Knitter's Maine Adventure

 During the week of  September 21-28, 2013, Consuelo will be hosting several knitters from around the country in Friendship to knit and chat for days, along with soaking up the Maine atmosphere.

Housing for this adventure will be in a multi-bedroom rental house facing Friendship Harbor. There is no cost for the fun, but the housing is not free.

There are single (private) rooms and double (shared) rooms. In order to reserve a spot, you will need to pay a deposit for the room by 1/15/13. Please make your deposit through Paypal, either with your Paypal account or with a credit card. Thanks!

Single room: $100.00 deposit

Shared Room: $50.00 deposit

A busy September leads into October

Marilyn, Rich and Us

Time continues to fly by. Summer seems to be a distant recollection of recent past. We're busy planning for the next leg of our journeys, which will start on October 19. We leave then for Massachusetts to visit the Ipswich clan one more time, then on to Connecticut where Consuelo is taking classes at "Stitches" through the weekend. Then we'll start our southern slide, with arrival at Jekyll Island to start November 1.

Runaway boat

Ready for some zip line, while Consuelo hides in the car

August had us busy with visitors. Paul's family visited early, then Liam and Amelia stayed on until Thursday, when we brought them down to Ipswich and stayed for an evening concert at the Crane Estate there. The next week, we tripped over to New Harbor, the next Maine point, and had lunch there with friends Clive and Sandy Henery who we see at Jekyll. The following day, we had a fine visit from my cousin Marilyn and Rich who stayed a couple of wonderful days with us. Marilyn delighted me by giving me our grandmother's camera which she has had in her possession forever. I was thrilled to add it to my small camera collection.

Pensive Porter

A day later, TJ, Luna and Porter arrived for a week long visit. Soon after they arrived, we got a call that our pontoon had broken away from its mooring and was high and dry on the shore in Hatchet Cove. We secured it for the night, then floated it off on the next high tide, and moored it somewhat better. No harm done.
We did some boating on a very foggy day, which made for an interesting tour.
One day TJ and the kids tried out the zip line at Monkey C Monkey Do. We tripped down to Pemaquid on a sunny day and enjoyed the rocks and the scenery. We played games and read books. We were sorry to see them leave.
We caught our breath for a few days, then Deb and John Wilkinson arrived for their 3rd annual visit. John and I moved the back door to make space in the kitchen for the refrigerator, then we waited out hurricane Irene as it plodded it's way through New England. Aside from losing power for a couple hours, it was a non-event here.

Pemaquid Point Lighthouse

Moved the back door

The rest of New England was harder hit by the hurricane, and a few days after the Wilkinsons left, the Red Cross called and asked us to deploy to Southbridge, MA, where they had set up headquarters for all 6 states. Vermont saw the greatest damage, but each NE state had relief efforts. After a week there, and as things were starting to wind down, we were redeployed to Hazleton, PA, where Irene's impact was capped by TS Lee, which pushed the Susquehanna River over its levees in several towns. This became the largest relief operation ever in the Northeast for the Red Cross, with nearly 100 ERVs out feeding and 900 volunteers helping out. We spent 2 weeks there, finally returning home on 9/26. As with most Red Cross deployments, we got the crud, appearing as a cold which lingers still.

Parked with Red Cross in PA

I was pleased to find out that Escapees Magazine had honored me with the cover photograph in the Sept/Oct issue, which included an article that I wrote about Jekyll. I have to set a new, higher goal for my photographic efforts now.

August!

My, the summer is traveling by fast. Projects, visitors, the boat, the garden, grandkids, events, art shows, all keeping us busy this year.Lots more to go before we shift gears, pack into out motorhome and travel south.
My garden is a bit smaller than last year, I skipped broccoli and carrots and have fewer tomatoes and cabbages. New this year are cucumbers, black beans, peppers and winter squash. The Maine spring was cold and wet in May, slowing everything down. My seedlings didn't do well, so mostly I have plants that I bought. One exception is the heirloom tomatoes from seeds that I saved from last year. They sprouted very slowly, but are coming along fine now. We've only harvested summer squash, green and yellow so far. Slugs are getting to the cabbage again.

Garden visitor

I've had some success with writing for publication. Escapees Magazine has published 2 articles so far. They are publishing another in September, this a feature article running 5 pages with 11 photos about Jekyll Island. They have another in the queu for next year, and one just submitted. I've also had a press release and a short feature in the coastal magazines here in Maine. I'm working on a feature on Mid-Coast Maine, but it's going slow, as the content is difficult to narrow.

Our table at Friendship Day

I've had a little success with photography. My Friendship Maine book has gone through 3 printings and one revision, and I need to order a 4th printing now (I print 10 copies at a time). We had a table on July 30 at Friendship Day, the local summer weekend celebration, where we sold books, posters, note cards and Consuelo sold slippers. We did pretty well I think. The next day was "Art in the Big Tent", again here in Friendship, where I had framed and matted prints. No sales... I think I was priced too high, and/or the traffic wasn't right. I'm not completely turned off, but less enthusiastic about art sales. Meanwhile, we've got a bunch of nice framed prints to put up in our house here.

