Ohio

Thursday, May 23

Today we finished the first leg of our trip after about a 6 1/2 hour drive to Wendell and Dawn Lantz's home Archbold, Ohio (Northwest Ohio).  It was cool and rainy for a good portion of the trip.

We have set the motorhome up on Wendell's father's property which is real near their home.  It's a good set up with electric and water and a paved area near their house (which they are trying to sell and no longer live in).

This part of Ohio is really flat.  Where we are parked, we can see for what seems to be miles over newly planted wheat and corn fields.

We finally have gotten to see Cole and Amy's new baby, who was born premature.  Clara immediately laid claim to all Brayden's time.

Friday, May 24

I spent the morning at the YMCA a few miles from here swimming and Clara spent the day entertaining Brayden.

As is usual when the Lantz's visit their home in Beaufort (which adjoins our property), we always eat dinner together.  However, when in Beaufort, we swap homes.  We can't very well do that here with the motorhome.  The size of their family seems to continually increase.  At various times, there are their four children (Cole, Autumn, Dylan and McKinna), Amy, Cole's wife and Brayden, and Dylan's girlfriend, Emily at the table.  I don't see how they do it, but it gets done.

Saturday, March 25

Today starts the parties.  We are here to help celebrate Dylan's graduation from High School.  It is traditional that most Seniors graduating have a party at their home, inviting family, friends and classmates.  That's nearly 100 parties over this weekend for graduating Seniors at Archbold High School.

We accompany Wendell and Dawn to two today.  They are really big affairs.  Each host student has mementos and photos laid out on tables at the party showing all the key moments in their life to date.  Like I said, it's a really big affair.

Sunday, May 26

Today is Dylan's big day!  This will be the third Lantz family member graduation that we have attended.  Only one to go in 4 years, Mckinna.

Dylan Lantz receiving his high school diploma

The Lantz family - Autumn, Cole, Amy and Brayden, Dylan, Wendell, Mckinna and Dawn

Four Lantz generations, Marvin, Dylan, Wendell, Brayden with Cole

Dylan and the "honorary" grandparents

Dylan with Mom and Dad

Monday, May 28

Today is Dylan's day to have his graduation party.  It is big affair, with well over 100 people dropping by the Lantz residence to congratulate Dylan and to share stories.  The party is from 4 pm to 8 pm and the visits are steady.  Of course, you can't have this many people drop by without feeding them.  We had hamburgers and sausage burger and the garage is set up as the picnic area because it rains just about the whole day - but a little rain doesn't deter a party!

Dylan with Dave and Shirley Lersch (Dawn's parents)

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Autumn and Dylan

Dylan and Emily

The cooks

Serving up burgers

Clara and Brayden become buddies

Tuesday, May 28

We are in no particular hurry, so we decide to spend another day in the corn fields of Ohio and enjoy the Lantz's hospitality another day.

I get in a good swim at the Y and relax, while Clara continues to play with Brayden.  Tonight we all go out for Mexican food  to celebrate a great weekend.

We enjoy the beautiful grove of walnut trees.  Wendell and his Dad grow them.  These are about 15 years old and will be harvested when they are about 30 years old.

Wednesday, May 29

We pull up stakes and move on down the road.  A rather frustrating day trying to find our way across Michigan toward Lake Huron.  Between ignoring the GPS, and then not ignoring it, we managed to get thoroughly lost twice.  That's a new record.

There are many beautiful barns in Ohio and Michigan

We stop at a KOA campground about 15 miles from Lake Huron.  Tomorrow we will head into Canada for a few days.

Kentucky

Wednesday, May 22

This morning we did not have hot water - and Mama ain't happy!  I have been noticing that we seem to be losing water from our tank and could not figure out why, plus I had noticed that the gas water heater had been behaving strangely.  This morning I figured it out - the pop-off valve is weak and water has been dripping down in the burner and putting the flame out.

I did some research and found a dealer for the Attwood water heater, called and set up a time to drop by and get it fixed.  It so happens that the place we stopped is a salvage yard for damaged RVs.  They buy RVs from insurance companies, strip them for parts, and sell parts on the internet - very successfully from the looks of things.

But, it was very depressing to walk around their salvage yard and see all the "retired" motorhomes. Not a pretty picture.

Bill, it's a good thing we didn't see these before we bought ours!

