Getting Ready

The weather is cooling and I was finally able to post our picture on the profile part of the blog ....seeing that sand and water of the keys just getting me itchy to follow that warm sunshine south. We are having the motorhome repaired where the blowout caused some problems and we have invested in new shocks and tires. I'm almost ready to go. Its been hard to post this summer as it is more difficult to find things when your not moving. Won't be long though.

The weather is cooling and I was finally able to post our picture on the profile part of the blog ....seeing that sand and water of the keys just getting me itchy to follow that warm sunshine south. We are having the motorhome repaired where the blowout caused some problems and we have invested in new shocks and tires. I'm almost ready to go. Its been hard to post this summer as it is more difficult to find things when your not moving. Won't be long though.

Jag's on the Manistee

We just spent the holiday weekend on the Manistee River at our friends place where they actually made a campsite for us to use. See below:


The weekend turned out to be really nice with warm sunshine during the day and cool evenings to sleep well. We had a campfire each night and canoed the river one day and spent some time at a crapshow in Houghton Lake.....sorry I meant to say craft show.......

The Manistee River as always is beautiful.....




We did run across something a little unique. The guy that lives below has put in his supply of wood for the year and then some. I'm not sure how he will get the upper logs down without the whole thing collapsing but it is quite a pile of logs!


Next stop for us will be Harsens Island for a visit with old friends in two weeks.

Motorhome Heaven

Lowes Motor Speedway became a motorhome Mecca this week with 4,000 or so people with their motorhomes came to see the 2007 offerings by most of the motorhome manufacturers. Lots of people were wheeling and dealing for new coaches and boy oh boy it is tempting when you see these things and how comfortable they have become. It is certainly a far cry from what we had as our first motorhome. All electric units that are no different from home and when slides are totally opened over 400 sqft of living space. There was also a huge number of vendors of every little gadget you could think of to use on the road.
The displays were set in a huge field that probably was 40 plus acres with everything imaginable for choices. Although, I do think that the units displayed were on the high end without too many class C or B coaches. We of course started looking at the high end Prevost conversions that range in price from $1,000,000 to believe it or not $2,500,000......I did say looking!!!!
It's really hard to believe that some of the units are the price that they are, but they have all kinds of amenities that today cost an arm and leg. These units are really to live in not camp.
Yes the red carpet was out!
We do enjoy our motorhome and the urge to get a new one when you see these units gets to fever pitch, but sanity finally came through and although I love these things and the travel that they make possible, the prices are a bit steep.
One particularly nice thing about these conventions is that the manufacturers offer repair services to your coach without labor charges.... only parts have to paid for. This was exceptionally nice as the tire blowout damage we had on the way down was more extensive that we thought. We ended up having a wiring harness reworked and some step parts replaced right where we camped. Thank you Monaco.

FMCA Convention - Charlotte, N.C.

We have belonged to FMCA for 30 some years and have attended their conventions before but its really just a chance to rub elbows with the manufacturers and talk motorhome stuff.....Marge and I both hate doing that!!!!!
We had a rather bad start however.... our front right steering tire blew out on the way down and two new tires and a 4 hour delay was not much fun. It also took out some wiring under the coach but I was able to repair most of it. We may be able to have the Holiday Rambler people look at it down here.

Right Front Excitement

While some things at this convention started today, the main focus with seminars and information really starts in the morning. They have a lot of interesting things from safety driving courses to fnancial seminars and the displays open tomorrow afternoon. We were assigned a site and were quite lucky to have a reasonably open site instead of packed in between some of the 5,000 to 7,00o coaches that are here.

Our corner of the world.

Will send lots of motorhome info once we get it!

Tubing on the Manistee 2006

This was the 35th year we have been doing this....that is tubing or canoeing down the Manistee River and this year we had somewhere around 50 people. Each year this group of friends arrive at the CCC Bridge campground on the Manistee River for a few days of fun, family and a campfire that is enjoyed by all. The weather held and all of us had a wonderful time.

The only way to go!

Our friend Leslie and her niece and nephew

Loading up for the down river float

Just part of the group

Just the Taylor clan with spouses and children

Two of the original founders ....the Ritchies

Our future tubers!!

Jack....My Grandson enjoying his mother and his aunt from Colorado.

As mentioned this trip has been going over 35 years with 4 generations now of my family. We have gone from camping in tents and misbehaving to motorhomes and still misbehaving with all having a great time. The river has had a lot of water flow and the times we have had will always be remembered.

