Back in Georgia - with an overnight trip to Tennessee

We finally made it back to Longhollow on Lake Lanier after staying three days in Chattanooga to spend some time with Bill's son Shane and Shane's grandmother Sarah.  I have scheduled wall to wall doctor appointments for both of us, hoping to get them all over quickly.  We are hoping to leave here for Florida shortly after Thanksgiving.

Fall has been beautiful here at Longhollow, as evidenced by the picture above.  That's Bill's Trans Am at the gate.

We took the Trans Am to Knoxville, Tennessee, on Friday, November 5, to see Bill's hair dresser.  We spent that night in Knoxville, then drove through Maryville and Townsend and entered  the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Along the Little River Road we ran into some mixed snow, sleet and rain.  When we reached the Laurel Falls parking area, we saw snow sticking in the trees.  To fortify us for the drive over Newfound Gap, we poked our way into the usual Gatlinburg traffic to find a coffee shop.

The drive through the park across Newfound Gap was spectacular.  About three inches of snow had fallen, adding a beautiful frosting to the Fall colors.  I will let the pictures do the rest of the talking.

Trip from Boise to Georgia: St. Joseph, Missouri

We are still in Rock Port awaiting our tires.  Since we have already explored anything worth seeing (and a lot of things that weren't), we decided to drive down to St. Joseph, Missouri, Friday.  We visited the Remington Nature Center on the bank of the Missouri River.  Check out the pictures:




More Trials and Tribulations:
Power fluctuations in this campground fried our power converter (used to charge all the 12-volt stuff) and our bedroom TV Friday night - to the tune of about $700.00!  We had to drive to the nearest Camping World in Council Bluff, Iowa, to get replacements - 60 miles one way.

Trip from Boise to Georgia: Rock Port, MO

Windmills above Rock Port, Missouri

We are currently camped out at a KOA west of Rock Port, Missouri, awaiting some new trailer tires.  The campground hosts are treating us very well and the weather is beautiful.  The campground is nice and flat - a good place to practice my bicycle riding.

Rock Port is a small town of around 1400 people about 8 miles east of the Missouri River.  It was the first community in the nation to convert entirely to wind power.  It is the county seat of Atchison County, which is the very northwest corner of Missouri.

Image by jimmywayne via Flickr

Atchison County Courthouse in Rock Port, MO

Charity Lake

Fall is certainly in the air.  Yesterday, we took a short drive to the Brickyard Hill Conservation Area about 5 miles up the interstate and hiked around Charity Lake, enjoying the fresh air and the crunch of leaves under our feet.  We were too noisy to see any of the local deer or wild turkeys.

Fall Colors

After our walk, we drove to the shore of the Nishnabotna River, which flows into the Missouri.  This is one of Lewis and Clark's stopping points.  It is also a popular fishing spot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Trip from Boise to Georgia: Trials and Tribulations

Lots of stuff has happened.

• We bought bicycles, helmets, and a bike rack from George's Cycles, where Karen works.  
• We ended up having to stay with Starr and Karen over two weeks while we had some repairs done to the trailer. Topper and Ayla stayed in their garage and got to play in their fenced yard.
• We cheered Starr on at two other races:  the Dirty Dash and the City of Trees Half Marathon.
• Once the rig was ready to go (Wednesday, October 23), we beat it down I-84 to I-80, driving until after dark every day.
• The third day at a fuel stop we noticed a huge knot on one of our trailer tires.  Luckily, we were in front of a truck repair shop and had the spare put on.
• That night the trailer brakes locked as we tried to pull into the campground. The breakaway cable had caught on the spare in the back of the truck.  We slept with brake fumes.
• The next day (Saturday), we stopped at a rest area in Missouri and found a huge knot on another tire and the beginnings of a knot in a third tire.  This time we were one exit away from a truck repair shop.  We ended up ordering 4 new tires under warrantee and settled into a KOA in Rock Port, Missouri, to wait for them.  They are expected Thursday or Friday.

