Home again, for a few days

Dothan, AL; Lloyd, FL; Orange Park, FL – Thursday to Saturday, November 17 to 19, 2011

We made it back home on day 172. We have mixed feelings about the trip ending. We will only be home for 3 days and will head out to our annual Thanksgiving weekend at our friends river house, so we will still be in travel mode. We decided to not unpack and will probably still “live” in BG until we return on Monday after Thanksgiving. Won’t take the cats in the house, so as not to cause them any trauma. It will be interesting to see how they do after almost 6 months on the road in a small space. Come to think of it , it will be interesting to see how we do!!

We left Blue Ridge, GA Thursday morning. The storms had passed and it looks like clear weather all the way back. At the campground we stayed at for 4 nights, there was no doubt which way we should go.

Our route back home will be via DeFuniak Springs, FL so we can stock up at our favorite winery. We sure don’t care for this time change. We only made it as far as Dothan, AL before it was dark. We were back into the central time zone and it was only 5:00.

Friday we made it into Florida. Not too far over the border, we stopped at an Outlets store to see if they had EJ’s favorite shoes at Easy Spirit. Spent more time there than we expected, but found more than we intended. When we got back to BG, we had an unpleasant surprise, the water pump wasn’t working. Both of us thought, oh, no, not again. This is the 3rd pump we are on. Luckily it turned out to only be a blown fuse.

Made it to Chatauqua Winery and got our wine, after a few samples to be sure which ones we wanted. Once again dark got here before we were ready and we only made it to just east of Tallahassee at a travel center.

Up Saturday with only 153 miles to go. Are we dragging our feet or what? We stayed an extra day in Blue Ridge, it took two days to get to DeFuniak Springs and two more days to get to Orange Park, we may as well have tossed out an anchor!

The ever helpful Mocha decided to put her two cents worth in to routing us home.

Excited and sad at the same time. We are looking forward to seeing our friends and neighbors, but not getting back to all of the at home responsibilities. Here’s what greeted us when we got home. Looks like we’ll have something to do for the next few days.

All in all things were in pretty good shape. We have great neighbors who looked after things while we were gone. We even had a welcome home dinner with John & Jeanne, which made our day.

Stay tuned for another blog after Thanksgiving. We will be posting some trip trivia, highlights and general thoughts about our adventure. It’s been quite a ride.

BG Miles Today	659	BG Total Miles	13971
Eat Out total $	1870.29	BG Total Fuel $	7845.42
Entertainment total $	1401.63	Total Camping $	1374.53
E Miles Today	0	E Total Miles	3308.31
E Total Fuel $	682.86	Day # of Trip	170 to 172

Blog Catch Up Time

Farmington, NM; Santa Rosa, NM; Big Springs, TS; San Angelo, TX; Waco, TX; Texarkana, TX; Winona, MS; Hiram, GA, Blue Ridge, GA – Sunday, October 30 thru Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Back on the road again working our way back home. We’re on our way to see Frank’s Dad in San Angelo for a few days.  But first we have some more of New Mexico to negotiate.  As you can tell the roads out here are pretty desolate, but beautiful.  The third picture is of Ship Rock mountain, a landmark mentioned often in the Tony Hillerman series of books. Pretty impressive.  From the distance, the second picture appeared to be a hole in a big rock but as we got closer it became two separate rocks.

We’ve been dodging snow storms and endured a day long drive through a West Texas dust storm on our way to Big Springs Texas. Most of the time the wind was at our back, but when it was at our side it got very exciting. It was a nice sunny day and the dust had an interesting effect on it.

 

It was just after dark when we got to Big Springs where we’ll spend the night before the final leg to San Angelo tomorrow.

Another strange building along our way.  We couldn’t see any signs indicating what it was used for.

We arrived in San Angelo and we got to spend 6 days with Frank’s Dad.  He’s doing real well and definitely has all the good eating spots in San Angelo scoped out.  For instance, a full Mexican dinner for $3 at Gil’s Restaurant, with $2.50 margarita's.  It was half price night. You can’t beat that!  One thing is for sure, Dad won’t starve.

Things are so organized at Dad’s place that we didn’t have to do any remodeling at all this time.  We really enjoyed our visit.

Unfortunately one of his friends had to go into the hospital while we were there, but the good news is that he is back in his apartment now and seems to be recovering well.

After we left Dad’s we spent the next three days making miles.  Our first night was spent in Waco, TX, the second night near Texarkana, and the third night in Winona, MS.  In Winona our anticipated overnight at Walmart didn’t work out.  It wasn’t a Super Walmart and it wasn’t in the best of neighborhoods.  So we backtracked 4 miles to a Pilot Truck stop and spent a fairly quiet uneventful night there.  The next morning we did watch this one fellow walking around the parking lot brushing his teeth and smoking at the same time.  You can see the puffs of smoke behind him.

On what was to be our final day of this leg, we had over 400 miles to travel and try as we might, we just ran out of daylight and only made it as far as Dallas, GA. 

EJ got a haircut, and gave one to Frank as well, and we got gussied up for the last few miles to Blue Ridge, GA where we will visit with “cousins” Jim and Shelley Ward.

While we were there, Frank and Jim hiked part of the Benton McKay trail and experienced a 267 foot suspension bridge.  After the hike we discovered once again, the many dry counties in northern Georgia, and why you should pack a cooler to take with you.

EJ and Shelley went shopping in downtown Blue Ridge and brought home many goodies. 

While we were relaxing with Jim and Shelley, EJ enjoys the company of Brody and Maggie.

Unfortunately it rained on Tuesday and curtailed our planned trip to the Habersham winery in Helen, GA. So we decided to have a nice breakfast and go to the Mercier Orchard store where we were wowed by all the different varieties of apples, baked goods, and trinkets.  We all ate some miniature pies while we were there and bought other goodies to take along with us.

On Wednesday we had planned to leave to drive to De Funiak Springs, FL to pick up some supplies at the Chautauqua Winery before heading home, but once again bad weather got in the way and we decided to spend another day in Blue Ridge while the storms passed through GA.

While we were waiting, EJ took Frank to the Blue Ridge Antique shop where she had purchased some coffee.  We liked the coffee so much we bought two more pounds to take back to Orange Park with us.  Since it will probably take us 2 or 3 days to get home, we go by the local grocery store to stock up some food for the rest of the trip.

Afterwards, we enjoyed one last evening with the Wards before heading south on Thursday. It really seems hard to believe that we have been gone 24 weeks already!

BG Miles Today	2084	BG Total Miles	13312
Eat Out total $	1850.37	BG Total Fuel $	7500.45
Entertainment total $	1401.63	Total Camping $	1374.53
E Miles Today	149	E Total Miles	3308.31
E Total Fuel $	682.86	Day # of Trip	152 to 169