However, we ended the day on a much brighter note - and the water heater is fixed.

We picked the Kentucky Horse Park Campground near Lexington, Kentucky to spend the evening.  Again, a great choice.  One of the nicest parks in which we've stayed, and only $30.  

The campground, which has 237 spaces, plus overflow, is located adjacent to the Kentucky Horse Park.  The campground has a full size pool (unfortunately not open for the season yet), basketball and tennis courts, and playgrounds. We spent a couple of hours riding and walking around the Horse Park learning and seeing more about race horses than we'd ever known.

Man o' War - a famous horse from the early 1920's is buried here

The Horse Park is a working park, with arenas, stadiums, polo fields, stalls, gift shops, museums, restaurants and anything else for the horse and rider.

Clara really enjoyed this park.  She finally had a tree on which she could put up her swing.

Natural Bridge State Park, Virginia

Tuesday, May 21

We cleaned up the house, transferred all that we needed to the motorhome and left this morning around 9:30 headed for Ohio.  We had decided to make today an easy one and picked a state park in Virginia, which was only a 3-4 hour drive, as a destination for tonight.  I had never heard of Natural Tunnel State Park, but we have been very pleased with a very nice campground and very interesting geology.

Natural Tunnel State Park is a Virginia State Park centered around a Natural Tunnel, a massive naturally formed cave that is so large it is used as a railroad tunnel. It is located in the Appalachian Mountains near Duffield.

The Natural tunnel, which is up to 200 feet wide and 80 feet high, began to form more than a million years ago when groundwater bearing carbonic acid percolated through crevices and slowly dissolved limestone. A small underground river, which is now called Stock Creek, went underground and it continued to erode the tunnel over many millennia.

The walls of the tunnel show evidence of prehistoric life. Many fossils have been found in the creek bed and in the tunnel walls.

The tunnel passes through Purchase Ridge, which is made of limestone.

Although Natural Tunnel State Park was created in 1967 and opened to the public in 1971, the natural tunnel has been a Virginian tourist attraction for more than a century; Daniel Boone is believed to have been the first European to see it in the 18th century. The 41st United States Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan dubbed it the "Eighth Wonder of the World".

This was taken from an overlook above the tunnel as a train starts through the tunnel

A railroad was constructed through the natural tunnel in 1893. The first train, operated by the Virginia & Southwestern Railway Company, passed through the following year. In 1899, the Natural tunnel was purchased by the Tennessee & Carolina Iron and Steel Company. The railway originally carried passenger trains; today, the line is still open but now run by Norfolk Southern and CSX and is only used to transport coal.

It is known that a Cherokee maiden and a Shawnee brave who had been forbidden to marry by their respective tribes, jumped to their deaths from the highest pinnacle above the Natural Tunnel. The place is now known as Lover's Leap.

The mountain rhododendron are beginning to bloom

Tonight we are staying in Lover's Leap Campground.  For the first time in a long time, we've had to cut the air conditioning on.  It's in the 80's and we are parked in the sun, so the motorhome is rather warm.

Going North via West

May 11-14

Saturday morning we packed up the motorhome for our next adventure.

We left early driving both the motorhome and the Ford Explorer.  We are taking the Explorer to Dad for Anthony to use to take Dad around.  His 1984 Buick is about shot and it's a lot easier for him to get in and out of the Explorer, so we are leaving it with him.

We spent Saturday night with Dad and Anthony was able to take some time off for a fun weekend.

Sunday night, Anthony returned and we took the motorhome out to Walmart to spend the night so we can get an early start Monday morning heading to the mountain house.  We had spent Saturday night at Dad's in one of the most uncomfortable beds ever made and we are determined to not have a repeat performance.

We head out early Monday morning headed West.  We have some scheduled maintenance on the motorhome at Tom Johnson RV Service in Marion (it seems we always have some maintenance on the motorhome).  We have found that their service is reliable and we have an issue we water infiltration in a corner, so we need to get it fixed.

They loaned us a car so we did not have to drive the motorhome up the mountain to pick up the CRV (which we had left at the mountain house).  After some car shuttling, we have settled in on the mountain for a few days.

Tuesday is a work day.  The yard is in some need of some TLC, so this week we'll spend a few hours working on it.  We have scheduled delivery of some much-needed mulch for the planting beds around the house.