Friendship Sloops racing in Rockland Harbor

Friendship Sloop Hegira rounding Owls Head Light

I did get myself over to the Friendship Sloop regatta in Rockland to take some pictures. The stance of the event organizers is to take "crew" on boards for sailing as space permits. I got onto one of the boats, but there was no space in the boats racing that day. Instead, on a day with 98 degree temperatures in Rockland, my captain decided to cruise out to one of the islands which had a protected anchoring area and a small beach. He had his son, daughter in law and two grand kids on board, plus anothe pair of "crew" from Illinois. The breeze was light, so we motored out and back. I did catch some nice shots, but I'd like to be in the race next year.
My grand kids Liam and Amelia, ages 10 and 6, spent a few days with us this last week. We had water balloon fights, tripped to Camden, went to the "beach", did some dog walking, watched TV, read books. Consuelo tried to teach them knitting with some small success. We enjoyed their company, but probably needed to be more active. The other grandkids with their dad will be here next weekend for a week's visit.
Our house is getting little new work this year. We spent our budget on a new roof this spring, so major renovations will have to wait until the future. We have some maintenance and repair items yet to finish before we leave for southern climes. We'd like to tear down the kitchen ceiling and put in a "cathedral" type affair with proper venting and vent fan for the stove. It will be a messy job as we have to remove the cellulose insulation above the ceiling tiles which are barely hanging in there right now. Another project is to remove a window in the end of the kitchen and install a pantry to store all manner of things which have no good home now.
We've had a couple visitors from among our Jekyll Island friends so far this year, with others yet to arrive. Sandy and Clive Henery called yesterday, and they are in Freeport now. We'll be having lunch with them on Wednesday. Jim and Linda Strid stopped in for a few days. And Bob and Nancy Hoffman stayed a couple days with us in their motor home while on their way to Acadia. The three of us ferried out to Monhegan Island for a hot walk taking lots of pictures.
Later today I am taking pictures of the "Chowder Cup" sailboat race here. Our pontoon will be on hand to rescue and of the sailors who might get into trouble during the Class C segment of the race. Class C is the smaller boats who will race around the small islands in the inner bay, while the larger boats will sail out around farther marks. Should be fun.
Monday we'll be taking a walking tour of Davis Point, one of the other summer ghettos here in Friendship. In preparation for this, one of the owners of a house that will be open there on Monday asked me to restore an old hand assembled photo taken out their back door many years ago. It was an interesting challenge and you can read about it on my photo blog.

Out with the Red Cross Again

The tornadoes in Western Massachusetts did a lot of damage. We notified the Red Cross that I was ready to travel immediately after the event, but they did not have an opening for me until yesterday. Within an hour I was packed and on my way to Springfield. I expect to be here 2 weeks this time, and I'll most likely be doing the same things as my last outings, working in headquarters on staffing. I don't have info on the size of the operation yet. I do know that there is one large shelter open, and several mobile feeding trucks are out working the community.

I am staying in West Springfield, in a hotel that is in the backyard of where I lived for 3 years. My former efficiency apartment building us now a Friendly's, and that's not all that's changed over here.

Summer Arrives Soon, but first...

We've had a coldish wettish May here in Friendship. I've tried to get some vegetables started for the garden, but they have declined until very recently. I did gte some tomato seeds planted before we left Jekyll, btought them up here, and tended them in at night and out during the day, except for that one noght I forgot to get them in and they froze. Likewise a basil plant I picked up along the way. Only the rosemary survived that night, because rosemary is a perennial.

Around the first of June, the weather started looking better. That is, we had some days in the 60s. Until today. This morning it got up to 80 degrees, and like most parts of the country, a hot day is being capped off with thundershowers this evening. We've missed all the tornado activity here, thank goodness.

Since June 1st, I've planted onions, tomatoes, cabbage and marigolds that I bought, winter and summer squash, pumpkins in the garden. I have pepper seeds and more tomatoes, lettuce and basil starting on the deck. The peppers have been reluctant to appear, but I think they're beginning to peek out.

We've also done a lot of work on the landscape garden next to the addition we put on. We got some hostas from Paul and Maria, monk's hood, bleeding heart, and daisies from a neighbor up here. I bought some ragged petunias from Home Depot on sale, and I think most of those will survive. The hostas and astilbe that we planted last year had to survive being run over by our roofers, but they appear willing to go on. We put landscape fabric down there and added mulch, and have edged it with rocks that were dug up while planting the foundation posts for the deck. Yesterday, I planted nasturtiums and the lase of the onions out off the deck.

Since I planted, rain has been nil, until right now. We're getting a good soaking... hopefully not so much that things wash away!

The GW Bridge in a motor home

Our travels this spring took us from Jekyll Island, Georgia to Friendship, Maine, a distance of about 1500 miles. We stopped for fuel twice, once in South Carolina and again in southern New Jersey, and spent about $625 for diesel. We had about 1/3 tank to start, and ended up with about the same.

The only serious difficulty we had was entering the George Washington Bridge from New Jersey on Interstate 95. The signage was a bit confusing to me, and I'll explain.

