Airplanes and Cactus

We spent the Thanksgiving holiday in Benson, Arizona. Benson is just east of Tuscon. We went to the Pima Air and Space Museum. This museum is on 80 acres and holds 300 military aircraft. The picture is of the old blackbird spyplane that used to be the plane that flew the fastest and the highest. We also went to Saguaro National Park. The park is filled with these beautiful cactus.

We opted to have our own Thanksgiving turkey dinner instead of going to the large gathering at the campground. It was very good and for once we had leftovers to enjoy. The campground has a large telescope and an astronomer on staff. One evening we went to one of his shows. We got to see some star clusters, galaxies, nebulas, binary stars, and even Jupiter with four of its moons. All the objects we saw through the scope you cannot see with the naked eye.

We will be at our destination on Wednesday the first of December -- Wellton, Az.

White Sands Missiles & the Spaceport?

We went rockhounding east of Elephant Butte and where we go overlooks the area where they are building the spaceport. This is Spaceport America that Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Atlantic is pouring his money into as well as the state and feds. They had the ten thousand foot runway put in -- concrete three feet thick but parts of it didn't pass compression tests. They are busy tearing up the bad concrete and redoing it. They haven't gotten very far on any buildings either but the road to the place is at least paved now.

We are now in Las Cruces, New Mexico which is very close to the White Sands Missile testing area. We went to see the museum they have on the military base there. They have an outside display of old missiles that all were put through their final testing -- being fired -- here at White Sands. The "trinity site" where the first atomic bomb was tested is at the far north section of White Sands.

We are staying in a campground that a couple we worked with in Door County are staying in for the winter. Our former boss/owner of Door County Camping Retreat and his wife surprised us all and showed up at the campground too for a few days. We have eaten some great, inexpensive Mexican food in a little restaurant nearby and enjoyed listening to a 7 piece mariachi band. The band was just some local talent that played for tips but they were very good.

We are saying goodbye to New Mexico on Tuesday and heading to Benson, Arizona.

EEEEK --we found snow

We spent two and half very long days in Chanute, Kansas. We had some warranty work done on our rig. There was a pretty little park there with the bridge that had been built in 1872 and the railroad car and engine. We met lots of very nice people also having work done so we all kind of hung out together. There really is nothing to do in Chanute.

We followed U.S. highway 54 through Kansas, the panhandle of Oklahoma and into New Mexico. It was south of Santa Rosa, New Mexico that we started seeing heavy frost. Pretty soon it was actually snow. They sand the roads with red dirt mixed with a salt. We are now in Elephant Butte, New Mexico where we spent our first winter. We are enjoying visiting with all the friends we made and kind of surprised to see most of them all come back here for the winter.

Our goal is Wellton, Arizona by the first of December.

Route 66 in Missouri

We traveled across Arkansas on I-40 and then up interstate 540 through northwest Arkansas. We went through the Boston Mountains -- part of the Ozarks. Very beautiful but no place to stop and take a picture. We ended up in Carthage, Missouri close to the old route 66 highway.

Carthage is west of Springfield so one day we had to go to the Bass Pro shop there. It is huge -several city blocks. We also went to Lamberts cafe just south of Springfield. Lamberts is famous for their "throwed rolls". The food is typical southern fried fare but the rolls are fresh baked and they go around with a cart of them and if you want one they just toss it to you. You can have some sorghum molasses spread on it -- sweet like jelly but lighter than dark molasses.

We visited friends -- a couple that were workampers with us in Door County. They bought the cute little house in the picture with the big Alfa motorhome next to it. The house isn't livable -- it's their moneypit - their fixer upper project for the next few years.

They know the area so they took us around Carthage which has an old fashioned square in the middle of downtown with a huge courthouse in the middle. We ate at LuckyJs Arena and Steakhouse. Its a horse arena that has a restaurant attached. You walk in the restaurant and smell horse, hay and leather. The restaurant has windows overlooking the indoor arena. It was entertaining to watch the cowboys work their horses while we sat and ate.

I also took a picture of our rig in our campground -- The Big Red Barn" here in Carthage. Next stop is Chanute, Kansas to have work done on our rig. After that we will be traveling on highway 54 down into New Mexico.

Other Big News! -- Our job offer in Minnesota fizzled so now we aren't sure if we will be in Minnesota next summer or not. Stay Tuned!

Along the Mississippi

We have really enjoyed ourselves spending time in Memphis at our campsite overlooking the mighty Mississippi. The sunrises over the river were beautiful. The weather has been warm and mostly sunny. We have eaten some great barbeque. Of course we had to eat at The Pig on Beale -- the best ribs! We also tried Leonards which is diner that was showcased on the Food Network. We had ribs there too and they let you order them half wet (with barbeque sauce ) and half dry (with a dry rub and no sauce). The ribs were very good both ways. What they are more famous for is their barbeque pork sandwich and southern recipe onion rings with a slice of lemon icebox pie for dessert. Oh well, we will just have to go back sometime.

We toured the Mississippi River Musuem on Mud Island. We have been through it once before but its worth seeing more than once. After seeing this museum we would like to see the one in Dubuque, Iowa . This one showcases the lower Mississippi and the one in Iowa does the northern half of the river.

The pyramid is Memphis's conference center. It is very pretty when the sun shines on it but it doesn't have anything in it worth seeing as far as we could tell. Its built overlooking the river and they keep trying to develop the green space along the river -- to make it more welcoming. Beale street is still a pretty big draw for music and food. They've been adding "brass notes" to the sidewalk along Beale Street in honor of famous Blues muscians. Its a clever idea and I hope everything they are doing will boost the tourism in the area.

Next stop is Alma, Arkansas.

Camping with the Chickens

We only got a little south of Green Bay and lost a bearing cover off the boat trailer. We had to pull into a truck stop, unhitch the truck from the 5th wheel and go buy a new one. Of course we didn't have a big enough hammer to whack it in place. So we had to hitch up and go to a boat dealer down the road and have them do it. To top it off we hit a detour, major road construction and traffic at a dead crawl in Rockford, Il. We got to the campground just at dark and by the time we got to a restaurant to eat it was 7:30pm.

Our second day of traveling we stopped for the night in Whittington, IL. The campground we stayed at was called Whittington Woods. It did have beautiful woods but it also came with poultry running around loose. I took these pictures right outside our rig. There were also three turkeys but they stayed close to the coop.

Whittington is famous for Burton's Cafe. We had to go try it and see if we agreed that it was good home cooking. It was very good -- I had homemade ham and bean soup with cornbread and Jim had some fried catfish. What they are really famous for is their "white pie". I had a piece and it was very good, light and fluffy. They won't say what is in it but if I had to guess one of the ingredients is tapioca pudding.

We are now camped in West Memphis, AR probably for the next two weeks. Its very nice and warm!

Saying Goodbye

The owners of the campground are too the far left, John and Marty. The couple on the far right are Carol and Lewie. We have ended up meeting Carol and Lewie in our travels both going south and coming back up north. The couple next to them is Wade and Gail -- they were the mangers this year and in the very middle is Dorothy. She cleaned the cabins while we did the bathhouses.

One couple is missing - they already left to visit family in New York.

We will miss them all but more than likely meet up with many of them again during our travels. We will be heading to Memphis next -yeah its warm there!

We will be spending the winter close to Yuma, Az in a small town 20 miles east of Yuma called Wellton. We found a nice rv park -- at least it sounds nice and the picture we saw looked good called Pioneer Rv Park. We plan to be there sometime in December and stay until April.