Here are some pictures covering this time frame.

The Dirty Dash:

The Mud Flap Girls before (Starr and I made the mud flaps)

Starting out - Starr in the center waving

Starr making her way through the mud pits at the finish line

Starr leaves the mud pits

The City of Trees Half Marathon:

Starr and Leslie cross the starting line (behind the woman in red)

Starr on the home stretch

Starr and Leslie with their medals - joined by their friend Shannon

One of our beautiful Load Star tires

What's wrong with this tire?

The next post will contain information about Rock Port.  It's actually not a bad place to be stuck.

Hell's Canyon

Image via Wikipedia

Satellite image of Hell's Canyon

There is a lot of catching up to do.  Starr and Karen have kept us pretty busy when we weren't dealing with truck and trailer issues.  In the last post, I promised to write about our jet boat trip up Hell's Canyon, the deepest canyon in North America. So here goes:

The Tuesday after Labor Day Bill and I took off in a borrowed car to Slate Creek, Idaho, to spend a couple of days with Karen's parents, Bruce and Nancy Dreher.  Slate Creek is in north central Idaho on the Salmon River, the largest tributary of the Snake River.  The Drehers live on the east side of the river, a narrow mountain range is on the west side, and on the other side of that mountain range is the Snake River, the site of Hell's Canyon.

Image via Wikipedia

Salmon River

The drive up to Slate Creek passes through McCall, Idaho, described in an earlier blog.  North of McCall it just keeps getting prettier.  After Riggins, Idaho, we entered the Pacific time zone and followed the Salmon River north (down stream) to Slate Creek.

The Dreher Lookout

As the sun dropped behind the western mountain range, I began searching for the sure sign that we were almost there - the Dreher Lookout.  Bruce, who is a retired Forest Ranger, won it in an auction. He and Nancy disassembled it on its original mountaintop and re-assembled it on their property.  It is fully furnished as in its heyday with a working stove.

The next day we drove over the mountain range to Pittsburg Landing in the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area and boarded a jet boat to head upstream on the Snake River to the dam.  Shortly after leaving the landing, we spotted a herd of bighorn sheep on the Oregon side of the river.  On the way back downstream from the dam, we watched a bear moving along the Idaho shore.  The river has some impressive rapids, one of which contained another boat that had run aground the day before.  We made several stops to visit historical landmarks, including the Kirkwood Ranch.  (Do check out this link!)

Unfortunately, my camera was having issues, so I have no pictures of my own.  Check the Killgore Adventures website and these pictures I found using Zemanta.  The first one is from just below the dam.

Image via Wikipedia

Image via Wikipedia

Image by Photos of Nature's Calm via Flickr

The next day, I got my camera working.  We piled into Bruce's pickup and drove up Nut Basin Road for a bird's eye view of the Salmon River area.  The first one shows the Dreher Lookout and the Dreher "museum" on the right.  (Yes, these shots are from ground level!)

Steep

Bruce Dreher

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Trip to Boise: Henefer to Boise and Side Trip to McCall

We left the beautiful campground west of Henefer, Utah, on August 28, and headed up I-84 to Boise, Idaho.  South of Ogden, Utah, we pulled over to photograph the Devil's Slide, a fascinating geological formation right next to the interstate.  My picture is not great, but I couldn't resist including it.  For a better picture and more information, follow the Devil's Slide link above.

Devil's Slide

We arrived at the KOA in Meridian, Idaho, at about 6:30, set up camp, and then headed to Starr and Karen's house for dinner.  The next day we were back there helping with a landscaping project.  Since then, there has been very little sitting around at the trailer doing nothing.

Labor Day weekend, we rode up to McCall, Idaho, with Starr and Karen.  The 2 hour drive to McCall begins in the treeless desert mountains north of Boise and climbs into alpine forest, following the Payette River along much of its route.  McCall is on the shore of Payette Lake, a spectacular body of water formed in a volcanic basin.  Unfortunately, I forgot the camera, so I have pulled in some images from Zemanta.

