May 29, 2006 (Day 5)

Happy Memorial Day to all! Ours was spent “on the road”, traveling between Paxton, NE, and Cheyenne, WY. We awoke to blue skies and sunshine, but much cooler temps. A front came through in the night with heavy winds (some gusted at 63 mph). It brought cooler temps, so today we experienced temps 30 degrees cooler than yesterday…from 98 to 68 degrees. Everyone got out their long pants and sweaters and put away their shorts!

We had a continental breakfast at the campground before leaving. Travel on I-80 wasn’t as windy as yesterday, but some winds. This time winds were headwinds, not crosswinds. Gas mileage averaged 10 mpg today. The highest we paid for gas today was $2.60.

The landscape certainly is changing with rolling, grassy hills. Lots of cattle farms and grain fields were visible; also a very busy railroad that ran almost the length of our trip today. Some trains had 5 engines with many cars. Most were eastbound, but some westbound.

The wind blew tumbleweeds across the road for several miles. We certainly knew we were in higher terraine. The group stopped in Sidney, NE, and spent a little time (and $$) in Cabela’s, a sporting goods and outfitters mega store.

Our destination today was Terry Bison Ranch and Campground. It is in Cheyenne, WY. We all stopped to fuel at a Flying J, but found that electric was out all over Cheyenne, so we traveled on about 7 miles to the campground. Some of us went back tonight for fuel, so we will be ready to leave in the morning. Elevation here is around 6200 ft. For you walkers, try walking at that elevation! It is difficult.

There is a quaint restaurant here at the “ranch” called the “Senator’s Restaurant and Brass Buffalo Saloon”. A group of us went for supper and all had buffalo burgers! This was a first for me. Can’t say they were all that delicious. A working “modern day” cowboy entertained us with song and guitar while we ate. The ranch is over 47 square miles and contains domestic as well as wild buffalo, camels, ostriches, and other unusual animals. We were told a herd of moose were sighted near here last week. It is unusual for them to come down out of the mountains this far, but there were eleven in the herd.

After dinner, Dan and I played “joker”, a popular game among the Airstreamers, with a couple parked next to us. It was a nice evening. The weather is getting cold and we have heat on tonight, as compared to the air-conditioner last night! Low is to be in the low 40’s. We’ll be pulling the blankets up tonight!

Till tomorrow……..

May 29, 2006 (Day 5)

Happy Memorial Day to all! Ours was spent “on the road”, traveling between Paxton, NE, and Cheyenne, WY. We awoke to blue skies and sunshine, but much cooler temps. A front came through in the night with heavy winds (some gusted at 63 mph). It brought cooler temps, so today we experienced temps 30 degrees cooler than yesterday…from 98 to 68 degrees. Everyone got out their long pants and sweaters and put away their shorts!

We had a continental breakfast at the campground before leaving. Travel on I-80 wasn’t as windy as yesterday, but some winds. This time winds were headwinds, not crosswinds. Gas mileage averaged 10 mpg today. The highest we paid for gas today was $2.60.

The landscape certainly is changing with rolling, grassy hills. Lots of cattle farms and grain fields were visible; also a very busy railroad that ran almost the length of our trip today. Some trains had 5 engines with many cars. Most were eastbound, but some westbound.

The wind blew tumbleweeds across the road for several miles. We certainly knew we were in higher terraine. The group stopped in Sidney, NE, and spent a little time (and $$) in Cabela’s, a sporting goods and outfitters mega store.

Our destination today was Terry Bison Ranch and Campground. It is in Cheyenne, WY. We all stopped to fuel at a Flying J, but found that electric was out all over Cheyenne, so we traveled on about 7 miles to the campground. Some of us went back tonight for fuel, so we will be ready to leave in the morning. Elevation here is around 6200 ft. For you walkers, try walking at that elevation! It is difficult.

