St Augustine

Sunday night David, Maryann and I went to Bone fish Grill for another great meal for David's birthday. We always have a great meal there.

Monday was a lazy day. We had the morning to do a few things before getting ready to leave for St Augustine. We took our time going east towards the coast on hwy 40 and up I 95 to SA. Our first stop was at Enterprise to pick up our rental car and then on to the campground. Bentley insisted on riding along on the MH dashboard all the way to the campground for all the world to see. He had a great time looking at all the traffic, passer-bys and views along the St Johns River and beach.

The campground here is North Beach Campground Resort and each site is very roomy, secluded and private There is lots of trees, between each campsite so you feel like you are in a nice wooded area. Across the street in the front of the CG is the beach and The Reef restaurant. In the back of the CG is Aunt Kate's restaurant which sits on the St John's River with a nice dock for fishing. When we checked in the lady in the office was very friendly giving us lots of information about the CG and St Augustine. She also invited us to the party they were having tonight. She said the owner was preparing the food and everything, food, drinks were free, I told her we were here to visit our son and she said bring him too. A very nice lady.

We got to our camp site and got all settle in and fed the kitties. They all know when the slides go out it's time for them to get their food. Such good kitties.

For dinner we met Ryan and family at the Floridian restaurant for dinner. The food was very good and we sat outside on the patio to eat and watched all the trolleys and horse drawn carriages go by. The trolleys were all full of people singing Christmas carols and waving as they went by. Emma had a wonderful time waving at all the people,

Every time the trolley or the horse & carriage came by she would get so excited and jump up to wave.

                                                              I think David had fun too.

There are just so many fun places here in SA and lots to do . This time of year the downtown area is covered in lights and hundreds of people walking about. We are going to enjoy coming here to visit for sure.

On To Ocala

We spent Friday night in Tifton at the KOA CG. It's a nice stop for us on the way to Florida. Not too far from Chattanooga or from Ocala which is the next stop. We like this CG. It has a farm next door where Bentley can go visit the horses and cows. This trip it was cold and rainy so no visits for Bentley. Maybe next trip.

As you can see, the boys really enjoy their bunk. They each have a bed there and a window to look out. Life is good for our kitties.

On the way to Ocala we stopped at a quilt shop in Lake City, Fabric Art  Shop  https://www.fabricartshop.com/  They have been around for many years and in all my trips back and forth to Florida I have never had the time to stop. They are also an Innova dealer and I wanted to stop and talk with them about the Innova and the modification I am getting ready to do on my machine. Unfortunately no one there knew anything about the machines and the one person that might was not there. Oh well. It was a nice large shop aside from the purple building. They had lots of patterns, fabric and unusual things. They had a large selection of various types of threads, buttons, embroidery floss, Perle cotton, beads, paints, tatting supplies and Floriani items. Every where I turned there was something different. One very striking item was a display of beautiful hand made Christmas ornaments. They were not for sale, but they were absolute show stoppers. I should have taken pictures, but I didn't want to be rude. Wish I had now, because I can't even describe how beautiful they were. A very nice stop indeed. I did find a couple of mini quilt patterns and postcard pattern for $2.00. The fabric selection was very nice, but no reproduction or Kansas Troubles, or 30's fabrics.

We arrived in Ocala and met Mary Ann for dinner. She wanted to take David out to dinner for his 72nd birthday which on the 21st. She took us to a restaurant right around the corner from the CG on the top of the Holiday Inn & Suites. What a terrific place. Very unusual for Ocala. Very elegant and an Asian Fusion restaurant called Sky. http://www.ocalasky.com/default.php
The food was fantastic. We each had something different so that we could try more than one dish. Very, very good and we all ate too much. We would definitely eat there again.

Back to the MH for a good night's sleep.

ON THE ROAD TO FLORIDA

Normally when we travel we pack every thing into the motor home earlier in the day, except for the cats. We have dinner, then pack up the kitties and load them into the MH at the storage facility. We pull out of the parking spot where the electric hook up is and spend the night in an open area.In the morning we can head out early and the kitties are all relaxed and at home by the time we leave. Since the temperature is supposed to be 31 degrees we didn't want to spend the night without electricity or run the generator all night long, so we made reservations to stay at the KOA in Ringgold.

Before we left for the MH we had to give Finnigan (aka the puker) his ACE. He did very well and was very relaxed. No puking!!!!!! (which is unusual for him).  We had a great night. All was good.
We had a great night's sleep.

We were scheduled to leave for Tifton, Ga at about 9:30 in the morning. We got everything unhooked, picked up and ready to go except for moving in the 3 slides. Did a kitty count and Finnegan was missing. We thought he had walked to the bedroom, but he was no where to be found. We looked every where: under the front chairs, in all the cabinets, in the bedroom closets, under the bed, sides of the bed, behind the 4 pillows, behind everything in both bunks. We even lifted up the mattress on our bed to see is he could have gotten in there some how. There just wasn't enough room for him to get under the bed and we couldn't find him with the flashlight anywhere. We took out yummy kitty treats. Out came Nicky, out came Bentley, but no Finnegan. We took out catnip. "Yum" said Bentley and Nicky, but no Finny. Last resort was to vacuum. Finny will run the opposite direction from the vacuum cleaner. No Finny. We had already spent 30 minutes looking for him. Where could that cat possibly hide? I looked behind the pillows for the third time. THE PILLOW MOVED. Finnegan had crawled inside the pillow case on the bottom pillow . We couldn't believe it.
We spent so much time looking for that cat. At least we found him. Silly kitty. Or silly Mommy. Shouldn't you know to look inside the pillowcase?