Care must be taken when traveling around NY city in a large motorhome. There are a number of old "parkways" which are restricted for cars only. One reason for this is that they have many bridges which have low clearances that would impede our travel. Another is that they want to restrict commercial traffic to roads designed for heavy trucks.

The obvious route for us to take out of NY City would have been the Henry Hudson Parkway, but we could not travel on that. To avoid going way out of our way, we needed to connect to Interstate 87 immediately after crossing the George Washington Bridge. All of the signs in New Jersey stated that traffic bound for I87 needed to cross on the lower level. Other signs indicated that all trucks MUST cross on the upper level. There was no indication that trucks could access I87 via the upper level. Nor was there any indication that RVs must follow the truck routes, and in most cases, private vehicles like us are permitted where trucks are denied. With the information I had, my choice was to make sure I got on I87, so I chose the lower level.

When we pulled up the the toll booth, the very nice lady there told us that we were on the wrong level. She carefully explained that we would have to pull aside just beyond the toll booth and wait for an officer to escort us to the upper level. Oh, and pay your $32 toll here, and show them the receipt at the other toll booth.

We pulled aside and waited about 20 minutes for an officer to arrive. He told us to follow him, and we would go up a ramp that was marked "DO NOT ENTER". Which we did. That took us back onto the streets around the bridge, and we arrive at the upper level tool booths in a few minutes. A mildly confused warily eyed our receipt, and passed us through.

Getting on I87 after the bridge was no big deal, as long as we stayed in the right lane. Traffic was heavy but moving, and we got off without incident. An hour later we were parked iin a campsite north of the city, and the grand-kids arrive an hour after that.

A little knowledge is wonderful.In this case, the restriction that forced us to the lower level was because we were carrying propane, a hazardous material not permitted on the lower level. Signs that reflected that would have helped immeasurably.  

Jump into spring

Sunset on St. George Island
Oh, my, dear readers. I've been away for a long time. Sorry about that. We started this blog to document our travels, and we have not been traveling. Incentive dissolved.
In twenty five words or less, we left Maine in October, visited family and friends, did a little touring, went to Louisiana for RV repairs, schlepped over to Jekyll for the winter. OK, twenty six words.
The RV repairs had to do with our main slide, which wasn't working. We went to Dick Albritton's fine Alfa repair shop in LA for an upgrade to the motor, one better designed for the weight of the huge slide. So far, all that is working fine.

Foggy Jekyll Campground

We stopped in Roanoke, VA and Asheville, NC on the way down. We did a little touring in both places, going to the Blue Ridge trail and Biltmore Estate, and a nice downtown market in Roanoke.
We stopped at Summerdale, AL and St. George State Park in the Florida Panhandle on our way back east. Checked out the Gulf coast (post oil spill) in AL and wondeful deserted beaches in FL.
We arrived on Jekyll on Nov 28, just after Thanksgiving.
One of our goals was to share our knowledge here with those who were willing. Consuelo developed a beginner's and intermediate knitting classes. I put together a photography workshop and held 2 full 4 week sessions in January and February. We discovered that there was little structure to such activities, so we worked to develop some infrastructure. Part of that included creating a new blog for the winter group (jekyllwinter.blogspot.com), an online calendar, and developing policies that worked. There is now a working group designed to empower activities duing the winter season.

Alligator warming on the golf course

The photography was good this winter. Given that I'm just as inclined to put my feet up and watch TV as the next guy, instead of going out to find creative scenes to capture with my camera, but I got out enough. I continued to expand my skills both with the camera and with the software, in part by taking a class at the Jekyll Art Center. 90% of the class was reinforcement, 10% an expansion of my skills. I was disappointed that the class did not include creative feedback as promised. The culmination of all this was the Jekyll Arts Festival, a juried competition. This meant buying frames and mounting photos, always a challenge for me. Given their guidelines, I entered as an intermediate, and won two seconds, a third and an honorable mention. I've been informed that my time as an intermediate is over, I'll be in the advanced group next year. Harder, perhaps, but better.
To sell photos, I created 13" X 19" posters and sold a bunch, note cards, and I was requested to do portrait photo shoots. I also found a little work as a "Photoshop Expert" for a local photographer during the Christmas season.
We renewed old friendships and made new ones here during the winter. By February, I got out the golf clubs and did weekly rounds with the guys. Consuelo went to lunch with a bunch of other ladies a few times, and we had our share of dinners out.

Sunset over the fishing pier

Jekyll is partly under construction, as the old convention center has been demolished, and a new on under contruction. Huge tents have been placed in the historic district as a temporary convention facility. During November and December, 20th Century Fox tied up parts of the island making a movie. A huge chink of beach is still fenced in as restoration work continues where the movie set was located.
Now it's April, nearly all of our winter friends have gone home, replaced by snowbirds stopping on their way north and locals getting out of the Georgia winter for the first camp out of the season. We'll be here until 4/18, when we'll wing our way north.

And then came fall...

