Our time at Joe Wheeler State Park.

We spent about 4 hours driving to Joe Wheeler State Park located about 25 miles east of Florence, AL. Although it was overcast all day, it has been nice drive. Here is a picture of the country side on our drive to Joe Wheeler State Park.

The entrance to Joe Wheeler State Park.

Driving from the entrance back to the campground.

Sandy and I went for a walk in the afternoon and took a few pictures.

This is looking out into Joe Wheeler Reservoir.

A collection of pine cones, needles and seeds.

Our motorhome back at our camp site.

Red Buds blooming by the office.

We had taken a picture of this flower when we were at Cooper Lake State Park in Texas, but this one here at Joe Wheeler State Park looked so much better we just had to show it again. It kind of reminds me of a Snap Dragon.

More plants showing their spring colors.

Sandy came with me when I went fishing on Monday and took some pictures.She took this one of a group of turtles sun bathing on a log. Perhaps I should have tried fishing by their log because I didn't catch any where I fished.

I seem to do better at sitting and reading.

This is the view I get to enjoy in the morning as I look up while taking a shower and this is hard to beat.

Joe Wheeler State Park is a dense forest of 75-100 foot pine trees mixed with mature hardwoods and is well worth the stop. However, if you want to watch TV just be sure to have a portable satellite dish in case the trees stop you from getting a signal from your roof dish or use the local TV antenna. In our case, we have to get Fox on Monday nights to receive “24”.

All the sites have full hook ups with 30 amp power.

Tomorrow, Wednesday the 25th, we are heading to Nashville if the weather does not get too nasty.

Until next time,

Dave and Sandy

Time at Red Bay

We arrived at Red Bay on Monday the 2nd around 7:30 PM and checked in for our March 4th appointment with the Tiffin Service Department.

This is a photo that we had taken along the way in Arkansas and forgot to include in the last posting. Sandy liked the white trees along the white fence with the brick gate.

We were called to Bay 5 in the Service Center and met our service techs, Daniel and Daniel. We then went over the items on our punch list. We spent 3 days at this bay, moving out to our camp site each night and then back to the bay at 7:00 each morning. They finished with us by noon on Friday the 6th. Bob and Dorothy came over to visit in the evening . We had met them at the Cave Creek Campground a couple weeks earlier. On Sunday we asked Bob and Dorothy to come over and watch the Duke vs North Carolina basketball game. Their son had gone to Duke so they follow the games whenever they can. Duke lost, but the game was real close until the last couple of minutes.

Sandy took this picture of the Allegro Campground, “Camp Red Bay”, which is about 75 percent full. The campground is not luxurious, but it's free, has full hook-ups and presents the opportunity to meet people with common interests.

On Monday the 9th we went to Bay 20, which is the paint area and where we spent the next 2 1/2 days taking care of some paint issues. On Thursday the 12th we were in the cabinet shop for some work. The new bathroom door had not come in yet so will have to go back there next week. On Friday the 13th we had the "new and improved" Atwood levelers put on the rear of the coach. One of the rear jacks had been replaced twice before and the other one once. We sure hope the new design takes care of the problem.

With Friday the 13th comes the expected phone call from Sandy's former co-worker and good friend, Eppie, wishing her a "Happy Birthday". This ritual started a long time ago when they and some other employees were celebrating someone's Friday the 13th birthday at work. But Sandy, who's birthday is on the 12th, while having a, what I call a "brain fart", blurted out "my birthday never falls on Friday the 13th" (Dah). So every Friday the 13th she get's a few phone calls just to remind her of one of her biggest bloopers.

This is a photo of a mural celebrating the hundredth birthday, 1907-2007, of the Tiffins being in business in Red Bay. They started out as a General Store, then a lumber yard and in the mid 70's they started building motorhomes.

While we were in Bay 5 we met a nice couple, Joe and Jan,who were in Bay 4 next to us. On Saturday Joe came over early in the afternoon and invited us over for wine and cheese. So at 5:30 we went over to Joe and Jan’s and met Steve and Sharon. We spent the next 2 1/2 hours visiting about all things pertaining to motorhomes. We pretty well covered all subjects from dumping (sewage disposal) to great place to visit. Only an RVer could appreciate those conversations. Later we went for supper over at Gill’s Grill.

Sharon, Joe, Sandy, Jan and Steve. Joe and Jan are a couple as are Steve and Sharon.

There is a place in town where you can weigh the motorhome. On Sunday afternoon Steve, Joe, and I weighed our coaches after which we had a bull and beer session to see how we could move things around to get our weight distribution better. Later in the evening we and the wives went to the local pizzeria. It was great pizza that could only have been made better by having a beer. Franklin County is still one of the many counties in the southeastern states that are dry (no liquor).