There is a quaint restaurant here at the “ranch” called the “Senator’s Restaurant and Brass Buffalo Saloon”. A group of us went for supper and all had buffalo burgers! This was a first for me. Can’t say they were all that delicious. A working “modern day” cowboy entertained us with song and guitar while we ate. The ranch is over 47 square miles and contains domestic as well as wild buffalo, camels, ostriches, and other unusual animals. We were told a herd of moose were sighted near here last week. It is unusual for them to come down out of the mountains this far, but there were eleven in the herd.

After dinner, Dan and I played “joker”, a popular game among the Airstreamers, with a couple parked next to us. It was a nice evening. The weather is getting cold and we have heat on tonight, as compared to the air-conditioner last night! Low is to be in the low 40’s. We’ll be pulling the blankets up tonight!

Till tomorrow……..

May 28, 2006 (Day 4)

We rocked and rolled all night with the wind as strong as it was. It was a gentle rocking of the trailer that probably put us to sleep! However, to have it rocking and rolling the trailer while we drove down the road, was a different story!

Our group now numbers six units, with two units joining us in Nebraska City last evening. The campground host invited all of us to a continental breakfast this morning, donuts, coffee and juice, great nutrition! We then left the campground around 9 a.m. to continue west to I-80. The crosswinds increased in strength and became quite a problem driving. Dan was “white-knuckled” with both hands on the steering wheel, driving 50-55 mph in a 75 mph zone! Trucks passing us were a hazard and we were blown off the road onto the berm a couple of times. There were dust storms we drove through a couple of times, too. Two of the motor homes in the group had their awnings blow loose and one trailer almost lost the air conditioner cover. Thank heavens for duct tape and bailing twine! We are doing okay so far and don’t desire to drive in anything like that again.

We weren’t able to get into tonight’s campsite until 4:30 this afternoon. It was a long, hot day. A temperature clock in Kearney, few miles down the road, said 98 degrees. We are at Paxton, NE, tonight. When we arrived, we found two more couples (expected) who are joining us, one couple from Kansas and one from Iowa. We know these people, so they are not strangers. One more lady will join us some where on down the road. She is driving her car and will stay at a motel in Salem. While on the road, she is going to bunk with one of the couples who have a motor home in our group.

Here are the people who are making up this caravan:
From the Greater St. Louis Unit:
Glenn Waters, Alton, IL
Bob and Jean Helker, Chesterfield, MO
Joe and Nita Bublis, St. Louis
Dan and Beth, Wentzville
Charles and Nadine Kennedy, Kansas City Unit
Ben and Marcia Woolley, Iowa Unit
Leonard and Betty Sullivan, Wichita, KS Unit
Paul and June Ryan, Iowa Unit
Teressa Taylor, Colorado (don’t know what unit she is with)

Gas stops were frequent, considering we have 5 motor homes and 3 trailers. The motor homes have around 100 gallon tanks. How would any of you like to pay those bills? We have a 37.5 gal. tank, so guess we stop more often and it isn’t much different when you add it all up. The highest we paid for gas today was $2.66/gal. We hear that the farther west you go, the more the price per gallon goes up! We’ve heard from people in front of us who say Idaho is at $3.17/gal. Ouch! With the winds today, we averaged 7.5 mpg.

The group went together for dinner at a restaurant in town, Ole’s Steak and Game. Food was good and atmosphere “western”. One of our members who plays piano, played a few songs while we waited for our meals.

Well, on to tomorrow’s adventures. Till then…..

Saturday, May 27, 2006 (Day 3)

Tonight we are in Nebraska City, NE. It was hot today, with high’s in the low 90’s. There is a very strong wind which made towing a little more interesting. We can’t put out awnings or vents up here at the campground, as the wind is so strong. So the next thing to do is (ahhh) air conditioning. So grateful for A/C, both in the trailer (Silver Tent) and Suburban (dubbed Black Bear). Today we picked up two more couples; one from Kansas City area and one from Iowa. Now we are traveling with six units.

Today we drove 291 miles, with lunch on our own in our trailers at a truck stop. Tonight we all went to a wonderful Mexican restaurant. Food was very good. Then with our tummies full, we stopped at an outlet mall just up the road from our campground. Resisted the urge to buy anything, even though the mall was having sidewalk sales!