Maples in Friendship
It would appear that I've been saving the eyesight of our blog readers over the past few months, by not posting anything. It's true, when we are in Maine we're generally not traveling, and sharing our secrets seems less important. And I make no guarantees as to how many posts will appear in the future. But for now, here's one.

Summer faded from our Maine home several weeks ago. The autumn leaves are in full swing, glorious in their color. We've enjoyed watching them this year, along with a few late guests who stopped by and collected their fair ration of lobster. That's late, as in "late in the season", not formerly living. We expect to further enjoy the foliage season as we venture south soon.

Rose hips

Our garden was a qualified success this year. Snails and horn worms did significant amounts of damage, but we had good crops of yellow squash, basil, broccoli, cabbage and Brussels sprouts. We had some crops of pumpkins, and tomatoes. We had some eggplant, which surprised some folks who said you can't grow eggplant in Maine. But this year was exceptionally warm, and though they started late, they did produce.

Our tomatoes started out well enough, but horn worms arrive while we were away for a week and defoliated many of the plants. We got them under control, but much of the fruit was chewed, though usable. More vigilance next year.

Autumn barberries
We did process about 15 pounds of tomatoes into sauce to take with us when we travel. We also
made some pesto as a way to store basil and spice up our lives.

We put the pontoon on a mooring as I noted in an earlier post. This made it much easier to get out for solo trips to go fishing, but had problems, too. First, the right pontoon is not sealed, and in fact a small amount of water in the boat drains into it. There is no way to pump or drain this while the boat is in the water. It wasn't full, but it did take on a couple hundred pounds of dead weight as the season went on and rains fell. Second, the depthfinder transducer got knocked off its mount early in the season, and we couldn't figure out how to remount it without pulling the boat. So we went without it. Third, when we pulled the boat (ahead of a pending hurricane that didn't materialize), we found the bottom fouled with weeds and barnacles. I spent hours cleaning it as far as I got, and I'll have to do more in the spring. Since the trailer covers most of the bottom of the pontoons, I have to jack the boat up on the trailer to get to the junk to clean it. No fun.

Housetop ornaments

We had lots of company this summer. Kids and grandkids, Minnesota visitors, RV friends and long lot cousins graced us with their presence. John and Deb came by in July and John and I added a deck to the back of the house. We've enjoyed that addition greatly, at least until it got chilly in the past few weeks. We took most visitors to Camden or Rockland.

We had 2 of our grandkids for a week. We found a great free puppet show in Rockland to take them to. And Pepaw took them to a 3D version of Dogs and Cats movie solo, everybody came home singing the theme song and wearing our 3D glasses to surprise Abuela. Add swimming in cool Maine waters on 88 degree days for wet fun.

Friendship Harbor

We volunteered to help with the local association events planning and scheduling. It turned out to be a very minimal amount of work, and we had fun.

The house got some upgrades. We replaced our 40 year old refirgerator, and got an icemaker in the bargain, very nice on hot summer days. I goofed up the installation, and suffered an 80 dollar repair bill to un-kink the water hose. Duh! We also installed a dishwasher in the kitchen (where else would you put it?) and I messed up the plumbing there, too, but finally got it right.

Our barn is aging faster than we are. The sills are rotting into the ground. I've added a couple jacks to try to hold up the worst area for a few more years, but much more serious work is needed to make it last much longer.

The heat of summer

A sign at the harbor

Independence Day has passed. The heat of summer is upon us. Temps up here in Friendship have been in the 80s most every day. For about 10 days, rain was scarce, but we've caught up again. My guess is that this is a 'normal' summer, although we have had more days with the temp above normal than below.

Sticky has been with us, too. The dew points have been in the high 60s, meaning that fog rolls in just about every night, and the humidity stays high all day long. Under these conditions, it's guaranteed that you can work up a sweat just walking across the lawn. Pushing a lawn mower, as I did yesterday, multiplies the effect. The lobster men are out working on their boats in the evening, right around sunset because it's a bit cooler then.


So much for the weather. We've been polishing the house in preparation for company from Florida. The gang of 6+1 from Consuelo's family arrive tonight. Both of Consuelo's sisters are coming. A niece and nephew and their spouses are coming. And the baby. We'll have a houseful for a few days. I applaud the preparation and energy required on their part to get all the way up here. We're just about ready for them. Since they're "company", I'll be baking another cake. And we'll have a lobster dinner, too.

Our 20' pontoon is safely moored in Muscongus Bay. I put together the necessary cahin, a 100 lb anchor, and a float for our own mooring, acauired the proper permit, and placed it in Hatchet Cove. It was reasonably convenient to get to, requiring a 5 minute row in our old beat up dinghy. But the same day we put it in, another member of the Association told Consuelo that she had an unused mooring we could used. She has a dock, it's a 2 minute row, and that much farther out into the Bay. So we moved the boat to that location. So far so good.

Friendship Harbor

My garden is coming along well. The heat and rain have provided perfect growing conditions. If the tomatoes all bear fruit prodigiously, we'll have to rent another barn to hold the crop! Actually, we're planning to harvest and make sauce to can or freeze for the road this winter, along with whatever we get to eat as they ripen. The bugs are getting to the brussel sprouts, despite my efforts to protect them using pepper spray. My hope is that those bugs are going to devour the sprouts and leave the cabbage, broccoli and eggplants alone. That's what seems to be happening so far. We should have a good crop of squash and pumpkin later on, too.