Tuesday the 17th was a day we did not have to go into a bay so I Dry Washed 80% of the motorhome, will finish it up tomorrow. Jan and Joe came over late afternoon and invited us over for supper. Steve and Sharon also joined us. Jan had prepared a delicious Lasagna with salad and ice cream for dessert. We spent the evening visiting and before we knew it 10:00 o’clock was upon us. Jan and Joe, and Steve and Sharon are leaving tomorrow morning and if all goes right we will leave Friday morning.

On Thursday morning we noticed that we had a window fogging up between the panes so we will probably stay and have it replaced. At 3:30 we went out to Brannon’s Custom RV and had him look at hooking up the outside TV so it would run off the bedroom DVR rather than the front TV. He was able to make the changes in a couple of hours without having to add any switching gear. Now Sandy can be inside watching one program and I can be outside watching a different program.

The window came in late Thursday, so Friday the 20^th , we went into a bay for the last time on the trip. We had the side window replaced by the driver’s seat. Tomorrow we will head up to Alabama’s Joe Wheeler State Park and probably stay there and fish until the 25^th when we are going to Nashville for a few days, probably leaving there on April 1^st. When we leave Nashville we are going to Elkhart, IN to look for a recliner to replace the 2-piece recliner that came with the motorhome. Then we will slowly work our way home and probably be back in Minneapolis around the 8th of April.

Until next time,

Dave and Sandy

Leaving Arizona and heading to Red Bay, AL.

This morning, Friday the 27th we started out by driving 53 miles on I-10 until we got to Las Cruces, NM where we picked up US 70. This is the view coming into Las Cruces looking to the east and Organ Mountains.

In between Las Cruces and Alamogordo is the White Sands Proving Grounds and the White Sands National Monument. One of the disadvantages of having a 40 foot motorhome and towing another 24 feet is getting into some parking lots. It didn't look like we could get in and out of the small parking lot, so we took these two photos from the road and on the move.

This picture shows why they call it the White Sands.  It could almost be mistaken for a snow scene in Minnesota right now. 

We stopped for lunch at Taco Bell in Alamogordo. After lunch we stopped at Wal-Mart to pick up some essentials, pop and beer, and then we headed out on US 82. The following photos are on US 82.

They sure didn’t get much of a ski season here at Ski Cloudcroft this year. It’s already over and it's only February 27^th.

We found a place to pull over along the side of the road to get a photo of this Staghorn Cholla Cactus in bloom.

After crossing the Sacramento Mountains the scenery took a drastic change and we came out onto this high plateau that went on forever.

This is an oil refinery in Artesia, NM

After leaving Artesia we drove at least 30 miles where there must have been one oil pump for every ten acres for as far as you could see on either side of the road. The next 20 miles thinned out to about half that many oil pumps. Most of them were actively pumping.

In Hobbs, NM we picked up US 180 and drove to Lamesa, TX where we spent the night at their city park. The campsite has free water and 30 amp electric hookups as well as a dump station. During the night we had winds of 26 MPH with gusts of 39. From Lamesa we took US 180 to Mineral Springs where we took US 281 north to US 380. Once on US380 we drove to Greenville, TX and then north a little to Cooper Lake State Park where we are going to spend the night. Again, I managed to find a very narrow road to travel, but in this case, it was for only 6 miles.

Then it was back on to a little bit better highway.

A nice thing about US 180 and US 380 in Texas is that they are almost like a freeway in that they skirt most of the towns so you can maintain a good average speed. Sandy loves all the big old oak trees in Texas. The scenery looks much like it does back in Minnesota.

 

The low this cold March 1st morning at Cooper Lake State Park was 24.5 degrees. But the morning dawned with a bright clear sky with Cardinals everywhere. Notice the ice above the back of this Cardinal. Lorraine, the Cardinals are wishing you were here to see them.

 

We are going to spend another day here and enjoy this park, even if it is cold.

Here is our rig.

Sandy found this pretty purple flower.

And a few more pictures from in the Park

Double click on this picture to enlarge as the center looks so interesting.

After leaving the park on Monday the 2nd, we drove NW to catch US 82 and followed it over to the Natchez Trace where we proceeded north to Tupelo, MS, and then over to Red Bay, AL. Here's a picture as we are leaving the Texas State Park.

As the next two photos show, the trees are starting to bloom in the southern part of Arkansas.

This is a new bridge being built to cross the Mississippi River on US 82 by Greenville, MS.

 

But this is the bridge we had to cross.

 

New bridge again.

Back to the old.

Here we are heading up the Natchez Trace in the evening near sunset.

This turned out to be a 544 mile day. We drove 4 out of the last 5 days, covering 1689.1 miles in 32 hours 45 minutes of driving time which turns out to be a 51.6 MPH average. That is not too bad as I had the cruise set at 61 MPH when I could and we only drove on the freeway about 200 miles.

Now it's time to get ready to have some work done on the motorhome over the next few days at "Camp Red Bay".

Bye for now,

Dave and Sandy.