest problem we have right now is Ditto.  she has annual skin allergies and this year seems particularly bad.  We think it is probably from grass and are hoping she'll improve once we hit the road and she is subjected to grass as much less.

I never did come up with a satisfactory seat for me in the rear.  However, I can swivel Joyce's front seat around and recline up front, so I, at least, will have a comfortable seat to do my computin'.

We're both kind of excited with the new beds.  They are much more comfortable than the original fold down sofa bed that came with the RV.

Our trip plan is to head east to Virginia Beach, Va. and poke around there.  Then head up the coast all the way to New Brunswick and over to Nova Scotia.  On our way back we'll stop to see Tom, Jr. in New York.  As we work our way home, the plan is to follow the Blue Ridge Pkwy from the north end to the south end.

This trip will be the last two weeks of September and well into October.  If we don't get to see lots of beautiful falls colors, I'm going to be very disappointed.