The only downside of the warm, humid weather is that it's also perfect for silversfish, and we have a bumper crop of those pests, too. They're outside the house in huge numbers, hiding in any shady spot (like behind the knobs on our grill) and a bunch have found a way into the house. They won't hurt us, but they can do damage to fabrics.

Almost Summer

Martin Point Sunset

Maine bills itself as "Vacationland" on license plates and signs at the border. While it suggests that there's extraordinary places to go and see in the state, it also suggests that if you don't live here already, you probably would never want to. In other words, it's good for visiting, but not for staying.

So in the summer, when the kids (and teachers) are out of school and the big factories (you remember those, right?) close for 2 week shutdowns, people come to Maine to enjoy the cooler weather, abundant forests, fresh air, wonderful coastline, and great seafood. Southern Maine has long, sandy beaches, fine for attracting presidential families.Western and central Maine offers trails, lakes and rivers for fishing, and some pretty golf courses. The midcoast and Down East have ocean adventures, sailing trips, the remarkable scenery of Acadia National Park, quaint little villages, and world class art.

In the modern world, the visitors come by car and plane, and a few thousand on cruise ships. A hundred years ago, the primary mode of transportation was the sea. Thus the coast was populated with ports and a healthy fishing industry. When the roads were built, and cars became commonplace, little villages like Friendship became geographically distant from the action, too far out of the way for people passing through to the rest of Vacationland.

But we still have visitors here, the ones that are smart enough to come to see us and make our house a destination. And our visitor season starts real soon now. So we've been busy getting ready. Putting finishing touches on our house like moving furniture, painting, and upgrading the kitchen with a new refrigerator and dishwasher. Adding some bookcases to hold our books and treasures. And getting ready to build a deck to enjoy the sun in comfortable surroundings.

Getting the lobster traps out

Then there's the boats. Paul's boat stayed here last year, and needed some attention to get ready for the water. The steering gear needed replacing, some wiring was moldy, and a good cleanup. Our pontoon ("The only one in Friendship") had been covered for 20 months, but still needed to be power washed and readied for the water. This year we're going to put it out on a mooring, as it needs a lot of water to launch, and the only ramp with deep enough water has no place to park. We've filed our mooring permit, acquired the needed parts, and should get it out there soon. Meanwhile, to get to the mooring, we have an old dingy which my brother gave us. It will work just fine, but still needs some repairs and a coat of paint. So there's plenty to do.

Then there's the garden. The few things that we planted there already are doing OK, except for the carrots. That includes cabbage, brussel sprouts, and pumpkins. The seedlings are up and ready to plant, the garden is tilled and covered with weed preventive (or maybe "limiter"). All that's needed now is time and energy, both of which are in short supply.

But the first visitors have been here. Last weekend my brother and his wife stayed a few days with us, playing rough and ready games of Taboo, and munching excellent lobsters. This week Paul and Amelia came up, so that Paul could take his boat home. And we're ready for 'em. More or less.

So, if you're on the visitor's list for this year, Come on Down! If not, well, Why Not!

Late Maine Spring

Lupine in Hatchet Cove

Last year while we were traveling in Alaska, we got reports from our Maine friends as to how bad the summer was here. It was a cold, we summer. Gardens failed to produce much of anything useful. Pumpkins only made it to 6 inches in diameter. Some said that it rained every day in June.

I'm of the opinion that we bring good weather with us where ever we go. Of course, it's never perfect, we've seen some nasty stuff. When we leave somewhere, it often gets really bad where we've been. Like when we left Pincher Creek, Alberta at the end of May last year. They got 8" of snow, while we had wonderful summer weather farther north in Banff and Jasper.

So, since we're the good weather omens, it stands to reason that Maine would have great weather since we're back here now. So far, so good. We've been here for two weeks, and we've had 1 day of rain. It's mostly been sunny, with crystal clear skies. Yesterday Portland recorded a record high temperature of 86 degrees. In Friendship, it was in the mid 70s. And the forecast calls for a "hat trick" Memorial Day weekend of three beautiful days. So, if the weather is a marker of happiness, we should be delighted.

Spring is abundantly obvious everywhere here. The dandelions are very healthy, the lawns are growing impressively fast, and tulips and lilacs are most colorful and fragrant. Of the wild flowers growing here, I like the lupine the most. We have a patch growing next to our house, and they are peaking right now. My photos show other patches down near Hatchet Cove, near the water's edge.

The trees are in bloom, too. Our apple trees in the back yard are blossomed and looking very healthy, as much as old, old apples trees can look. I expect that we'll have another bumper crop of apples to pick up in the yard this fall.

We've been busy trying to capture all this weather by working toward a fairly large vegetable garden this summer. We arranged to have George Simmons stop by with his tractor and till a plot that's about 22' x 35'... not huge, but most likely more than we'll want to tend later. Seeds have been started indoors for broccoli, tomatoes, eggplant, and more. We also tilled flower beds next to the sunroom, and we've been planting hostas, nasturtiums, and will have lettuce and spinach growing there, and a few herbs.

