Grandma and Papa time !

We got up late this morning after a late night. Hailey and grandma went on a 4 wheeler ride. Then it was time to get ready and head to do some shopping.

First it was to the dollar store and then to Wal-mart! Oh no Hailey in Wal-mart .. look out Papa wallet .. LOL

We were suppose to be food shopping but we ended up getting a makeup kit, Barb Pet Set and Playdoe … 2 pairs of shoes and 3 new dress! Uh … we got just a few food items .. not much.

We came home and it was time to play with the new stuff. As you can see in the picture she looks beautiful with her new style.

Soon it was pool time and then dinner, then riding and before long it was late and time to get ready for bed.

Trip home to get grand daughter

We got up early and got on the road by 6.30 am. We are on another road trip to get our grand daughter Hailey!! Yes, grandma and Papa are so excited she will be spending several weeks with us before she starts school.

We ran some errands and then picked her up and stopped to see our youngest son Gabe and then it was back on the road. We were stuck in traffic for over an hour in St. Louis at the West Florissant exit .. there was a wreck.

After finally getting through all the traffic we finally arrived home around 9 pm. It’s been a long day but worth it.

A busy day

Today has been a busy day. We got around and then loaded the green 4 wheeler as it’s getting new tires. After we got the tires on we then headed to the local arctic cat dealer. We ended up leaving the bike there as it’s not wanting to start.

Then it was a trip to Wal-mart to pick up a few things which ended up costing $95! Ughh it sure doesn’t take long. 3 bags is all we had .. grrr

Then hubby went fishing and i just relaxed a bit and played online. Later hubby came back and then we went to do our laundry .. yes that dreaded task needed to be done.

At least we did get spend a few hours sitting outside relaxing and visiting with friends.

Moved back to Lonesome Pines

We got up early and headed to Lonesome Pines campground to get our new spot secured. Then it was back to Wilder to finish putting the slides in and unhooking hookups and hooking up to roll.

Here is where our home will sit for around 30 days before we move again.

I have a large backyard! The dogs will have lots of room to explore and potty area. Plus we have a fire pit for when the grand daughter comes to visit. We do get some afternoon sun where the 4 wheelers and truck are parked but i have shade under my awning .. I have several blinds up so i can see outside which i love. When my blinds are down the walls seem to cave in on me even though i am living in much living space with our new home. We have a nice breeze and i the wifi is working!! Wifi is a big thing for me … i love having internet access inside of my home. We get 13 TV channels on our antenna so that makes hubby happy.

Getting ready to move

Here is our campsite in Wilder. We are moving in the morning.

Here is a view of the stream in front of where we are parked.

Here is hubby doing what he loves to do here .. yes .. fishing!!

As you can see from the picture in the evening it gets foggy from the cool stream.

It’s still Hot!!

I haven’t posted in a week because once again not really much to post about. It’s been hot here. Too hot! Although looking at the national weather map it’s been hot most places.

We had been told the spot we are on here in Wilder was a prime spot. Well it’s not my type of prime spot!!

As you can see in this picture i took a few days ago It is a pretty view early in the morning and just before dark but once the sun hits and you have to close the blinds. I'm ready to move. We do have morning shade until around 9 am, but once the sun hits it’s very hot here until late in the evening! It is down by the stream but you can’t really see the water from our view. It has that small ground rock that comes inside and gets into everything.

The humidity is worse near the spring as well and in the morning when you get up everything is dripping wet from the dew.

The rules state that you can stay 30 or 60 days (depending on your pad) and then you have to move out of that campground for 4 days before you move back. Tomorrow our 4 days are up and I'm going to insist that we look for a new spot. I prefer Lonesome Pines as 50 amps are available anywhere you park and when the wifi is working that is a added plus. Lonesome Pines is the only campground that offers wifi. Plus at least in Lonesome Pines we got about 6 channels and here we get 1, not much to chose from with it being so hot you can not really stand to be outside.

Let’s just say I'm ready to spend the money and order satellite TV and get a air card! Hope your all staying cool and having a great week.

A Friend Passes

Today is a bit of sad day. We got a call from friends in Mississippi that the camp host there passed away this morning. His wife passed away last spring before we left. We saw him this spring and he looked bad and could barely talk because he gasped for air.

They found out a few weeks ago he was in stage 4 of lung cancer. He hadn’t seen his son in over 12 yrs and he was on his way to see him. When he arrived our friend Bill and his son found him on the bathroom floor dead.

We are sad for his family but we know that he missed his wife very much. He is in a better place now but our hearts are sad. We are thankful we were able to see him in May.

Later in the afternoon we took the red bike into get new tires. We were tired of having to put air in them everyday. Next week the green bike will get a new set as well (they had to be ordered).

Later that night we got another call from our friends in Mississippi and they wanted to let us know they were safely in a motel room hiding out while tropical storm Bonnie decided what she was going to do. Were praying for all of our friends in Mississippi that Bonnie takes it easy on them.

Moved to Wilder

Here at the ranch they have 2 types of campsites for members to park on. 30 day and 60 day pads. The 60 day pads are hard to get as the full-timers that live here year round like to trade places with other full-times. We don’t mind the 30 day pads because by 30 days I'm ready to move to a new spot anyway.

