Potrero Chico (day 2)

Didn’t get any sleep Saturday night. None. As expected, the church party went on as a lot of Mexican parties do, right until sunrise. The music was loud and it never stopped.

Potrero Chico, Nuevo Leon, Mexico

We were up at 6:30am yesterday to get an early start for the border. The Columbia Bridge border crossing is actually about 25 miles (40 kms) west of the city of Laredo. We like this crossing because it’s never busy and there is lots of easy parking for an RV of any size.

Laredo, Texas

We had our best sleep in days at the fairgrounds near George West, Texas. They have only just installed rows of full hook-up RV sites there, but we didn't use them. We just parked.

Near George West, Texas

Yesterday's blog got posted late, so you may want to check it out first before reading the story below.

Yesterday's blog post

Austin, Texas

Yes, parked up at a Sears store mall right beside the I-35 in Austin, Texas. This is not an ideal overnight spot! How did we arrive here? Well here's the story...

Lake Limestone, near Groesbeck, Texas

We got an early start yesterday. We're trying to get back into the habit of leaving early and arriving early! We took all Texas backroads and arrived at our destination around 2:00pm.

Monticello Park Campground, near Mount Pleasant, Texas

We left Hot Springs National Park at a decent hour, but as soon as we left we came across a laundromat. We were going to have to stop and do laundry at some point today, so rather than risk trying to find another one, we simply stopped right away.

Hot Springs, Arkansas

We took a break from driving yesterday and hiked into the town of Hot Springs. There is a one mile hiking trail that goes from the campground into the town. It poured with rain all morning, but things cleared up a bit by 11:00am or so.

Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas

We did a fair bit of driving yesterday, and it was all on the backroads. Plus, we didn't start off until later in the morning so we didn't arrive at our destination until after 4:00pm.

Blanchard Springs Campground, Ozark National Forest, Arkansas

We got an early start out of the Round Spring Campground yesterday morning. We took advantage of the facilities and had a nice quick hot shower.  Then on our way out we used the dump station for the first time this trip, and topped up our fresh water tank.

Round Spring Campground, Ozark National Scenic Riverways

We actually had a good night sleep at the Salem, MO Walmart. Interesting note, there has been a Walmart in the town of Salem, MO since 1971… store #46, if I remember correctly. Saw a sign that said they have one employee who has been there for 40 years! I hope she was able to take part in a share purchase plan!

Salem, Missouri

Well the highlight of yesterday was the weather. A storm system moved in yesterday morning that dumped a pile of rain on us all day, with a high temperature of only 61F (16C).

Berryman Campground, Mark Twain National Forest

Yesterday morning, Sam and Donna took us down to the old section of the city of St. Charles. This is famous as being the spot where Lewis and Clark and their dog Seaman set off for their expedition way back in 1804.

Downtown St. Louis

Today was our big trip to downtown St. Louis. We've never been to St. Louis before and we were looking forward to seeing a new city, and we were looking forward to meeting some new RV'ing and blogging friends.

O'Fallon, Missouri (day 2)

We had a fun, relaxing day yesterday. Even managed to squeeze in an afternoon nap!

O'Fallon, Missouri

Another long driving day, but now we can relax! We actually slept in yesterday morning, and didn't leave the winery until almost 8:00am. Whiskey seems to be back into her normal schedule now that we've left Ruth's Dad's where she had been waking up around 6:00am every morning.

Simmons Winery, Columbus, Indiana

Just another driving day. Did 299 miles (478 kms) today. Considering that we normally like doing about 120 miles (200 kms) a day, this is a lot of driving for us. But Sherman is doing fine just truckin' along!

New Philadelphia, Ohio

On the road early again yesterday morning, and managed to do another 235 miles (376 kms). Mostly on backroads again, but did do a little bit on the Interstate.

Port Allegany, Pennsylvania

We were up early yesterday morning to the sound of raindrops on Sherman’s roof. We said goodbye to John and Ellen and thanked them for their hospitality.

Near Camden, New York

We enjoyed our time visiting Ruth's Dad and want to say a big "thank you" for putting up with us and letting us use the shop and tools to fix up Sherman!

We left at around 7:50am, which was later than our planned 7:30am start. We were supposed to be at the Canadian Tire in Kemptville for 9:00am for Sherman's emissions test, and we made it at 9:05. They took us in right away, and as expected, Sherman passed with flying colors and the bill was $35 plus tax.

Headin' south!

Got Sherman all ready to go yesterday, and we're hitting the road!

One more sleep!

We head out tomorrow! And other than Sherman needing a bit of a tidy up, we're pretty much ready to go. The only thing I didn't get done was to finish cleaning the roof and touching up the roof caulking. That will have to be done on the road sometime because it's supposed to rain on and off here today.

Comments

Wow, thanks for all of the interesting and well thought out comments regarding my restaurant situation the other night. I agree with those of you who think the waitress messed up and forgot to put the order in. If that was indeed the case, I wish she would have just come right out and said that to us! We probably would have been more accommodating and felt bad for the girl. Anyhow, I guess we'll never know.

How long should you wait...?

I was out for dinner last night with four old friends. Went to the Heart and Crowne pub in the market area of Ottawa.

