October 3, 2016
We are on the road again. I am no longer an RV driving virgin. Yes, I finally drove, towing the 5th wheel. Piece of cake.
We left Minnesota Sept. 19th and drove to Austin, MN, where we took in the Spam Museum. Did you know there are 13 different kinds of Spam and Spam is sold in 44 countries with over 8 billion cans of Spam have been sold. Personally, I have not eaten Spam in 40 years but tried their low sodium and lite, and liked it.
From Austin we traveled through beautiful Iowa just missing the terrible flood waters by a day. We camped on the Rock River in E. Moline, IL, where we met my niece and her family in Le Claire, IA, on the Mississippi River and we had a lovely visit. We also had the opportunity to visit the retail store of the TV show, American Pickers. It was smaller than we expected but had quite a few interesting things, including an Indian motorcycle that had been buried in someone’s backyard for 70 years!
The next day we headed out for Springfield IL where we toured the Capitol and Abe Lincoln Library. Time well spent and we highly recommend both. The architect that did Springfield’s capitol building also did the capitol building of Iowa, both very ornate and beautiful.
From Springfield we set off for Cave City, KY to see Mammoth and Diamond Caverns. Interesting and lovely but somewhat underwhelming.
From KY, we drove to Athens, AL where Tom’s sister Barb and her family live. We left our RV there and drove 3 hours to Cleveland TN for a long overdue visit with our friends Buck and Leslie. Lot’s of laughter and catching up. We played golf one day at Cleveland CC where Buck is a member, Leslie and I spent Friday on a lovely drive through the Appalachians to Murray, South Carolina, for a girls day out while the boys played golf, both breaking par – LOL. Tom said the only good balls he hit all day was when he stepped on a trap rake. Poor baby.
We bid our friends a fond farewell Saturday morning and set off for the famed Baggage Claim Store in Scottsboro, AL. Here again underwhelming but we at least can say we stopped.
We arrived back in Athens in time to help celebrate our nephew’s birthday and get caught up on family happenings. We went to a super Mexican restaurant and had a real fun night.
We met friends in Huntsville Sunday to tour the Space Camp Museum Center. Wow, what a day that was. So much to see that we spent the whole day here learning about our rocket/space programs. Strongly suggest a visit to this facility.
Tomorrow we are off to our final destination in Dade City, Florida, for the winter. We are looking forward to it.