9/29/14 Beaver Dam Campground, Minden, LA

Today I was up at a more normal time for me, 7:30.  Once up I began working on my laptop.  Most of the time when I'm on my laptop I'm usually working on this blog, financials or a few other small projects I have.  Today it was all about this blog.  I'm having trouble posting pictures so I was working on that most of the morning till Jami got out of bed around 9:30 with no luck :(


We both sat outside enjoying the warm weather and our awesome campsite.  That is one thing we really love about this lifestyle, our view is constantly changing.  And we've been able to enjoy a lot of those so called "million dollar views" for around $20 bucks a night :)  Jami and I chatted and played on our tablets for awhile, then we ate some breakfast before taking Jemma on a walk around the campground.  Being a Monday all the weekenders left yesterday leaving only 3 other campers in the whole park.  NICE!!!!   Don't get me wrong, we love meeting and chatting with people, but we find most of the time on the weekends there can be a lot going on with the family's camping that we tend to stay close to our campsite.  During the week it seems to be easier to meet more full-timers/part-timers or couples around the campgrounds. 

Jami decided today would be laundry day so she started a load of laundry.  We have a combo washer/dryer in our rig "Splendide 2100" to do laundry.  Its a lot different than doing laundry in a house with a normal washer & dryer.  There are debates all over the internet on them about how large of a load you can do, wrinkled cloths, wash/dry times and so on.  We actually love it, now it does take about 2-3 hours to do a load of laundry from wash to dry and a load is about 3 pairs of shorts and 3 shirts. As long as we don't over stuff it we don't seem to have any wrinkling problems which is important cause most RV'ers don't iron, including us :)  Now a separate washer & dryer would be nice, but we were unwilling to give up the extra space it would have taken up.  The only time we have to use a laundry mat is when we need to wash a comforter, other than that everything else we can do in our Splendide 2100. 

When we returned I decided I would remove the screen on our Fantastic vent fan in the bathroom and clean it.  It snaps out easily so I got it out and went out side to hose it off.  Easy enough job even a cave man could do it :)  Once done it was back to the computer for an hour or two to see if I could get some pictures to upload into yesterdays post, Nope :(  I think I need a "Blogging for Dummies" book or something, so frustrating!   

I moved on and started working on a Financial/Budget page to add to this blog to help people that are looking into this lifestyle see what it cost us to live it.  Its broken down into categories and monthly expenses in each along with what we budgeted.  I think it will be very helpful to those looking into this lifestyle.  Of-course that has turned out to be challenging too :)  So it may take me a bit longer to get that posted, be patient. 

There is a Dam at this park so we decided to take the walking trail to see it, but we didn't want to walk as far as we did yesterday so we drove the truck down to the boat ramp and jumped on the trail from there.  First we took Jemma down the boat ramp so she could take a dip in the water, that always helps her stay cool for awhile when we go walking.  Once she was good and soaked we were off to the dam.  While on the trail we had another trail merge into ours, about 5 minuets later we learned that was probably the trail were should have turned on, so we retraced our path and turn onto the merging trail.

 We arrived at what I can only describe as disappointment.  I guess technically its a dam, but I think its more of a overflow.

 There was a walking bridge so we walked over it and to the other side of the "so called" dam. 

We walked back to the truck and drove back to our campsite.  It was just over a mile walk, perfect for Jemma.  She needed a nap after all the adventures

Chillin like a villain :)

 

I tried again to upload photo's to yesterdays post with no luck :(  I then tried to update the maps in our GPS, couldn't do that either,  AARG!!  I usually don't think of myself as a dufus, but I may be second guessing that here soon :)  So I grabbed my tablet and played a few games trying to calm down.  Jami went inside to work on her computer and then began cooking dinner.  After dinner we both got showers and sat down to watch some TV.  Jami decided to use here computer to see if she could upload photo's to the blog, SUCCESS!!!!  We tried again on my computer and it didn't work so there must be something work with my laptop.  I did get a message saying my graphic card has an error so maybe that's the problem.  Anyway, Jami got the pictures posted in yesterday journal if you want to go back and see them.  We watched TV till midnight before going to bed.  Tomorrow we only have about an hours drive to Shrevport, LA where we're working the FMCA Six State Rally so theres no rush to leave early.

9/28/14 Beaver Dam Campground, Minden, LA.

