Still no Sunset

The weather has just been to good to get a good sunset. We did have a little fog tonight that made the sunset look nice though. The surfers are enjoying this time of the evening too. One of my duties is to lock the gate to the park at sunset. I was told to wait until at least a hour after sunset because the surfers surf until the sun goes down and will have to walk all away around to get out if the gate is closed.

A few of the days photos

I caught a photo of this Blimp cruising the coast today. It must be owned by an old Hippy that owned a VW bus in the 60s.

This squirl couldn’t decide which trash can he wanted to raid first.

The recent storm, if that’s what you want to call it, has uprooted a lot of kelp and deposited it on our beach. What a mess.

I can’t believe I have been here at the beach for 2 weeks now and I still haven’t got any sunset shots.

What is it?

It sits on the top of the motorhome. It twirls around in the wind. And it sucks.
I just installed 2 “Xtreme Vents” in place of the traditional holding tank vent caps. These little devices point in the direction of the wind and, using a venturi effect, creates a vacuum in the vent tube which sucks the odors out. Even if it doesn’t work, they still look cool swinging around up there in the wind. They are, however, guarantied to work and are guarantied for life.

Check out my new link “Why I Love America”. This was emailed to me by a good friend and made me think how fortunate I am to have experienced a lot of these scenes.

No rain yet

The weather keeps calling for rain but we haven’t seen any yet. Good thing I guess since I took a good look at our site and realized that if we get a good rain, the back of our site will fill up like a swimming pool. I will have to see about digging some drainage canals. As you can see in these photos, the sea is looking a bit stormy. It does make for a pretty sky as seen from our site.

We are still enjoying the heck out of this Camp Host thing. The work is a piece of cake and being the social kind of guy I am, I am meeting a lot of people. It takes me about 1 hour to do my rounds which should only take about 15 minutes because I have to stop and talk with everyone. We already signed up to do this gig again next year.

Busy Busy

We have been rather busy lately. We have had quite a few visitors, some that we have known for many years and some that have met us thought our website and travels. Also our Grandson came to visit for a couple of days. He helped Nana bake cookies.

He just loved visiting Nana and Papa at the beach. He got to go in the water with some friends while Nana sat on the beach, occupying herself with Video Poker. Where was I? Well I took the work duty so Susan can spend time with our friends. I had plenty of time, however to man the camera for a few shots.

The weekend around here was busy but quiet. I was rather surprised being we were full for the weekend. Next weekend will be a Holliday weekend so we will see what that brings.

This morning I caught a squirrel trying to enjoy a little snack while this bird was trying to steal a free meal. The squirrel won out and got his snack.

Well the weather is taking a turn for the worst. We haven’t seen too much of the sun in the last couple of days and they are calling for rain tomorrow, however, after that it is supposed to clear up again and be nice.

Beach creatures

For the next couple of months, you will most likely see a lot of beach shots. Does anyone know what the first photo is? I believe it is a Sea Slug. There are some pretty cool tide pools along this beach so all kinds of strange things can come crawling out of the sea. This guy was about 8” long.

By the way, this is our job. We strolled the beach this afternoon to make sure everyone was observing the rules. I know, it’s a tough job, but someone has to do it.

Life is rough

Well, today we moved into our winter home. We are in a Southern California State Park right on the beach as Camp Host for the rest of the year. The temperatures are in the high 70s during the days and in the high 50s at night so life is good right now. I am sure we will be getting some stormy weather as the next 2 months progress. But we are talking about Southern California storms so how bad can it get? The only down side, looks like I will have to be dragging my lazy body out of bed at 5:00a twice a week.

Class C on steroids

Thought you might get a kick out of this Class C on steroids.

The Grandson

This little guy is one of the main reasons we come back to Southern California. The other reason is, of course his sister.