Our morning started out with a call from our grandson, Ryan, age 8. He had to tell us about his ballgame the night before we left. It was a good way to start the morning, hearing his voice.

Early to bed tonight, as tomorrow we will travel our farthest distance on this trip, over 300 miles. We make several stops to stretch and for potty breaks. Learned that if we hear someone of our group say they have to stop and “check the refrigerator”, they mean they have to potty. So now when you see an RV parked along side a road, it most often is more than mechanical problems!

P.S. To our blog readers: If you did not register in the blog, you will not be able to comment back to us. However, all you need to do is send an email to our normal address: ars9068@aol.com

Until tomorrow……

Thursday, May 25, 2006

With one day to “lift-off”, we are busy, busy. We have been working on getting the trailer and Suburban packed up with all the essentials we will need for the next 4-5 months, including two seasons, and all the “stuff” in-between. It seems that one of us is running daily, or twice a day, to town for this or that. It will be good to have it all done and finally be on our way tomorrow.


Friday, May 26, 2006

Well, today is the day. I am wondering if we will ever be ready to go. Last night was a baseball game of Ryan’s which we wanted to see and be around family one last time before leaving. It was hard to say good-bye, wondering if an eight-year-old, five-year-old, and three-year-old would understand why grandma and grandpa won’t see them for several months.

The weather, when just last weekend was cool, has turned quickly into summer and we are dealing with temps in the low 90’s and that dreaded humidity.

The washing machine has run daily for the last few days, trying to keep the dirty clothes washed up. Then once we got the boxes and piles of things up off the floors, we were able to clean the house to at least see what the floors looked like.

We hope to leave today at noon. Things don’t look positive! There have been several phone calls with people and neighbors wishing us well and safe trip. That has been so nice. We have great neighbors who are willing to help us out by watching our house while we are gone.

Departure time turned out to be 2 p.m. We heard from our friends in our caravan to Salem who were at Bill Thomas’ Camper Sales on the west end of Wentzville. We hooked up with them and the four of us (Airstreams) headed for Columbia, MO, for our first night. We got into the Boone County Fairgrounds for our overnight stay. Only one other camper was here. All of us went to dinner at a favorite diner called the 63 Diner. This is a small place in a 50’s theme with waitresses in poodle skirts and with pony tails and a life-size statue of Elvis gracing the entrance. When we got back to the campsite, we pulled out our chairs and sat around visiting until darkness set in. After a short walk, we have all retired to our trailers for the night. Till tomorrow……

This is a test for me to figure out how to post a picture to this blog. Assuming I have now found the right combination of key strokes, the picture you see attached was taken by Ray or JoAnn Kolley on our Mystery Caravan when we were in Nauvoo Il. It's a picture of the new Mormon temple. The original temple was burned down in the 1840's by locals who didn't want the Morman's in the area.

May 19-21, 2006 GSL (Greater St. Louis) Unit Rally held at Carlyle Lake, Il. We arrived mid afternoon Friday, enjoyed visiting with everyone, especially the Bakers, Stablers, and the Roodhouses who we had never met before. We watched a Alfred Hitchcock movie (North by Northwest) on the side of a white tent from 8:30 to 11:00p.m. “Starts on the Water” was the name of the rally with the “Star” being Cary Grant that night. Saturday we visited, drove to some other Corps of Engineers campgrounds and had a “Chili Dump” for dinner. Everyone brought some of their favorite chili, dumped it all in a big pot and served it. Not bad! That evening we listened to a 1949 Groucho Marks radio show called “You bet your life”, visited and ate smores around the campfire. Sunday consisted of more visiting around the “breakfast table” and getting hooked up for departure. We arrived home after a couple of stops and had a nice dinner with Harry and Nancy Corbett.

B&D TravelsDespite a cold and windy weekend with the family a good time was had by all. Mermac was closed for flooding and at the last minute (15 minutes) we diveret to Pere Marquette (sp). No rain even though it was forcasted. Great campfires.