I have a good amount of pictures for this post, but I can not get them to post at this time.  As soon the problem is fixed I will add the pictures in so keep checking back,  Sorry




9:30!!!!  That's when I crawled out of bed this morning.  Wow that's late for me.  Jami made it out around 10:00.  We certainly slept in.  As usual we sat outside with our electronics, Jami with her coffee and me with a soda.  It was almost 10:45 when Jami made us some scrabbled eggs w/ sausage mixed in and some toast & grapes.  Boy did that hit the spot!!  After our breakfast/lunch we went back outside to enjoy the beautiful weather we've been having, Plus I had a few maintenance items I needed to do.  But first we listened to a pod cast of an interview that the Executive Director of RVSEF (our boss Walter Cannon) did a few weeks ago that aired today.  He did a great job as expected. 


Now it was work time, the first thing I did was remove our 8' portable ladder from the back of the camper and trim back a few branches that were touching our camper, then it was time to deal with a rubber seal at the top of our kitchen slide that keeps moving out of place when we travel.  This seal is attached to the RV and runs horizontal across the top of the kitchen slide.  There is a plastic track first screwed the whole way across the slide opening, then this rubber is slide in one side of the track and pulled to the other side.  To keep this seal from moving there is a screw in each end of the seal.  Its job is to seal out the weather & water when the slide is pulled in for travel.  What is happening is as we travel down the road somehow the seal begins to move forward, I'm guessing the slide-out must be moving or vibrating in such a way to make this happen.  The screws in the seal to hold it in place has somehow pulled through the seal.  Sometimes I get into projects or a maintenance jobs like this were I wish Kenny (my step-father) was here to give his opinion and/or help me fix something.  I've moved this seal back into its correct position twice before, but this time I wanted to see what I could do to prevent it from moving again.  I decided adding a screw with a washer on it in hopes it wouldn't pull through the seal.  I finally got the seal back into position and on its track and added the screw with the washer to each end, I would liked to added one in the middle too, but with the slide toppers that would have been a little more work than I wanted to get into today.

Tree branches trimmed

Top horizontal rubber is the piece that keeps moving forward

 

Okay, now on to the next item, wash the bugs off the front cap of camper.  But first Jami stopped me by saying "have you lubricated our slide outs"?  Jami participates in a couple RV related forums and a question about lubricating the slides outs came up.  Well, no I havent, so I grabbed a can of silicon spray and prayed them.

Now I must admit that lately I haven't been removing the bugs from the front of the RV cap as often as I should.  I used to do it every time we traveled, but not lately.  I'd like to say I've been to busy, but we all know that's not true :)  I moved the ladder to the front and started cleaning the cap with Dri - Wash n Guard.  This is a waterless cleaning product that not only cleans, but waxes to.  You spay it on, then wipe, then when it hazes over like wax you wipe/buff it off.  It works really good and makes the RV and trucks look great., but it does take longer than washing with water and much more elbow grease.  Its a great solution for when you are not allowed to use the campground water for washing or if you want to get a protective wax on while cleaning.  About half way done I had to stop because the sun was shinning on the cap drying the solution to fast.  Perfect timing, my arm needed a break anyway.

Jami and I decided to take Jemma for a walk on the trail that passed by our campsite, we had no idea where it went or how long it was, so we were going to find out :)  It was a nice trail with a few small wooded bridges.  Jemma chased a deer, then almost got in trouble with a snake.  I can never remember the saying about the red, yellow & black snake, which is what Jemma found.  Luckily Jemma left the snake alone and it turn out after I Googled it not to be a Coral snake but to be non-poisonous, probably a Florida Scarlet snake.  But I re-learned the saying, Red touches Yellow, Kill a fellow.  Red touches Black, friend of Jack. 

We were tracking our walk with an App on Jami's phone and could see that this trail was continuing to lead us away from the campground, we were hoping it would eventually begin to loop back.  After a little over a mile and a half we decided to turn around and head back.  When we returned it was a 3.5 mile hike in all.  By then the sun had moved enough for me to continue cleaning the front cap of the camper. 

SPANKY CLEAN FRONT CAP!!! ;)

By the time that was done Jami started cooking dinner.  Pork chops, green beans, corn & left over macaroni and cheese shells.  It was so good!!!  After dinner we got showers and watch TV till it was 11:00 and time for bed. 