Image by SLV Native via Flickr

Payette Lake

Image via Wikipedia

Payette Lake Marina

Image by timmyjimi via Flickr

Brundage Mountain on Payette Lake

Image by meganpru via Flickr

Another view of Payette Lake

The reason for the trip to McCall was for Starr to participate in the Payette Lake Run on Sunday. The entire race course is 18.6 miles long and follows the shoreline of Payette Lake.  There are also an 8.6 mile race and a 3 mile race over the same course.  Starr ran the 8.6 mile course, with a personal best of 9.11 minute miles, finishing 9th in her age group.  This was the first time I was able to be there for one of her races  I even got to drop her off at the bus to her starting location.

After the race, we drove around the McCall area checking out possible sites for the Starr Johnson/Karen Dreher nuptials, tentatively scheduled for summer or fall of next year.  The scenery provides a magnificent backdrop everywhere you look.  We visited several camp facilities and a hotel on the lake shore.  One of the last stops was Ponderosa State Park. 

Image by JillOW via Flickr

Payette Lake from Ponderosa State Park

That's all for now.  Stay tuned for the next installment, including a jet boat trip through Hell's Canyon.

The Lincoln Highway

Image via Wikipedia

Original Lincoln Highway Marker in Wanship, Utah

Yesterday we took an auto tour of the significant sights along the part of the Lincoln Highway that goes through Echo Canyon in Utah.  The Lincoln Highway, established in 1913, was the first automobile road from the east coast to the west coast.  It originates at Times Square in New York City and ends in San Francisco.  It coincides with or runs close to Interstate 80 along most of its route.

The Pony Express route, the Mormon Trail, and the California Trail traveled by pioneers and 49'ers all passed through Echo Canyon. as well as the Union Pacific Railroad.  The Donner Party passed through in 1846 on its il-fated way to California.  Brigham Young led the first group of Mormon settlers through the canyon to the Great Salt Lake in 1847.

 Echo Canyon is bounded on the north by steep cliffs sculpted by nature.  In places, some of the layers of rock are a composite of rounded pebbles of various sizes embedded in what appears to be hardened mud.  There is a natural bridge in the cliffs near the site of the Emory Pony Express Station.  The highway goes under an old Union Pacific Railroad trestle near Echo Reservoir.

Here are a few of the pictures I took on our tour:

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Trip to Boise: Cheyenne to Rock Springs to Henefer

White Mountain

After leaving Cheyenne at noon Saturday, we stopped at the Rock Springs/Green River KOA right off I-80.  It was packed overnight, but was almost empty by the time we left.  Since we were staying only one night, we kept the trailer hooked to the truck and did only minimum setup.  Bill then got out his guitar and I escaped to the pool.

Our home

The trip along I-80 from Rock Springs, Wyoming, to Henefer, Utah is full of wide open spaces interrupted by amazing rock formations and a few pronghorn antelope. We definitely noticed the ups and downs.  Our mileage varied from a low of 7.8 mpg to 8.2 mpg.

Utah Welcome Station

We stopped at the Utah welcome station to gather information about the area, then peeled off onto I-84, reaching the East Canyon Resort before 4 PM.  Everything is set up for our six-day stay here.

Trip to Boise: Minden to Cheyenne

Thursday morning we pulled out of Minden, Nebraska, for Cheyenne, Wyoming.  The day was a lot cooler than previous ones and the trip was fairly uneventful. Nebraska is a WIDE state, so we saw a lot of cornfields.

Our destination for the night was the Terry Bison Ranch and RV Resort.  It is a working ranch established before Wyoming was a state.  Historically it was the largest ranch in Wyoming, but has been significantly reduced in size.  The stock includes over 3000 head of bison that are raised for slaughter.  They have a small herd of seven camels and are the only camel breeders in Wyoming.  There are also llamas, alpacas, goats, and wild mustangs.  Trail rides and train rides tour the ranch.  A restaurant serves cowboy quisine, including buffalo steaks and burgers.