Almost living in the Service Center

This morning, I had to get up at 7:00 in the middle of the night. I call it 7:00 in the middle of the night because I believe there is no such thing as 7:00 in the morning. There is 7 in the evening and 7 at night. Anyway we had a 8:00 appointment to get the brake recall done on the motorhome. This was supposed to be a 4 hour job. We waited all day for the call that our home was ready but it never came so at 4:00 we headed down to the service center to see what the deal was. The service writer informed me that they will have to set us up in the service center because it was not ready. I asked him why a 4 hour job has turned into a 8 hour job. I also asked him if he was going to pay for our reservation we had for tonight and tonight’s dinner. It just so happened as we were talking, the technician was done and taking it out for a test drive. So tonight we are back at the Pechanga RV Resort where we should be.

Back in Temecula

We arrived back in Temecula CA today. The Rexhall Rally was a blast. We can’t wait until the next one. We wanted to stay for the Good Sam Rally but we have an appointment at the Temecula RV Service Center for our brake recall. Tonight we are spending the night in the Pechanga Casino parking lot. The reason we are not in the RV park is because we need to be at the RV service center at 8:00a and figured for just an overnight we will hangout in the parking lot. Tomorrow after we get the motorhome back we will check into the RV park. We will hang out at Pechanga RV Resort until our Host jobs at San Elijo next week.

Back on the road

One of the reasons we went Fulltime is because we never wanted to leave (to go home). I thought by going Fulltime I would never again have to say I don’t want to leave but tonight was the last night of the Rexhall Rally and, I don’t want to leave. We had such a good time, as we always do, and have got to see our good friends we have made in the past and have meet so many more good friends. As with last year we have a new bunch of friends to stop and visit on our travels around the country. We got some good tips on places to visit next year and got invited to a couple more upcoming rallies, which I am sure we will take advantage of.

By attending the seminars, I have gained a little more knowledge about Rving and the Fulltime lifestyle and picked up a few more tips from our fellow Rexhallers. I even sat down with Mr. Rex, one on one at one of the dinners and had a short but good conversation and shared some tips with him. I am sure he gets this a lot though.

I got a chance to head on over to their service center and pick up some Rexhall specific items I needed for our coach. Now we are good to go for another year.

This rally was also good for the motorhome because staying the parking lot at the fairgrounds, we had no water or sewer hookups and limited amperage power so this gave me a chance to exercise the boondocking systems in our coach and make sure everything is still in working order. I am glad to report that everything works very well.

So tomorrow, it’s back on the road again.

Fun Rally

We are just having the best time here at the Rexhall Rally. Above is a picture of just some of the top notch entertainment that we have enjoyed here at the rally. I have taken in a lot of the seminars and have learned a thing or two, even though I thought I knew it all. One thing I learned was the AirCard offered by Verizon to access the internet has a larger coverage area than I though. I was using the Verizon High Speed network and was paying $79.99 a month for their unlimited usage plan. With the AirCard I can use their Broadband and where the Broadband is not available it used the same Verizon High Speed network I was using for only $59.99. That’s a $20 savings for faster internet. And I don’t have to tie up the cell phone anymore.

The Rexhall Rally

We did the big trip today. We traveled from the Lancaster Fairgrounds Campground into the Fairground for the Rexhall Rally. It took more time to bring in the slides and pull up the levelers than it did to make the drive. The turnout this year is really down because of the gas prices. Most all the rigs have California plates on them. The Rexhall Rallies are a lot of fun. The have RV accessories vendors (already spent $100), New Coach displays, Seminars, Breakfast, Social Hours, and Dinners. There is something going on all the time. We always make new friends every year. We have already been invited to other get togethers in the short time we have been here.

I got a chance to clean up the motorhome and car again so I am much happier now. I think we have driven in the rain maybe 3 times this year and it sure makes a big mess out of everything, especially the poor car being drug behind the motorhome. I did it with a bucket of water and a rag. Then I go over it with my bottle of spray detailer. You do what you have to.