9/27/14 Beaver Dam Campground, Minden, LA

Well, as normal when camped in campgrounds just off major highways we were awaken by fellow RV'ers pulling out early.  According to our clocks it was 8am, but our clocks are on eastern time so it was really 7am.  Jami stayed in bed for a while longer, but I was up so I went outside to see how the weather was and who else was out and about.  Apparently we were in a pretty deep sleep cause over half of the RV's that pulled in last night were already gone.  Jami was up and out of bed by 8:00 local time.  We both got some breakfast and hung out inside doing our normal things, Jami on Facebook and me on the laptop computer.  A little after 9:00 we started getting things ready to travel and by 9:45 we were on the road,  I think that must be the earliest we have ever pulled out of a campground.

We were on the road about 15 minute's on I-59 south then we exited onto I-20 west when I saw a rest stop, knowing we left pretty early and Jami's morning coffee was probably going through her I radioed her and asked if she wanted me to pull in.  Being the "rest stop" sign didn't saw how far till the next one we played it safe and pulled in.  When bathroom breaks were done I asked Jami if she wanted to drive the Dually pulling our 5'th wheel.  At first the reply was Uuumm,  well,  Hmmm, I don't know,  how far is it to the next rest stop?  She looked it up on her tablet and saw it was 75 miles so she decided she would go for it.  Now Jami has driven the dually while pulling the camper before both on the highway and on smaller streets going through town, but I was always in the truck with her, this will be the first time completely by herself.  There she is ahead of me :)

Now up to this point the roads have been smooth with very little traffic, no sooner did she get a few miles down the road the traffic came out of know where with of-course plenty of semi trucks, then the roads turned into the roughest, bumpiest roads we've been on yet.  I think the closest dirt track would have been smoother.  I thought on some of the bumps the trailer tires were about to come off the ground.  Jami made it to the next rest stop, but just before it she got to cross her first real bridge by herself.

She was ready to get out of that truck and back into her Toyota, she said it was stressful with the terrible roads and all the traffic, but being right behind her the whole way in the Toyota I can say she did terrific!!  She stayed centered in her lane, changed lanes and handles the semi's next to her excellent.  Anyone following her would have been impressed on how well the driver of that truck/camper was handling all those obstacles.  Can you tell I'm proud? :)  Although the conditions weren't idea for her first solo drive, I'm sure she gained a lot of confidence in herself because of it.

While in the rest stop Jami noticed a screw driver stuck in the underbelly of our camper.  She asked me about it so I looked to see what she was talking about.

Yep, That's a screw driver alright.  I guess we ran the screwdriver over causing it to bounce just right to stick itself into our underbelly.  I pulled it out and fortunately it didn't seem to hit anything important on the other side of the underbelly.  I'll have to tape the hole up later.  Jami went inside the camper and noticed the recliner was now in the reclined position and one of her pieces of crafts that was attached to the wall came off.  I'm telling you, the roads were awful. 

I took over from there and the roads smoothed out and traffic lessened, of-course :)  We were on I-20 for most of todays trip to "Beaver Dam Campground" within the "Kisatchie National Forest".  This is a National Forest campground and it is beautiful!!  Large campsite with water & 50 amp electric for $15 a night!  This place will probably be getting a rating of 8 out of 10 when I add it to my campground reviews page. 

 

I have no idea what kind of plant this is, just thought the purple berries were pretty.

We were really liking this place so we made plans of a campfire tonight right away which means we needed to run into town to pick up some wine, and since well be in town I offered to cook dinner.  FYI - that means I'm buying dinner :)  We stopped by the first grocery store we passed, no wine, so then we went to a Wal-Mart, no wine.  So we asked where to get wine, whelp, its a dry county :(  So we bought me some mix so I could drink frozen strawberry daiquiris (yes, I drink girly drinks), Jami still had wine for her at home.  We got some subs from Subway in Wal-Mart and headed home.   Once home we ate our subs, got showers and got the fire started.

 
We sat out there till almost 1am local time, now we haven't really adjusted from the eastern time zone to the central time zone yet so my body was thinking it was almost 2am and it wanted desperately to go to bed. I bet we adjust to the new time zone now.