August expenses

Again, spending more than we wanted to, with August coming in at $1,747. But, the majority of the extra was split between vet bills for Whiskey and renovations for Sherman.

Drive Clean

That's the name of the Ontario vehicle emissions testing program. It's just a big money grab because the vast majority of vehicles tested pass with flying colors. For cars, the test costs $35. But for motorhomes, there is confusion.

New flooring...preview

I had to post a couple of pics just so you know I have been working! It's a bigger job than I thought it was going to be. Cutting out the old carpet on the entrance stairs was difficult and they had so many staples holding it in there that it was apparently not meant to be removed!

Seven more sleeps!

We leave a week from today, and it's going to be a busy week! Didn't get much done during the day yesterday because we went into Ottawa for lunch with my Mom and two sisters. So after supper I worked on the floor until about 10pm last night.

Europe in a motorhome?

We got into this motorhoming thing about four years ago. In fact, we had never even been in a motorhome until July of 2007. We always thought of motorhomes as being crammed into RV parks with your neighbor being parked about 10 feet away and we knew that wasn't for us. But then we met Glen and Steve.

Saturday

I got some more of the old carpet cut out from around the entrance steps. We're going to replace it with the same fake hardwood laminate that we're putting through the kitchen and bathroom. Of course they had it held in there with a gazillion staples, but I guess that'a the way they do it. At least it never came apart in 16 years!

Route south

Well it's only 10 days until we leave so we were looking at our route south. We have a few things we want to see along the way, and I've included some of them on the map below, but we've been known to stray as we find things to do that are close to our plan.

New Carpet!

Well the carpet is done and we're very pleased with it. It was a bit more difficult than I expected though, and my hand is sore this morning from cutting the old carpet out yesterday!

New carpet coming!

I took a small patch of the old carpet with me into the city yesterday, and the first place I stopped at was able to match it up pretty good with a short roll they had in stock.

Two weeks to go!

We leave here September 6, so there's only two weeks to go! We're making good progress though and I'm confident we'll have everything ready by then, including replacing the carpet. That's the only real big job left on the list.

License plate sticker (part two)

So I made the phone call to the Ontario Ministry of Transportation. You would kind of think that the people who answer their help line have probably heard it all, but this girl said she had never come across this problem before.

Sunday

It kind of rained on and off all day yesterday, so didn't get much done. I did adjust Sherman's drivers door window, but I don't think it's getting any better than that. I have a feeling it's not the original one and that it was changed at some point, so this is as good as it gets, but at least it's slightly better than it was.

License plate sticker

Okay, so we're going to Mexico and odds are good that it will be for an extended period of time. Sherman is registered in Ontario, and so has Ontario license plates and a renewal sticker that expires in February 2012.

Two more jobs done!

Picked up Sherman's new heater control valve and got it installed yesterday. Fired him up, tested everything for leaks and everything works great!

New cupboards

Making some more progress on my list of things to do to Sherman. Got the new cupboard doors made and installed, and I'm very impressed, even if I do say so myself!

Busy day

I had a busy day yesterday. After we finished with Whiskey's vet visit, I headed down to Ottawa with a list of things to do.

Update on Whiskey

Well, we spent an hour at the vets. They gave her fluids because she was dehydrated and some medication to settle her stomach. We also have taken home fluid replacement  and have to administer them ourselves for the next three days.

Not a good night

We're off to the vet again this morning. Whiskey has been getting progressively worse the last two days and now can't keep any food down. I was up four times with her last night, coming out both ends. Worse, is that now she's not even interested in eating.

Progress

Some of you think I've got lots to do over the next three weeks! Well it's true, but I'll do a little bit every day and before you know it, I'll be done!

A quiet Sunday

Didn't get anything done to Sherman yesterday, and when I look at what I still have to get accomplished we can't have many more days like that! We're only here for another three weeks and I don't want to be rushing around near the end trying to get things done.

Tired

Might have got two or three hours sleep last night. Poor Whiskey had a bad night with an upset tummy, so Mom and Dad had a bad night too. We think it's a reaction to the rabies vaccine and so all we can do is see it through.

Red Pine Camp

So we visited Red Pine Camp yesterday. It was about an hour and 15 minutes drive to beautiful Golden Lake from Ruth's Dad's place. We got up there about 11am, and went searching for my sister Alison and her son Marshal.

Vet bills

So we took Whiskey to the vet yesterday afternoon. She needed her rabies shot updated for her to be able to enter the U.S. next month.

Slept in!

Whiskey actually let us sleep in this morning. She's been waking us up at just after 6am for the past while because she wants to come down to Ruth's Dad's house. We are sleeping in the motorhome, up at the top of the backyard.

Streets and Trips

You might remember that we won a GPS edition of Microsoft Streets and Trips from Sam and Donna's contest back in February. We installed it on the laptops in early April, but for whatever reason we never really sat down to figure it all out until now.

Interesting times

If the U.S. government were a family, they would be earning a fairly decent $58,000 per year. But they would be spending $75,000 per year. On top of that, they would owe $327,000 in credit card debt. Currently planned deficit reduction measures would reduce their annual spending to $72,000 per year.