Our plan was to spend two nights at the ranch, taking the train tour out to the bison herd the day after we arrived, then to head out for Utah early Saturday morning.  Those plans changed when we discovered a propane leak.  Bill fought it all day Friday while I dealt with offers on the condo.  Since we missed the train tour Friday, we decided to go on the 9 AM ride Saturday, pull out at noon, and stop somewhere in the middle of Wyoming along I-80.

The train tour was fun. The engineer/tour guide told us the history of the ranch and the area and answered tons of questions.  Check out the slide show below.

Trip to Boise: Lone Jack to Minden

Image via Wikipedia

Entrance to the Harold Warp Pioneer Museum

Yesterday was a little rainy - the coolest day we have seen in quite a while.  We left Lake Paradise Resort in Lone Jack, Missouri, at 11 AM and arrived in Minden, Nebraska, about 6:30 last night.   We came to Minden to visit the
Harold Warp Pioneer Village.  The entrance isn't very impressive, but the place is INCREDIBLE.

Harold Warp was born in a sod house near present-day Minden in 1903, the child of Norwegian immigrants.  He moved to Chicago in 1924 and turned a plastic window material he developed into a fortune. Warp Bros. is still doing business and has a presence on the internet.

When Harold Warp heard that the school he had attended as a child was to be destroyed, he bought it and began creating his Pioneer Village.  There are 25 buildings spread over several acres housing over 50,000 items showing the progress of life in the United States from pioneer days to the present.  Included are a frontier fort/log cabin, a sod house, the schoolhouse mentioned above, a general store, a train depot with two locomotives, a church, a livery stable, a fire house, a land office (the one where Harold's father filed his homesteading claim),  a firehouse, a Pony Express barn, a Pony Express station, a blacksmith shop, and many large warehouse type buildings housing a couple of Conestoga wagons, multiple horseless carriages, over 350 antique cars, several airplanes, hundreds of examples of farm machinery, horseless carriages, and many other thousands of historical items.

We wandered around in the village for about four hours and saw only a fraction of it.  A few of my pictures are included below.  For some better shots, click here.

Missouri Town 1855

It was finally down in the high 80's today, so we set out to visit Missouri Town 1855.  The reconstructed town is located in Fleming Park, a Jackson County Parks and Recreation facility near Lee's Summit, Missouri.  The park also includes two large lakes and a bison herd.

Over 25 antebellum buildings from various locations in Missouri were rescued from destruction, carefully dismantled, and reconstructed on 30 acres in the park.  Most of the buildings are furnished with period pieces.  Interpreters wander the town in period costumes and speak to you in character.  Sheep, chickens, and horses add to the ambiance.

We spent a couple of hours wandering the grounds.  I took about 40 pictures. Several  are included in this slide show.

Independence, Missouri

Pioneer Woman

Yesterday was another scorcher, but we had the wanderlust anyway.  We headed into Independence, Missouri, to visit the National Frontier Trails Museum.  An excellent movie there provided lots of information about how the West moved as the United States grew.  Exhibits depicted the travels of Louis and Clark and the travails of the pioneers that traveled west.  The Pioneer Woman statue is in a courtyard of the museum. She is carrying a pail in her right hand and a baby on her left shoulder

Independence Depot

This completely restored railroad depot stands on the grounds of the museum.

We took the Truman Trolley from the museum parking lot past several historic sites.  You can ride all day, getting off and on at the various stops, for one dollar - probably the best deal in Independence.  We were on the last run of the trolley loop for the day, so we just stayed aboard and listened to our tour guide point out the sites.

Image via Wikipedia

Truman Home

We passed several sites having to do with Harry Truman, including the house he and Bess lived in, the church where they were married, the place he bought gas for his car, and the Truman Library.

A splinter group of Mormons stayed in Independence when the larger group headed to Utah.  A plot of land across the street from their very impressive church is believed by over 2 million people to be the place where Christ will return to earth to call the saints home.  (Sorry - no picture.)