9/26/14 Travel Day Bonita Lakes RV Park. Meridian, MS

I slept in this morning rolling out of bed a little after 8am.  Jami followed at 8:30am.  We were in no rush to leave so we putted around till about 10 when we started to pack up.  Being we pulled into our site facing the wrong way it took a little longer than normal to pull out.  Jami guided me as I backed down the road where I could drive forward out of the "West Loop" campground.  I pulled into the dump station while Jami continued on to a gas station to fill up the Toyota with gas.  Once I finished with that always lovely job I was on the road  at 11:15am.  The first 6 miles is a wind road down the mountain, which was much nicer than the drive UP the mountain :)  Once down the mountain I meet up with Jami and we got onto I-59 south.

I love roads like this,  No traffic, smooth, rolling hills

 

 

 

Now once we got near Birmingham the traffic picked up, we exited onto 495 around the city and rejoined I-59 again which is also I-20.  We arrived at "Bonita Lakes RV Park" at 4pm and got checked in at the office, then pulled into our campsite #28. 

 

 

About the only word that comes to mind when trying to describe this campground is "Dump".  Its a run down campground that services either long-term rentals for people that have temporary work in the area or 1 night stays like us.  Now it does have full hook ups with 50amp electric so I rated it a 2 out of 10 on my campground reviews page :)  Here is something you don't see every day,

 

Yep, a window A/C in each slide out window.  We got set up quickly, I entered the address for tomorrows travel day in the GPS's and did a little work on my laptop computer.  The GPS's and I are working together again, but I now print out the directions on the computer before each trip just to make sure the GPS has me going the way I want.  Jami made the announcement that she wanted me to cook tonight so we jumped in the truck to find a place to eat :).   First we stopped to fill the Toyota with gas and then headed to Chick-fil-A for dinner.  We went through the drive thru and headed home.  We went inside , ate dinner and watched TV as  more campers continued to trickle in, What started out as a fairly empty section of campground was almost full by 10pm.  During our travels here we went through a time zone so we gained and hour, so with the clock saying 10:30 and my body saying 11:30 I was off to bed.  I felt like my head was getting a little stuffy so I took some Nyquil, yah, I should sleep good tonight :)  

9/25/14 Relaxing Cloudland Cayon State Park, GA

I was able to sleep in till 8:15 this morning, no doubt due to the calmness of camping in a secluded park with little to no noise.  Jami was awake but laid in bed till 8:30 waiting for her coffee to brew :)  We sat outside with light coats on, Jami enjoying her morning coffee time and I was just enjoying the lack of anything around us.  I desperately need to wash the RV and not seeing anything in the rules prohibiting it I'm thinking that will be on todays "to do" list for later.  First we want to do a small hike on the "Overlook" trail.

Around 10:30 or so we jumped in the truck and drove down to the trail head about 4 miles away, but still located in this park.  As soon as we got to the trail head this is what we saw!

 

 

Oh ya, I think we'll enjoy this trail :)  The trail follows the edge of the mountain for almost a mile so off we went.

Outlook Ahead :)



 

 

Once we finished that trail we drove to another area of the park where there is a trail that takes you to tower and an animal viewing area.  We weren't expecting to see any animals in the middle of the day, but what the heck, ya never know. :)  The trail to the viewing tower was short, but steep.  Yep, I'm feeling the burn in my legs from yesterdays stairs.  We need to get in better shape.  Once there the tower was not very tall, I had it in my head it was going to be this large tower about 60' tall.  Kind of glad it wasn't, that just means, yep, more stairs :)

There is a fishing pond beyond the tower so I'm sure in the early morning you can see numerous animals.  We made the climb back up the trail to the parking lot where we parked and drove back home.  It was so beautiful outside I decided before I attempt to wash the RV I would sit outside and begin writing todays journal entry and upload all the pictures.  Jami got a picture of me doing just that :)  Sneaky

 

So while I was doing that Jami gave Jemma a bath.  She needed it after finding some deer poo today on our walk and rolling in it.  Sheesh!  After Jemma was all clean again and I was caught up on todays journal i decided it was time to wash the RV.  So here I go, I'll be back :)

 Clean Jemma :)

 

 

Okay, I'm back :)  I washed the RV, dually truck and ate lunch.  It all took about 21/2 hours so it was getting close to dinner time.  I started working on the "Campground Reviews" page and got it caught up to our current campground.  Wow has that been a work in progress.  Now that I'm caught up the reviews should get much more detailed with a more accurate rating.  While I was finishing that up Jami was cooking dinner on the grill.  Yes, I usually do all the grill cooking, but Jami knows how time consuming and difficult it is to enter in all of the campsites we've been to so she let me get it done while she grilled the BBQ chicken.  Oh was that yummy!  After we ate outside on the picnic table Jami jumped in the shower while I did the dishes and then it was my turn in the shower.  Tonight is campfire night so we were getting excited for the sun to go down. :) 

 

Once out of the shower I went outside, Jami had wine poured and the fire started.  I carried some more wood from the truck to the fire pit and assumed my fire watching position in my chair :)

 

Jemma already in here fire watching position, Jami getting ready to assume here position in the chair.