Wednesday is a play day.  We drive over to Asheville to visit Bill and Jan.  Jan had a partial knee replacement last week on both knees and we are checking up on her - and she's doing great.  Up and walking around, maybe a bit slow, but she is moving well.

Thursday is a big workday.  Horha and Roberto arrive around 9 am to start spreading mulch.  It is something Clara and I use to do, but too many weak backs have made our brains a little stronger - we get help.

It doesn't take long to realize that we don't have enough mulch.  We had 10 yards delivered and we need at least that much more.  I quickly find a local place that will deliver today and sure enough, about the time we used all the first load, the second load shows up.

After we (mostly Horha and Roberto) finish that, they start to work taking some pine trees down.  The pines grow fast and tend to overshadow all the hardwoods, so I'm slowly getting rid of all of them in the view and around the house.

Thank goodness we won't have to do this again for a year or two.  This calls for a sundowner!!

The yard looks really good now.  I just regret that we won't be here in June when the laurel and rhododendron bloom.  But some of the flowers are already coming out.

After a hard day of work yesterday, on Friday we slow down on to relax and enjoy the house.  This evening we had dinner at the Grassy Creek Country Club and go to a play, "Spirited Recollections, A Personal History of Burnsville",  at the Parkway Playhouse in Burnsville.

Saturday we awake to rain, the first this week.  It's really kind of nice sitting up on the mountain in the clouds.

The fog settles in for the day

This afternoon, we go to our favorite place in the mountains, the Orchard at Altapass and spend a great afternoon listening to live music and watching dancing.  There is no place in all our travels quite like The Orchard, where we always see old friends and meet new ones.

Sunday the rain let up for long enough this morning to get some grass seed put out in the bear spots in the lawn and to get some lime and phosphate spread.  The grass is looking great, but we can't seem to get some of the bear spots to fill in, plus the moles keep messing up some areas.  Hopefully I've got the moles taken care of and maybe this grass seed will fill in.

Keith and Diane Howell came over from Asheville for lunch and catching up on their family.

Tonight the clouds dropped into the valley and we were treated to one of those rare sunsets with the clouds below and the sun reflecting on the clouds above.

Monday we are finishing up a few chores around the house getting ready to head to Ohio/Canada/Niagara Falls on the first leg of our summer motorhome travels.

Tonight we went to Will and Bonnie's for dinner, meeting some new friends and renewing acquaintances with old ones.  Bonnie always puts on a special dinner.  The last time we visited them, I had mentioned that the best dessert I had ever had was a fried apple burrito at Wisdom's in Tubac, Az.  Bonnie had called Wisdom's and gotten the recipe, bought a deep fat fryer, and fixed fried apple burritos that challenge (and probably beat) Wisdom's.  Wow!  What a treat.

A Wilmington Weekend

May 4-5

Slade called earlier this week and said he and the kids were going to Wilmington to see the Battleship North Carolina this weekend and wondered if we wanted to meet them there.  We immediately suggested that perhaps we would drive the motorhome down and we could all stay in it.  We hatched a plan and we made reservations at Carolina Beach State Park.

As we discussed it, we decided that we would surprise Anna and Evan and not tell them anything about us being there.  It worked perfectly.

We left early Saturday morning, arrived at the campground and set up camp.  Slade had as a pretense for going to the campground that they were going to get a cabin.  He drove into the campground and were passing our site when Anna commented that the motorhome looked like Mimi and Papa's.  Slade quickly drove up to the motorhome and out we came. What a fun surprise!

Saturday afternoon we went to the North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher for a great afternoon visiting the fish.

Evan loses a finger to the alligator

and eaten by a shark

After the visit to the aquarium, we went out on the windy beach.  The winds were gusting to 42 mph.

Saturday night we enjoyed the campsite and great hamburgers over a campfire.

Mimi and Anna compare shoe sizes.  I think Anna is going to  be a very tall girl if she fills out her height to match her shoe size.

Sunday morning after breakfast, we broke camp and headed over to the U.S.S. North Carolina Battleship Memorial.

There was a dog show on the grounds which we enjoyed for while before boarding the ship.

The dogs were competing in a jumping contest into a pool.  

All the kids try out the bunks

This anchor would sink Eureka

After a nice lunch downtown, we all went our separate ways with new memories.