Meanwhile, we've been making repairs where needed, and working to finish the 3rd bedroom upstairs. It was used for storage for our personal junk while we tripped off to Alaska last summer, so we had to empty it out first. Now the junk is scattered all over the house, but most of it is still upstairs. We've patched and started painting, and expect to start moving back into that room in the next few days.

We decided to make the large bedroom into a sewing room for Consuelo. She had considered making the attic more accessible and sewing up there. But I think that would have been a poor choice, since there's no ventilation and it gets pretty hot or cold, depending on the weather. We'll sleep in the now-being-finished 3rd bedroom, which should be fine, as we don't spend a lot of time upstairs otherwise.

We also found a new refrigerator at Lowes and had it delivered. Since it's a bit larger than the old one, it lives in the expanded kitchen area for now. We'll have ice on demand here, something that we've missed. And we'll save some money on electricity, too.

In another money-saving move, we signed up for cable TV and Internet. We get HD now, more channels and really high speed Internet. Most of the savings comes from dropping Starband satellite Internet service. They were really nasty when we called to cancel our service, wanting to charge us a cancellation fee. We had not signed a contract beyond our original 2 year commitment, and we stood our ground, and they relented.

Our Maine vehicles and boat have been registered. We tried to take our Ford Explorer on a 100 mile trip last week, but it had been stored in the barn in our absence, and we lost the power steering about 1/2 way there. We took it into a repair shop and hope to have it back today. No money saving there, I'm afraid.

Major summer projects include building a deck off the back of the house. The small deck that's there is pretty rotten. Consuelo fell of the back of it while hanging laundry and got a pretty bad bruise. We have the plan ready to go to the town office today for a building permit.

Chestnut blossoms

Similarly, the barn is pretty rotten, too. The south side has developed a bulge where the wooden foundation has completely failed. I've had some discussions with folks who know better than I that we might jack it up and keep it in place for a while, but a good heavy snowstorm might bring it tumbling down. More thought needed there. We do use the square footage for projects and storage, and losing it would be problematic.

We're enjoying our house here. Summer will bring boating days, events and visitors from near and far. This will be fun!

Go East, Old Man!

Spring Robin in Elk Horn

Our home has been rolling down the road toward Maine. After leaving Lincoln, NE, we headed north to Pender, NE, to the Blue Ox factory where we had our tow bar, the part that connects our car to our motor home, checked and repaired. It was still in pretty good shape after 5 years of traveling.

We developed a problem with our slide awning, designed to cover the main slide to keep it clean. It failed to unroll when the slide extended, requiring a ladder and some muscle to open it and extend it before the slide went out. The awning is made by Carefree, and a call to one vendor in Lincoln resulted in a report of "No we don't want to deal with Carefree". Camping World in Council Bluffs said they might be able to fix it, so we went there after Pender. But Camping World really didn't want to help either, saying that they might replace it, but it would likely take a couple weeks. We decided that getting it fixed in Maine would be our best course of action.

Danish Windmill in Elk Horn

From Council Bluffs, we roamed along I80 to Elk Horn, IA, listed as an "overnight stop" on one of our RV lists. We found a wonderful Danish Windmill and Danish Immigrant Museum there, and a tiny campground which offered us electric. In the morning, we toured the sights, anso found a nice quilting store on Main Street.

We could have made one more stop on our way to Rochester, but made the trip in one day. We arrived at the Silver Lake Campground around 5:30 PM, got ourselves parked and set up, and began contacting our friends there. We had planned most of our appointments for the following week, so we called Mayo and asked that they reschedule. We managed to moev up everything, including our dentist appointments.

I made plans with Curt Kraft to play golf on the next day. Now that Curt is retired, that was no problem for him. It was the first of 6 golf outings in 1-1/2 weeks, interrupted only by Clinic visits and weather one day. That was a load of fun.

The time in Rochester was wrapped up by a get together with my former work mates at Jon Camp's new house in Stewartville. It was good to see everybody and chat for a while. I showed a boatload of pictures and ate altogether too much. Thanks, Jon.

Immigrant Museum in Elk Horn

On Saturday, May 1, we moved the house to Lake City, MN. They were having their annual 100 mile garage sale along the Mississippi River, and we toured a few garages. We bought little... a few hostas to plant in our yet to be built Maine landscaping. Saturday night, we had dinner with John and Deb Wilkinson at the relaxing river condo. Good food and good company. We'll see them again in late summer when they come to Maine.

Sunday began our trek east. We stopped at a Flying J in Beloit, IL for an overnight. We ate at a greasy spoon in a truck stop, and the next day, I developed serious diarrhea and a low fever. We kept moving though, and arrived later in the day at the Elkhart Red Cross, our home chapter for our volunteer activities. We got our paperwork up to date, and they found a couple tasks for us to do while we were there. We also did some shopping at the RV places. I managed to find a pair of awning arms which may effect a repair for the awning.