 

 

I was texting with my Mom when we heard a group of coyotes hooting & hollering.  They weren't to terribly close, but close enough for us to keep our guard up.  They would stop for a bit and then start the howling again as they slowly made there way around the campground.  We called it a night just after 10:30 and were in bed by 11pm.  Now when we go to sleep we turn the TV on and set the sleep timer for it to turn off, well last nice we got involved in a movie so we didn't get to sleep till after midnight.  Tomorrow is a travel day :(  So stayed tuned to see where we end up :)

9/24/14 Travel day with a walk. Cloudland Canyon State Park, GA

We both had a much better nights sleep last night.  I was up at 7:30 and decided to change our travel plans.  Originally we were going to drive 41/2 hours today and stay at a campground on Hwy 75 for 1 night and then drive another 4 hours the next day.  We had talked about staying at Cloudland Canyon State Park in the North/West corner of Georgia yesterday but decided we wanted to go further towards Louisiana where we have a Rally to attend starting on 9/30.  Well this morning I changed my mind so I did some map questing and got our new directions printed out.  Now we only have 3 hours to drive.  When Jami got up around 8:30 I informed her of the changes and she was very happy about it.  She hates long driving days. 

We started getting everything packed up, I got the tanks emptied which was pretty easy since we have full hook ups here.  We were in no rush so it took us a little longer than normal, but still we were pulling out a 10:15am.  It was a boring trip as almost the entire trip was on freeway's, I-40 to I-75 to I-24 to I-54.  Once we exited the freeway it was 6 miles to the campground, but it was a windy road so I didn't get much over 35mph.  At one point I had to stop while going up a pretty steep grade because a semi had broken down in my lane and a tow truck was on site getting hooked up to tow it.  Luckily police were there directing traffic around.  That wasn't fun trying to get going again up that steep hill.

Once we arrived at the park I jumped into the Toyota with Jami and we scouted out the campground to find the site we wanted.  There are two campground, the East rim & the West rim.  East rim is fairly open, but the west rim is very wooded.  We chose Site #40 in the west rim.  This may be the only site in this section that a roof top satellite MIGHT be able to get signal.  The site would not be a great site if you pulled into it in the direction your supposed to, but we decided I would pull in facing the opposite way which put the water & electric hook ups on our door side.  But what a great campsite when you pull into it facing the wrong way.  We sent up the satellite and it did find a very week signal so I moved the camper forward 2 more feet and whala, we had great signal.  Now its the best site in the park :) 

We have all the privacy we could want.  And after the last few campgrounds we were sure ready for a place like this.  That's mainly the reason I made the change of plans to come here.  We got everything set up and being its been awhile since Jemma has gotten a long trail walk that's what the plan was.  This place has a few different trails and 2 water falls so we headed out to see one, maybe both of the falls.  The trails can be a little treacherous with all the tree roots and rocks which also makes it a much more difficult walk.  Glad I didn't were flip flops :)

 

 Small cave

 

Ya, that's the trail!

 Jemma crossing the walking bridge

 

 We decided to view the Hemlock Falls on this walk

 

 Stairs

 More stairs

 And more stairs

 What's this? Yep, more stairs.  And believe me there were ALOT more.

We were pooped after walking down & back up all those stairs that Jami could barely hold that rock up :)

 

We didn't get any pictures of the falls because you couldn't get a good camera shot from above it and we had enough stairs for today.  We'll try again tomorrow.  The total walk was 3.2 miles which felt more like 10 miles!  Jami made spaghetti for dinner when we got back, she makes awesome spaghetti! Delicious :)  Then we both got showers and watched some TV.  We had full intentions of have a campfire tonight, but we were felling a bit pooped so we will postpone that till tomorrow and went to bed.  AH, the peaceful sounds of the woods.  Which is mostly the sounds of crickets :)  Well sleep good tonight.