Movin’ on to Lancaster CA

We arrived in Lancaster today about 11:00a. We are in Lancaster for a Raxhall Rally. Rexhall is the manufacturer of our motorhome and every year they sponsor a Homecoming Rally. It is always a whole lot of fun.

Last night was supposed to be a quiet night at the race track since most of the race crazies had gone home. However, the thunder showers were pretty noisy.

It rained all the way to Lancaster this morning and now my motorhome that I spent 3 weeks cleaning is all dirty again. The car is even worse. This campground will not let us wash it. At least I can run the car through a car wash in town. I will see if I can just give the motorhome a sponge bath later. We will be in the Lancaster County Fairground Campground for 2 nights then we move into the Fairgrounds for the rally on Wednesday, so my next trip will be about a ½ mile drive. For the next 2 days we will catch up on some laundry and shopping.

The rains came and so did the race

Well we woke to rain this morning. It was looking like the race was not going to happen. The California 100 was supposed to be the first race but the rains kept coming. Finally a break came and they started the Toyota 400 race. The ended up with enough time after the 400 to run the 100.


The rain kept a lot of fans from filling the stands.


The safety crew got in a quick nap before the race started.


We had a front row spot and the best place to catch the race was on the roof of the motorhome of course. Susan chose to watch the race through the windshield from inside because it was LOUD. She also had the luxury of having the TV on and got to see all the replays and close-ups of the wrecks.

The curse

The curse of Dan and Susan, the Fulltimers may strike again. They are calling for rain tomorrow. As you may know if you have been following our travels, it has rained in just about every place we have visited this year. If it rains tomorrow, the Indy Car Race may not happen. I sure won’t be telling anyone here it was out fault.

Man is it HOT

We are now at the California Speedway in Fontana and my outside thermometer says it is just a tick under 100 degrees. And that’s in the shade. Of course we have the generator running with both airs on. The weather report says it should cool down a bit and possible rain Sunday. There is nothing going on here right now. Tomorrow things start happening. I will try to post more later.

Off to the races

Tomorrow it’s off to the races. The Indy Car raced to be exact. We are headed for Fontana to the California Speedway. We went last year and had a great time so we decided to do it again this year. I will try to post a few photos if I get a chance.

Still in Temecula

We have one more week here at the Pechanga RV Resort then it’s off to the Indy Car Races in Fontana. Believe it or not, we haven’t even gone into the casino yet. I have done a pretty good job of whittling down my fixit list in the last couple of weeks. There are just a few items left, but I need to pick up some supplies first. It seems however, that every time I take one thing off the list another goes on. The other day the wind kicked up a bit, and I failed to retract my awning soon enough, that it pulled the awning arm loose from the side of the motorhome. I fixed it so that will never happen again by drilling clear through the wall to the inside and replacing the lag bolts with through bolts and large washers and nuts inside the motorhome. Fortunately it is in an inconspicuous location so you don’t see the hardware from the inside. Now in order to come loose, it will have to rip a large hole in the side of the motorhome.



I don’t know if you remember, we had a new Granddaughter just before we left on our journey last December. Being back here in Southern California, we have had time to get acquainted with her. It is going to be difficult to leave again after getting to know her. Grand kids are so cool.

As you may recall we spent the month of April in Florida visiting Susan’s Cousins. Well Jim has come to Southern California to participate in a Celebrity Golf Tournament. Last night he invited us up to Laguna Beach to have dinner with him and Jennifer. What a nice time we had. They sure are good people.

The weather here in Southern California has been absolutely fabulous. I just hope it holds out for our 2 months here as Camp Hosts at San Elijo State Beach.

Fixing and Cleaning

We have been here for almost a week now and I still haven’t had time to clean up the motorhome. Well actually my back started acting up again and my grandson came to visit. Tomorrow, hopefully I will be able to get started. I came up with a pretty good list of things the clean and fix. Hopefully I can get most of it done in a couple of weeks. Pechanga RV Resort is just as we left it in January except they did raise the weekend rates $10. I don’t know why they have to raise the rates since they make millions off their casino. They even raised their buffet price to $21, they just lost my business. Otherwise the RV Resort is still as nice as ever.