I was thoroughly embarrassed that night when I set off the alarm in the Red Cross building. I had unlocked a door while going back and forth to repair an Ez Up shelter for them, looking up info on the Ez Up web pages. At 9:30 PM I realized that I had not re-locked the door, and apparently nobody from the Chapter had caught that fact. So I opened it and locked it, setting off the alarm. I went back into the motor home and said to Consuelo, "the cops will be here soon." And they were. I reported my actions, he said fine, then somebody from the Red Cross came out and turned off the alarm. Embarrassing, but had to be done. Turns out that the Exec Director was the one that was supposed to check the locks, so she was embarrassed, too.

On leaving Elkhart, our main slide failed to retract. After trying several things, I relented and gained access to the manual gear to roll the slide in. Fortunately, a little elbow grease was enough to get the slide moving up a ramp it needs to climb, after wich it retraced the rest of the way on its own. One more thing to fix in Maine.

We stopped for overnights in Hubbard, Ohio and near Scranton, PA, before finally arriving at Croton Point Park in Croton, NY.

Lost a Friend

A friend of ours passed on today
We feel the loss severely
She graced our life with joy and love.

She never earned a show award
Nor fought the fiercest bear
Instead she won our hearts and minds.
We walked the woods and climbed the hills
She'd look for squirrels and rabbits
The home again to watch our door.

When young, she'd wander miles away
Seeking kinship and adventure
Usually to come home again, tired and muddy.

We took her to obedience school
So she could teach us how it's done
We learned a lot from her

She'd jump, and dance, and shake both paws
But couldn't do roll-over
And then she tell us that she loved us.

Fourteen years makes a dog quite old
The last were not so nimble
Her legs gave out, she'd not complain

We took her to her ancestral home
In Alaska, then around the west
She loved the snow, the desert, the woods.

Thumper, we knew the end was near
We held you in our hearts
We will go on, never the same, missing you... loving you.

NOW we're over the hill

Before we left Provo, we got tickets to the BYU Ballroom Dance exhibition held in the Marriott Center on the university campus. This program has produces internationally acclaimed ballroom dancers, having won competitions in Europe many times. And we now know why. They are terrific, and we were amazed at the presentation of various dance steps with up to some 80 dancers on the stage at one time. Really impressive.

The Rim in Moab

We left Provo and headed southeast to Moab, an small tourist town situated between Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. Our campground was at the south end of town, situated under the cliff hundreds of feet high called "The Rim". Remnants of the active mining history around Moab lie scattered at this end of town, not the prettiest part. But we had views of not only the Rim, but also the 11,000 foot La Sal Mountains.

Lizard in Canyonlands

But the jewels in the region are Canyonlands and Arches. We decided to go to Canyonlands first, given that we had maybe one and a half days of good weather, and there was farther to travel up to Canyonlands. This huge park was created in the 1960s, is divided into 3 parts: Island in the Sky, the northern part where we went, the Needles, some 65 miles south of Moab, and the Maze, across the Colorado from the other parts, and inaccessible to mere mortals. Island in the Sky is a large mesa, about 12 miles across. The canyons are some 600-2000 feet below the edge. Jeep roads provide access to the lower canyon, following the White Rim Trail around the lower mesa above the Green and Colorado Rivers, which join in the park.

South Window Arch

The next morning, I cruised up to Arches, much older and more developed for tourism (more signs, parking, sites, etc. Arches is home to some 2000 natural arches, formed by unique geological processes. Some of the standing rock formations are just as impressive as the arches. I spent 3 hours and several rolls of film (just kidding) wandering around in the park. By the time I got to Delicate Arch, the icon on the other Utah license plate (the one that doesn't say, "Best Snow on Earth"), the sky was overcast and the light was completely flat and the rocks were more or less one dimensional. So I skipped the 1-1/2 mile hike up to Delicate Arch and took the long shot from the lower (read: Far Away) viewpoint, where a ranger intern was trying to impress us with facts about kangaroo rats (they drink no water...). I took one last drive inward to "Fiery Furnace", but given the opaque sky, the fire had gone out, so I went home.

Balanced Rock in Arches

We considered staying another day in Moab, but the weather forecast was not kind, so we decided to pack it in and head for Colorado. We tangled with a balky slide awning, which is still attached but not playing nice, requiring a manual roll up and down whenever we want to put our main slide in or out.

We decided to take Utah 128, know to the Moab locals as "The River Road" and to the state as a Scenic Byway. And it was very scenic, following the Colorado River for some 40 miles surrounded by towering red rock cliff walls, canyons of infinite depth, and angry rapids here and there. We began to understand how awed Powell must have been when he made the first boat trip down through these waters some 150 years ago.

In the ghost town of Cisco, we turned right onto a road marked "Not State Maintained" for a 10 mile trip up to I70. The road was OK, but I did have second thoughts, and though it would turn to dirt around the next bend. We stopped at the I70 interchange for lunch, then headed into the Colorado hills.