There have been great travel kitties today,

The scene of the crime.

 Finnegan says he's sorry he created such turmoil. (Not really, he was probably laughing at us the whole time).

 Nicky says he's happy Finnegan got in trouble. Ha Ha

Nicky and Bentley love looking for squirrels in this campground. What a good spot.

More travels tomorrow.

Loretta Lynn Concert 2

I'll try to upload these videos on a new post. The one I wanted to post was too long a video and wouldn't post. Poor Loretta was freezing on stage as was everyone else and she had a runny nose. She was dressed to the nine's, but I think I'd have been wearing an overcoat. At age 82 her voice was still great and she was belting them out one after the other. Probably wanted to get it done so she could go warm up. I know I would. What a trooper and a great lady. We really enjoyed it.

Here she is singing with her sisters, Peggy Sue, who has quite  a great voice herself and Crystal. Terrific show.

Loretta Lynn Concert

The concert was held in the outdoor arena on the ranch. It was all outdoors, but it did have a roof over head. We had no car, so we had to walk there. It was a bit of a walk, but we took the shortcut down a trail. Due to the previous days rain a cold front had come through and it was to be 40 degrees during the concert. Yikes. Neither of us were prepared for cold weather and being outside for 3+ hours. The only thing I could do was layer-- 2 shirts and 2 pair of pants and a sweatshirt. It was cold!

The performers were supposed to be Loretta, Crystal Gayle and Peggy Sue (their sister) as the Van Lear Girls. It took us a while to figure how who the Van Lear Girls were. Van Lear was where Loretta, Crystal and Peggy Sue) were from in Kentucky. When we arrived we walked over to the store at the campground and there was a sign saying that Sheryl Crowe was also performing. Wow, we hadn't realized that.

The concert started at 8 pm and we arrived by 7 pm. The longer we sat there, the colder it got. It was packed with fans. Patsy,(Loretta's daughter) came out first and told everyone that there would be a lot of camera and video people there as they were filming a PBS documentary. Boy, she was right. They were right up in Loretta's face while she was signing, but I'm sure she is used to that.
I have a few video, although they are not great. I had to zoom in and they are a bit shaky.

Crystal Gayle

Sheryl Crowe. Couldn't believe she showed up in a thin sleeveless outfit in 40 degree weather. She must have been freezing.  The man behind her is Ernie Lynn, Loretta's son. He is in their band The Coal Miners and he is an excellent singer. Lost of talent in that family.

Hurricane Mills & Loretta Lynn

Our last night we stayed at Loretta Lynn's Ranch in Hurricane Mills, TN. We have never had the opportunity to stop here before, but in July I noticed she had a concert scheduled for Oct 4th, the very day we would be coming by there on our way home. So we made reservations for the 4th at the campground and were fortunate to be able to get tickets to the concert.

Her ranch is about an hour west of Nashville. The ranch has a campground, outdoor concert area, motor track course, horseback riding, her plantation home, museum, a replica of her Butcher Hollow home and a coal mine and numerous gift shops. They had tours of the various places, but we didn't take any of them since we wanted to get home before it was too late in the day. The property there was just beautiful with lots of pastures, woods, shady areas and also a river ran through it. The campground was very shaded, although the sites were a little tight and the hook ups were in strange places. It was a very nice stay.

I have lots of  short videos from the concert which I'll post on another blog post.

Rollin on the River

The Mississippi that is. We had a 2 night stay at the Tom Sawyer RV Park on the Mississippi River in West Memphis. We have stayed here before and enjoyed it so much we wanted to come back if we ever passed through this area again. We could have stayed another day, but we were scheduled to be at our next stop, so we couldn't do it this time. This is a no frills RV park except for the fact that you can park right on the Mississippi (provided there has not been an overflow of the river). The barges go up and down the river all day and night, so you can just sit and watch them go by.

As I mentioned in my last post there was a terrible thunderstorm the first night we were there. They predicted 70 mph winds and tornadoes which did occur just north of us. We had it pretty bad, but luckily no damage.for us.We were just glad to be able to go to bed without worrying about being blown into the Mississippi.

We did enjoy our time there and the kitties enjoyed it too. The next day was beautiful and Finnegan and Bentley had a nice stroll around the CG.When we travel, they each have their favorite place to ride. Nicky likes it under my seat or in our laps, Finny on the back of the couch or in our laps and Bentley likes to ride under the quilt on the bed or on the couch.They really love it when we stop. They all run to the door to smell the fresh air and try and figure out where we are. At night they are either in bed with us, in their bunk or on the dashboard looking out. What a kitty life.
I'll post a few pictures of them just being kitties.

Finnegan on the back of the couch.

Bentley on the table.

Bentley on the dashboard looking for squirrels.

Nicky on the couch.

Finnegan on the bed. 

Bentley in the ottoman.

Nicky loves to get in the cabinets. He can't stand to see an open cabinet and not be able to get in, so he just stands there staring at it and us until we pick him up and put him in. Then he's the happiest kitty you ever saw. Oh to be a kitty in our house.