We moved again

We have moved up to Temecula CA today. We are at Pechanga RV Resort. This is the place we started the year last January. I sure like this place. We will be here for about 3 week. This will give me time to clean things up a bit and fix the things that need a little attention.

Oh No, California

We are back in Southern California. We made a B-Line from Medford Oregon to Escondido California. Made it in 4 days. This is not my usual mode of travel. Susan had some things to tend to otherwise we would be somewhere along the California coastline right now. We plan to hang around here for a couple of weeks then head for the California Speedway for the IRL race then off to an RV Rally. After that we will be heading back down to Southern California for our Camp Host jobs.
Oh Yeah, looks like we will be hosting at San Elijo State Beach instead of Carlsbad. It is only another 10 miles down the coast. Looks like we will be hosting the south loop. We should be in site #55 if anyone is interested in stopping by to say hi.

What a Dump

I have a link for Park Reviews but this one warrants a front page mention.

We decided that since the Lost Hills KOA had such a bad rating that we would drive an extra 1.5 hour down the road and stay at the Pyramid Lake “Resort” in Gorman CA since it had a better rating. What a joke! I have not figured out what constitutes a Resort. Some of the Resorts we have seen are worse than a lot of the campgrounds we have stayed at. This park would normally be a drive through however we had been on the road for 4.5 hours and there was nothing for another 2 hours. This is a Western Horizon Membership Park. This is an Excellent reason why one should not buy into a membership “Resort”. This place is a Dump! They warn you about the rattlesnakes when you check in. The grass has given way to what weeds could even survive the neglect. Their cable TV has about 7 channels and none of them are clear and most are not even watchable. I couldn’t even level the motorhome the site is so far off. I could go on and on with the things that are out of order and dirty and run down. Good thing this is only a 1 niter.

I hate Interstates

Actually I hate the California Interstates. We traveled I-10 through Texas and everyone I talked to said Texas was long and boring. I actually enjoyed I-10 through Texas. It was rolling hills, clean and green. California’s stretch of I-10 is either Los Angeles traffic or barren desert, depending on where you are. We are presently traveling down I-5 and it is dry, brown and boring.

No Cell, No Internet

We have been traveling and staying along the Oregon coast for the last couple of weeks. Even though their land line phone carrier is Verizon, they do not have many cell towers around. We have been without cell phone and internet connection for most of the time.

Our stay at South Beach State Park near Newport was nice. We got a chance to visit the light houses in the area. It seem kind of strange that a lot of the sights we have seen are featured on the Travel Channel shortly after. Last night we watched a bit on Haunted Lighthouses and the ones at Newport were on the show. Quite interesting.

Our next stop was disappointing, the campground that is. We had made reservations at a place called Beach Loop RV Village in Bandon near Coos Bay because it was the holiday weekend and I read some good reviews about it. When we arrived they told us they gave our site away because we had called and canceled. No We Didn’t! They found us a spot anyway. The place is in dire need of some maintenance. The office was always locked up and you had to ring the bell to get the managers to come out of their house and open it. Their “advertised” internet connection was their business line and was in the office so you had to disturbed them to use it. I didn’t bother. The town of Bandon doesn’t have much to offer.

The beach along the Beach Loop Drive has a lot of nice scenery to offer though.

The one thing we found very interesting was a place called Game Park. This is a walk through animal preserve. Much like the drive through ones where the animals roam free, except for the big cats and other dangerous animals.

We got to pet and hold baby tigers, bears, foxes, and skunks. Yes Skunks. These were what were called a golden skunk. They were a golden color with a darker stripe down its back. Of course they were de-stunk.