Next stop for us is the FMCA convention in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Trees Trees Trees

We're in the woods and we have to go to the library in Graying to connect, but we are enjoying ourselves greatly in this warm weather and a nice cool river to soak in. The Manistee River is a beautiful trout stream and the CCC Bridge State Forest Campground is absolutely one of the more beautiful campgrounds in Michigan. No services but spots located right on the river and with a campfire at night just a very beautiful, quiet, relaxing place to be. Will post some pictures of our annual tubing trip shortly.

Holiday Travel Park - Traverse City

I have made mention that my favorite private park in Michigan is located on Silver Lake just south of Traverse city, Michigan. It has about two hundred sites of which 70 or so are absolutely beautiful. It is very well kept and has on some sites really unique features like the 10 or so sites on the "isthmus" I have stayed on the isthmus and enjoyed waking at dawn and wading out to catch a few fish on my fly rod. Totally quiet and calm casting as the birds start singing in the morning....pretty hard to beat. There are other amenities like the beach area which is sandy and ideal for little ones. They have rental boats and canoes, playgrounds etc.
Of course not all sites are on the water and those that aren't still are quite nice. The campground was built some years ago by the Wally Byam Airstream owners group and was limited to airstream owners. While the park limits ownership of lots to airstream product owners the lots when not in use are rented as a regular campground. Our lot this time has a separate little area for campfire and is nicely landscaped.
There are new lots that have all the amenities but are somewhat distant from the lake, but they two are nice and of course the campground is so close to everything that Traverse City offers.

NEW POST !!!!!

I have to apologize for the lack of posts, but two problems .....we've been very much homebody's and on our trip to the Magnolia Music Fest to see Lonestar we got caught quite literally in a tornado in Ohio which damaged our DATASTORM Link to the Internet. M ostly though we have been busy. Our Datastorm should be repaired in the next few days and we are starting to travel again. We are now at our favorite Michigan Campground......Holiday Park in Traverse City on Silver Lake. It's an old "Wally Byam" Airstream exclusive campground, except not exclusively Airstream anymore. Were going to be here through the weekend visiting friends seeing the sights. We'll get camera going tomorrow and show you whats up.

Memorial Day - Jackson, Michigan

We have been home long enough!!!! I missed the motorhome and Marge did too. Memorial Day weekend we left early (Tuesday) and decided that we would combine a little of my business with a trip north. I had some contact to make with people in Jackson Michigan and we decided to see what else was of interest and low and behold there was this fantastic old train station that still operates as an AMTRACK stop. What classic neat architecture.....and brick streets too!


We followed along the track to find a Norfolk Southern rail yard and what appeared to be older rail repair and warehouse buildings from a different era that also have interesting architectural details.

We camped at a place called Greenwood Acres that was the sight of the Goose Lake Music Festivals in the late 60's and 70's. Concerts were put on here in an attempt to copy Woodstock. It didn't have the success that Woodstock had but there was a quite a party here when it was active. Below is what was the stage with light towers. Oh and that's us in the Campground.

Thursday we head to the Upper Manistee River

Freighter Adventure

We have been home now for about 4 weeks and its time to do something soon. I have been ready to go again almost as soon as we got home. It's nice to be home and catch up particularly with the grandkids, but we both enjoyed traveling so much that I miss it. We did however share an adventure that was quite interesting that I thought would be worth sharing with everyone. Our boating friends belong to a group of wood boat hobbyists that planned an excursion to a Lakes Freighter that sailed the Great Lakes for almost 80 years. It was built at the same time and with the same methods that the Titanic was built with rivets and steel. It hasn't sunk yet, but is more or less resting on the bottom of the Maumee River in Toledo, Ohio now that it has become a museum.

The ship has obviously seen better days but it was fascinating to see how nice it must have been "back in the day" as our guide put it. Fine wood paneling and surprisingly large kitchen facility. The crew was sizeable in those days (30 +or-)as it took quite a number to be able to load unload and handle that large a ship (700' long and 68' wide) There were only a few passenger cabins but they quite nice, but being in the bow would be uncomfortable if there were heavy seas at all. I tried to take a picture of just one of 4 huge holds but it was so big the flash would not light it all up enough to show.
The view below is from the pilot house back to the stern showing all the hold covers. Todays freighters are capable of moving 4 times as much ore or grain and are substantially more automated with unloaders built in. This was also a steam operated freighter with coal then later fuel oil was used for the boilers.
The picture below was taken amidships towards the bow and pilot house.


