Church of Christ
Mission USA
Journey From Shenandoah, VA To Fairmont, MN
(visiting as many supporters as possible)
 
      Overall we had a good trip with the mild weather from VA on. We stayed in some nice places, some not so nice. One thing about living in a MH or any RV is that no matter where you are it is the same house inside (well almost, see end of paragraph): you may even forget where you are until you look outside or hear a noise to remind you. Especially when you “awake” at night with half your wits still asleep! What does make the difference is the levelness; we never put down our jacks on pavement out of courtesy except for places designed for it. Therefore, we are most often out of level on these temporary stays. Sometimes we have to sleep with our heads at the foot of the bed because it is up hill. Others times we may roll left or right.  Also, in most parking lots or whenever the wind is excessive anywhere we have our slide-outs in. As I have said before, it is very close quarters then and it is like moving into a new house when we can slide out.

      We only took the MH where needed, but as I said in my first presentations (12-06ff): “If our journey takes us by Mount Rushmore, we will not turn our heads away from it.” My last presentation was at Greenfield and we stayed at Reelfoot Lake S. P. in TN. This is where we had the tornado watches. We saw many snakes swimming in the water and one big one sunning just over the bank – I think a cottonmouth. How big? All I can say is “big” because I couldn’t stretch him/her out like I did the rattlesnakes back home. You know what I mean?

      When we left TN and crossed the wide Mississippi River we entered into Missouri for the first time in our lives. We met Tammy & gang in Saint Louis: saw the Arch, the underground Museum Of Western Expansion, the old court house, etc. I truly enjoyed the museum. Had I lived back in those days Sandy and I likely would have traveled west in an old covered wagon. Having such a kin spirit I wanted to see Daniel Boone’s last home place (he lived there with his youngest son Nathan) and grave, 14 miles away on his own property then. It is such a good and lovely ground. I enjoyed walking upon all those grounds and being beside the river where Lewis and Clark passed by. These places weren’t far from the campground. Time was short and my mind was boggling – oh so much history – we have so much for which to be thankful in this country. Oh, by the way, anybody want to guess how many digital pictures we took? 

      The route also took us by Hannibal, MO so we stopped for a night in Wal-Mart. We enjoyed exploring the haunts of Tom and Huck. I especially enjoyed “Lovers Leap” overlooking the rolling Mississippi and Hannibal. A plaque there reminds us of three young boys who explored there also in 1967 never to be seen again.

      We headed on toward our destination with a strong head wind. Fuel mileage was showing about 7.4 mpg, but the next day we had a strong tail wind and got up to around 10 mpg. I wish for a good tail wind, but for a segment heading due west we had a very strong cross wind (up to 55 mph). It was hard driving!