Our next stop was a campground on US-199 in California about 5 miles from Crescent City. This was a nice place right at the edge of the Redwood Forest. We took a drive today and got lost. I really do need a GPS for the car. I mapped out a route before we left but took a wrong turn and ended up WAY away from where we wanted to go. At least some of the sights were nice.


We then headed over to Medford Oregon to visit some good friends we know from Southern Cal. They moved to Oregon quite a few years ago and after spending some time in the area I can see why. Susan has found a new place to settle. That will be sometime down the road though so who knows.

Things came up and we have to be in Southern Cal by Sept 14th so we are making a b-line down I-5. Something I do not like but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

We are in Red Bluff California for tonight and as you can see I finally got back on the Verizon Network so we are back online again. Verizon cell phone was almost non existent in Oregon. I think next year we are going to head back up to Oregon and spend more time there. It is really pretty country.

Remembering

As I sit and watch the news of all the disaster on the gulf coast, I can’t help but be sad. We spent March in New Orleans and Biloxi. I remember the beautiful Colonial homes in both areas. They are all gone now. That was a big part of history, gone. I took a moment to look back through my photos today and remember what it was like.

Newport Oregon

It took us about 3.5 hours to get from Fort Stevens State park near Astoria to South Beach State Park near Newport. We traveled US-101 all the way. I had talked with a person while at Fort Stevens that said 101 was boring. He said the coast looked the same the whole trip. He was wrong. It was a nice drive traveling through small towns along the way. Some of the views of the coast were outstanding. We first pulled into Beverly Beach State Park north of Newport but it didn’t look like we could get much Satellite TV in there and we had no cell phone reception so we moved on to South Beach. No problem here. You really can tell we are on the coast here with the sound of 2 fog horns in the distance and if you listen carefully you can hear the seals on the jetty. The photo is one of the lighthouses here in Newport. This one is unique because it combines the light keepers house and the light in the same building. We will be spending 3 nights here before moving on further down the coast.

More Rain?

We were going to do some sight seeing yesterday but guess what? It rained! I did mention that rain has followed us all around the country. Well I can’t really say this was our fault since they get 10 inches a month during the winter and 1 inch a month the rest of the year. It always rains here. Today we got a chance to get out with only a short burst of rain and then the rest of the day was nice.


We visited an old ship wreck which is the rusting remains of an English sailing ship that ran aground in 1906 on the beach in the State Park we are in. Then we went over to The Ft Stevens Historic Area at the mouth of the Columbia River where a number of Batteries were set up to protect the rivers entrance. The photo is a replica of what they called the disappearing guns.


These guns were hidden behind earth mounds and could raise, fire, and lower leaving the enemy wondering where the fire was coming from. We took a drive through Astoria and view some of the historic homes in the area. Tomorrow should be a good day which is good because we will be traveling. We have been lucky that we have only had to travel one day out of the year in the rain.

Astoria Oregon

We are at another fine Oregon State Park. We are in Astoria Oregon which is located in the extreme northwest corner of the state. Right on the coast. Although it is on the coast, you wouldn’t know it because of all the trees. It feels like we are in a forest. It is a bit cooler and damper here than what we have seen for the last few months so you can tell we have reached the coast. There is a lot to see here so we will spend 3 nights. Susan seem to thing Astoria is where the movie The Gooneys took place.

We got a bonus

When we mapped out our route from Susan’s Sister’s place to the coast, we decided to follow the Columbia River just because it was the most direct route. It looked pretty grim for a while as we traveled the eastern part of Washington and Oregon. There was nothing but miles of dry nothing. However, we didn’t count on The Columbia River Gorge and The Historic Columbia Highway. This is listed as one of Americas Scenic Byways, and rightly so. There are seven waterfalls, a couple of overlooks, and the Crown Point Vista House within a 15 mile stretch. It just so happens the Oregon State Park we stopped at is right in the middle of it all. Sometimes you just get lucky.