While I have enjoyed boating and particularly fishing in the Great Lakes, I can not imagine what it would been like to have been on a working boat such as this. I know I would not have enjoyed any kind of heavy weather.

Run for home.

Well, the snow did it! Our plan was to go north see Monument Valley, Four Corners, Durango and other places of elevation and probably SNOW!!!!!. Needless to say we changed course and decided to keep a moderately southern route to avoid the cold and snow. We headed east to the windy Amarillo and then on to Tulsa, Oklahoma to visit with one of our old friends who stood up in our wedding 40 years ago. This is Jeanne whom spoiled us with a great dinner and conversation and memories and my good wife Marge

After our stay in Tulsa which was beautiful with the spring greenup we went on to Missouri and stayed near Fort Leonard Wood just West of St. Louis. Stopped in Indiana and then Home!!! A bit of rush but the bug to get home was strong.

Grand Canyon

After our exciting trip from Oatman we arrrived fairly early at the Grand Canyon Campground. The weather appeared to be turning so we hustled over to the canyon via the transit system which is free and essential if you want to visit the overlooks. The views are unbeliveable and while we took probably 2 or 3 hundred pictures all were fantastic. What we both had problems with is the edge.....no guardrails in most places and foot trails that just wander for miles each way along this edge from the visitor center. Now I'm not real fond of heights. In fact, I wasn't even fond of riding in the buses that took you to the various points along a road that was entirely too close to the edge in my book. Below are just some of the views we saw.

The weather did turn and we stayed the second day thinking it might get better but by early evening SNOW started coming down. We had planned on heading north to Monument Valley after the stay here at Grand Canyon but the cold weather and snow quickly changed our minds and we decided on a more southerly route home. This post was a bit delayed as there were so many pictures and for some reason I had difficulty in posting them each time I tried.

Oatman, Arizona

We left Kathy and her family on Monday and drove to Needles, California which is on the Arizona/California boarder separated by the Colorado river. It was in the high 80's when we arrived at Moabi Regional Park and stayed the night. Lots of TRAINS there but failed to take any pictures. There was even an old Fred Harvey Hotel thats being restored.

We left the next morning and proceeded to take old Route 66 to Oatman, Arizona.
The road was pretty good until we started to climb up the mountain. Now my friend Art had told me about this place and it sounded kinda neat...... Wild Burro's running in the street looking for handouts and some neat old time shops. Well, I apparently misunderstood him, as he drove his car rather than the motorhome to this place....I was driving the motorhome (38 feet) plus towing the car. BIG MISTAKE!!!! First and most important., I need to pay attention to signs that say no trucks over 40' and then we saw no burro's althought we did not stay long enough to see anything more than their droppings. With no room to park or turn around we proceeded to go on to Klingman which turns out to be just over this "hill". I am a reasonably confidant driver, even with the motorhome, as we have had motorhomes for 30 years, but this was white knuckle and hold your breath time.

Marge was taking the pictures while I drove down the middle of the road except when I could hug the side closest to the "hill". She told me later that this allowed her not to view the dropoffs except through the lens and it made her less nervous. There was little or no traffic and what there was pulled off the road for us to get by. I'm pretty sure we did not go over 15 miles per hour until we well down the "hill" on the Klingman side.
This was first great adventure on the trip home may it be the last of this type!!!!

aaghh......Grandchildren!!!

How can anyone resist those smiles!!!!!

As its been a week or so since I've posted anything, you can understand when you see the energy these little ones consume. We have been busy!!!

We've been able to pamper and cuddle and really spend some quality time with these little ones.

Putting puzzles together...

Reading to them, although its sometimes rough reading the same story over and over.

We even went to tumbling class together

We spent a day at the San Diego Animal Park which was phenomenal....although everyone was pretty well worn out by the end of the day.





One of the Primary reasons to go West on our part was to participate in Garretts 3rd birthday. Kathy and Tony threw a party that was fantastic....the theme being dinosaurs...even his cake was a dinosaur.

There was even a dinosaur egg hunt.

The party was very much a success and fun was had by all..... especially the grandparents ....and we hated to leave. But today we left after wishing Garrett another happy birthday and we started our trip back to Royal Oak. This contribution was very hard to put together, we took probably 400 pictures and we were seemingly so so busy with so much happening it is hard to figure out what to put on this blog. Maybe once I figure out how to put a large batch of pictures as in slide show it will be more informative.

Tonight we stopped in Moabi Recreational area near Needles, California....tomorrow we should be at the Grand Canyon.