Since we have our new rig we have found a bit of difficulty in finding spots large enough and finding 50 amps is the most difficult. Lonesome pine campground is all 30/50 amps but Wilder, Hill Country, Foggy, Melody, and Powder Mill only have a limited amount of 50 amps. Powder Mill only has 2 true 50 amps and the camp host is on 1 of them. The other is next to the camp host and our campers would be almost touching side to side. I do not like that!!

We had been riding around and looking at the 50 amp sites and Hill Country had several but we were not due to move until July 26th. Well Tuesday night we decided to go out riding again and thought well since the weekend was coming up it might be best to move before then. The 50 amps in Hill Country were all taken, Powder Mill was out as i don’t enjoying be that close to my neighbor. Melody Lane campsites are so small there is no way we’d even try to take our new rig there. We found 2 nice spots in Wilder and so we agreed the next morning we’d get up and take a 4 wheeler down and save our spot.

Well when we got there can you believe both spots were taken! So I decided to drive by one of the prime spots in Wilder to see if by chance it was open and it was! I had wanted to park on this site all last year and could never get it.

Just my luck so we parked the 4 wheeler and went to hook up the camper and moved to our new spot.

Nothing much happening

Nothing much has been happening since i last posted. It’s been too hot to do much of anything but stay inside to keep cool. We did go to town one day and get some grub, and i forgot to get me a air card. The wifi has been down for over a week and so no internet at my campsite. I enjoy playing online and hubby enjoys reading the papers online so he can keep up with the news back home. We’ve been taking rides down by the fishing area and through the campgrounds in the evening when it’s cooler. We’ve also spent time in the evenings visiting with friends and making new friends.

Were just enjoying sitting back and relaxing this summer.

Hope your all having a great summer .. it sure has been a hot one here!!

Mammoth Spring, AR and Little Grand Canyon in Thayer, Mo

Today is my baby boys birthday! Happy Birthday Gabe, we love you. He is 23! Wow how time has flown.

It is one hot day! We decided to take another day trip of looking over Arkansas campgrounds. It’s too hot to do anything else. Heat index predicted to be in the 100’s!

We decided to go to Mammoth Spring State Park. We had driven by several times and it looked beautiful.

First we headed toward the hatchery. We went inside to the aquarium. My pictures are not the best with the lightening my camera doesn’t do well.

Then we went outside to the hatchery. once again my camera didn’t do well, even though i turned the flash off. All i could get pictures of were the coy fish.

Then we headed over the museum, we learned some history. Did you know that Mammoth Spring, Arkansas was the inspiration of the Ole Grand Opry? I didn’t!

The museum is where the old train depot was.

You couldn’t go inside the train but you could see inside and snapped a picture.

Then we headed to the visitor center and the part i wanted to see ….

Yessssss … the dam! Oh it was so hot out walking but when you got below the dam, it was so nice and cool. The water made the breeze nice and cool. I could of stayed here all day long .. this type of stuff, dams, water falls .. basically water memorizes me.

This is the view when you walk across the dam.

What a day to go swimming and yes people were swimming.

Here is the museum from the dam side

This picture is taken from the top of the dam looking down .. beautiful!!

After you walk across the dam the old electric building is open to tour. It was pretty neat as this is where the electric came from to run the dam years ago ..

Wow … look at this huge machine …

This picture if walking back from the electric building.

Little Grand Canyon??

On our way back we say a sign that said Grand Gulf State Park, which is located near Thayer, MO. So since were on an adventure we followed the sign. We were beginning to wonder if we would ever find it. finally a sign that said turn here and then we came to the end of the black top and there it was. The sign that said Grand Gulf State Park. I was thinking it was a campground type park .. wrong ……..

We went inside the park and parked in the only parking lot there was. all we could see was trees and a trail. We got and started down a trail that was rocked and had hand rails .. should of been our first hint ….

Hmmm we never dreamed we’d find this …

The sign above says this …

Grand Gulf State Park preserves one of the state’s most significant geologic wonders – a major collapsed cave system often called the “Little Grand Canyon” When a portion of the cave roof collapsed, it created a three-fourths mile long canyon and one of the largest natural bridges in Missouri.

We walked around the other side and down about 20 steps and there was a nice rail patio and this is what you saw when you looked over the side .. sorry the last photo turned out bad but i got very light headed and we had to get me out of there before i ended up on the ground!!! I don’t do heights very well and looking at this really got me!!

Hubby got me safely in the truck and he walked around another side of the canyon and said that it was 1/8 mile long, 119 steps down and and the canyon on that side was 70’ deep! I have always wanted to see the grand canyon and hope that someday i do get there but not sure that i can actually see it without fainting .. hmmm if i almost fainted seeing Little Grand Canyon what will i do seeing the big one ??

On our way home we stopped at Wal-mart and picked up a few things we needed. I also got me a new memory card for my camera as my camera doesn’t hold many photo’s. I purchased a 4 GB disc .. it was a great day although it is very hot outside and the rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing in our nice and cool home.