Ainsworth State Park

Today we went from dry barren rolling hills to green lush mountainous terrain. We ended up in an Oregon State Park near Dodson, right in the Columbia River Gorge. The above photos show how it looked when we started our trip today and how it looked when we ended. We traveled half the trip in Washington then crossed over the Columbia River to complete the rest of the trip in Oregon, just because we can. The photo below is a view of Mt. Hood, 11,239 feet high. I do believe it does have snow all year round. There is a drive that circles Mt. Hood but we are not going to do it this time. It is 146 miles and takes a little over 3 hours. Instead, tomorrow we are going to view the many waterfalls in the area along the Historic Columbia River Highway. The State Park we are in is nice but it is so thick with trees that we have no view at all. I was hoping for something along the river. Susan did enjoy picking black berries all day since the park is full of them. When we got here there were plenty of spaces but the park has filled up since then. That’s the beauty of getting off the road by 2:00p. We usually get first pick of sites. Actually we were done by noon today because we got an early start.

Plymouth Washington

We are back. We finally have Internet access again. After Kamiah Idaho, we stayed two nights at a nice park called Chief Timothy just outside of Clarkston Washington. We were on Extended network so I could not access the internet.

Tonight we are in Plymouth Washington. What a dry barren drive to get here. We did pass through some nice little towns and farms along the way so it was scenic at times. We will only be spending 1 night here and don’t know for sure where we will be staying tomorrow night. It will be somewhere around the Columbia River Gorge. I don’t know if we will have internet access or not.

Kamiah Idaho

We drove from Missoula Montana to Kamiah Idaho today. Another nice drive. We went over the Lolo pass which is not very LoLo, in fact it is pretty HighHigh. It wasn’t as steep as some I went over but long, especially the down grade. I dropped it down to 2nd gear and coasted all the way down. At the bottom of the grade Susan spotted the sign that said we were in for 77 miles of windy road. Susan does not handle curvy roads well but I took it slow and she did well. We traveled through the Clearwater National Forest, Nez Perce National Forest, and Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness following the Clearwater River all the way to Kamiah. This river is named appropriately. It is crystal clear the whole way. There are periods of rapids and periods of deep glassy water with sandy beaches. There were wild berries growing along the way but we didn’t stop to pick any.


We are camped out on Susan’s sisters property. They live out, and I do mean OUT, in Kamiah. You hang a right just before town and travel 20 miles over the hills into the wilderness. No cell phone coverage out here. They cleared a spot of land and are in the process of building a log cabin on the property. The cabin is really nice with 3 stories, the bottom level being underground. In the evenings the deer come up and graze on the grasses in the yard. Of course as soon as we arrived it rained. I think we are going to hire ourselves out as rain makers.

Kamiah Idaho

We are now in a little town called Kamiah Idaho. We are visiting Susan’s sister. We are out 30 miles from anywhere. There is no cell phone, internet, or anything for that matter, so updating this site will be difficult. You may not here from us for a couple of days so check back later for updates.

Good timing

I sat down to download the photos from my camera’s memory card and it went caput. Well, it turns out that I was wanting a new camera anyway. And guess what…There is a Costco right across the street from the campground. Just a short visit to Costco and I got a new camera. Hopefully I can get some really good pictures now that I have zoom. The bad part…We just left Yellowstone.

Speaking of Yellowstone, I just added some Yellowstone photos to our photo link.

Missoula Montana

Seems like we have been in Montana for a long time. We have since we spent 9 days at Yellowstone. We are in Missoula right now. We were going to stop over for 2 nights in Garrison but we got there by 11:00 and it was too early to stop and the drive was good. We climbed a pretty good mountain at a 6 to 7% grade for a few miles. I just dropped it down to 3rd gear and let up on the accelerator and never got below 50 mph. The motorhome wasn’t even straining. We pulled into Missoula just before 12:30 so that worked out good. We will spend a few days here then head on into Idaho.