White Rim Trail and the Green River, Canyonlands

Coming in from the west, I70 is relatively flat until Glenwood Springs. Then the speed limit drops to 50 mph as the road winds through Glenwood Canyon for some 15 miles. After that, it works its way up along the Colorado River, then ascends up to 10,600 feet at Vail Pass. Our 360 HP Cat diesel took this in stride, if slowly.

Now we've been doing this RV thing for well over 5 years, and we've never been shut out at finding someplace to stay for the night. Consuelo uses Delorme Street Atlas, and we have several add on files with locations of Walmarts, Elks Clubs, Flying J Truck Stops, repair shops and the like. We had looked up a couple Walmarts which we figured would be OK for the night. The first one was in Vail. We looked, and looked, and looked, but there was no (visible) Walmart in Vail. The next one was at Copper Mountain, and likewise, invisible. Darkness was falling along with the temperatures. We were getting desperate. We finally cruised through downtown Frisco, and noted a Public Parking lot, which even had a sign stating "Over Night Parking Permitted". To soothe our worried souls, we had a great dinned in a good restaurant, Vinny's, and slept well that night, though our little furnace ran for much of the night keeping us warm. Due to our slide awning problem, we kept the big slide in, which reduce the heat loss. The morning low was 19 degrees.

We rolled back onto I70, climbing to the entrance of the Eisenhower Tunnel at 11,150 feet, admiring the snow covered peaks above us and the snow covered hemlocks below us on the hillsides.We then started the 60 mile descent into Denver. Down, down, down. We are definitely over the hill now.

Sunset at the Flying J in North Platte

After the red cliffs in Moab, Glenwood Canyons, the foamy Colorado, the white peaks of the Colorado 14s, getting out onto the prairie east of Denver to North Platte, Nebraska was, ummm, boring. But it was warmer, and the fuel economy was much better. We stopped the night at a Flying J truck stop there, then rolled today to Lincoln, NE for a few nights.

The bad news as of the moment, our constant companion for 14 years, our faithful puppy Thumper, is in serious pain an almost unable to walk, and not eating fresh cooked chicken and rice. We're concerned.

Utah!

Us and Rich and Shana Robb at Temple Square

We finally left Arizona on April 3rd, bound for Utah. The plan included spending a couple nights at Bryce Canyon National Park, but the weatherman was forecasting snow, so we skipped southern Utah and headed straight into American Fork, where we (thought) we had reservations for a few days. When we called the campground from I15, not only did they not have our reservation, but they said that they don't allow RVs over 36 feet. They suggested another park in Provo, which was nearly full, but found us a space. Other RVers who might be reading this blog should stay away from American Campground in American Fork.

Lakeside RV in Provo is just a hop skip and jump away from Utah Lake State Park, which was not really open when we got there. Utah Lake is the largest freshwater lake in Utah, receiving mountain runoff from the Provo River, American Fork and Spanish Fork rivers.

The Mormon Temple on a snowy day

We woke un Sunday morning to an inch of snow on everything. Normally we would just stay out of snow's way, but we had made arrangements to meet up with my former boss from Mayo, Dr. Richard Robb and his wife Shana, as they have a second home here, and would show us around Utah. They only had Monday and Tuesday available, and the weather again turned foul, with a smattering of rain and hail pelting us on Monday. But we did get to see the Mormon Temple Square and had lunch high above the Mormon Temple. The Tabernacle, home of the famous choir, had unusually excellent acoustics, and a very impressive pipe organ. Rich and Shana also shared details about the church and their beliefs with us. On Tuesday, we went to their house in Highland, where Consuelo taught SHana and their daughter Rachelle to knit, and Rich and I played pool and watched the Red Sox. Turns out that Rachelle's husband Kevin is a rabid Red Sox fan.

On Wednesday, the weather cleared. We got some house work done, did a little walking around the campground.

On Thursday, I took off for the hills while Consuelo stayed home to work on her marketing project. I ventured into historic Provo, then up US 189 into the Wasatch Mountains. Fishermen were out testing the streams and Deer Creek Reservoir to see if the fish had thawed out enough to be hungry. Of those that I spoke with, only one had caught anything.

Park City skiers enjoying a fine spring day

After, I drove into Park City, a tourist trap at 7100 feet elevation. Park City was the home to the Nordic events for the 2002 Winter Olympics. I stopped to watch the skiers and snowboarders having their fun on the slopes. The same storm that kept us housebound on Tuesday had dropped two to four feet of fine powder on the slopes, and the valley folks had come up for some fine spring skiing.

Downtown Park City

After the slopes, I found the shopping district on historic Main Street, built in the style of a mining town, which it was, but far more colorful now. Art galleries, jewelry shops and clothing boutiques lined the narrow sidewalks. A few interesting sculptures brightened up the town. One sculpture of two boys sliding on their tubes, had snow piled up around it so it almost looked like they were in their design environment.

The Utah State Capitol in Salt Lake City

I left Park City, wandered down to I80, and thence down the hill into the valley in Salt Lake City. I located the Utah State Capitol building and took an hour or so to wander around it and explore the inside. The government was not in session, so only me and a few other tourists occupied the building. I was impressed with the grandiose design and execution of the capitol building. And it sat high on a hill offering a view of Salt Lake City.