Three Forks Montana

Today was a bit depressing. We left Yellowstone this morning. We are now in a little town called Three Forks. I haven’t seen the town yet but I don’t expect much. We are in a nice KOA that has horses for petting and feeding. There are also chickens running around. Kind of cool. Tomorrow we will venture into town and check it out. We will be here for 2 nights then it’s on the road again. Oh by the way, it’s raining. We are thinking of hiring ourselves out as rain makers.

Yellowstone again

Monday we planned to go back into the park. We got a late start and by the time we got going the line to get into the park was backed up into town. That’s a little more than a mile so we turned around and went back to the motorhome and relaxed all day. Yesterday we played it smart and got an early start. We put another 130 miles on the car in the park. We traveled all the way to the little town of Mammoth to visit the Mammoth Hot Springs. On the way we stopped at the Artisan Paint Pot and spotted the big guy in the photo above. He was just grazing along side of the parking lot not caring about the spectators. On the way back from Mammoth we stopped by the Norris Geyser Basin but only had a brief look because a good friends of ours was stopping by for the night on their way to Whitefish. We had a great time last night starting out with a pizza party then later a slumber party. There were 6 of us in a coach that is really designed to sleep 2 but the couch folded out for 2 and the other 2 were on the floor. There was plenty of room. Today will just be another lazy day of lounging around.

Yellowstone National Park

Old Faithful

The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone

What a full day. Today we saw Forests, Mountains, Geysers, Lakes, Water falls, Canyons, Pastures, Elk, Buffalo (Lots of Buffalo), Deer, and all in one day. We even crossed over the Continental Divide. This is the point where the snow melt runs into 2 rivers, one running all the way to the Pacific Ocean and the other running all the way to the Mississippi and eventually into the Gulf. This peak is over 8300 feet. I put over 120 miles on the Toad. And we only saw a small portion of the park. We are going to go back to see more in the next couple of days. Everyone knows about Old Faithful. Well, it was neat but the real treat of Yellowstone is what is knows as The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. This is a deep gorge dug out by the Yellowstone River. The colors of the walls are amazing and the waterfall is taller than Niagara Falls. We liked it so much that the next time we go into the park, we are going to go directly to The Grand Canyon and spend more time. We have to drive the upper loop also, which has the highest concentration of wild life. While driving through the park today we were held up a couple of times by buffalo just standing in the middle of the road like they own the place…Oh yeah, they do own the place. Also there was a big bull Elk standing in the middle of the road looking at the line of cars he was holding up as if he was saying, “What!”. Such a cool place!

What a beautiful drive

No Interstates today. It was a straight shot from Bozeman to West Yellowstone. The whole way was a very easy drive down a two lane mountain highway. We followed the Gallatin River the entire route with lots of trees and mountains in the background. All along the way we saw many rafters tackling the rapids in the river. We climbed over 3000 feet but it was so gradual that I did the whole thing in 5th gear with no strain. The weather was beautiful and the big plus was at the end of the drive, Yellowstone Grizzly RV Park. This is a very nice resort style park full of nice Big Rig coaches. We are already talking about extending our stay. We are actually outside Yellowstone park but only less than a mile from the entrance. We will be spending a lot of time in the park.

It’s been raining all year

I think that every stop we have made this year with the exception of about 3 or 4, it has rained. Fortunately the rain has usually come during the late afternoon so driving has not been a problem since we are off the road before 2:00p. At least the rain has given me the chance to locate all the leaks and fix them, yes I have had a few. Since we don’t drive during the rain, keeping the motorhome and car clean has not been a problem. Usually the rain washes the dirt away. Today I spent half the day washing and cleaning the motorhome and car to remove the road grime that the rain didn’t wash away. When I find a park that will let you wash the rig, I take advantage of it. Most parks do not allow washing.
Tomorrow we will be heading for West Yellowstone. We are looking forward to the drive that follows the Gillian River and is suppose to be very scenic. And there are no Interstates.