Training

We are in our second week of training to be "Park Rangers" here at Everglades National Park.  We've had lectures on the history of the Park: It was established in 1947 as the first national park dedicated to preserving it based on it's ecological impact in the area.  Originally the everglades comprised 2.5 million acres of land starting by Orlando and the Kissimmee River basin south, which flowed into Lake Okeechobee which over flowed into the everglades.  However, with man's infinite wisdom, in the late 1800's and even today, he has drained, diked and altered much of this area for development and farmland and now the everglades is only 1.5 million acres.

So we learned all about the hydrology and how the government promised to restore and repair the everglades, but of course, it's much more concerned with the people on the east and west coast having fresh water (which they waste) then allocating it back to the everglades, so the eco system is still in peril.

We learned about the birds that are here, over 350 varieties. So here are a few that we have seen:

Wood Storks

Great Egret

Check out the blue eyes!!

Anhingas

Purple Gallinule

Great Blue Heron

And of course an Alligator!!!

and we are learning how we are suppose to give our interpretive tours.  It looks like Fred and I will be giving tours of the Nike Missile Site which was in the park, as while as nature tours on the Anhinga Trail.  I will also be doing a "Coffee with a Ranger" either on Friday or Sunday mornings.  So we have read more nonfiction books about birds, the everglades and the Cuban Missile Crisis in the past month then we've read in years.

As part of our training, we have also been able to explore some other areas of the park.  We went on a boat trip into the Gulf of Mexico and got to see the mangrove trees, the pelikans and some beautiful roseatte spoonbills. (Pictures to follow when we get some good ones.) We did a five mile canoe trip into the everglades, which was suppose to be from 3 - 5, however, it was almost 4 when we got out on the water and a 1/2 hour after sunset when we got back to shore.  It was erie being out on the water after dark.  We also did a five mile bike hike in the pouring rain.  This is definately one tour neither one of us wants to give!!!

We are looking forward to finding out our schedules and planning our tours.

Our New Assignment

We have arrived at our next assignment, Everglades National Park.  It is only 160 miles from my parents in Fort Myers Florida, so we hope a good place to spend the winter.

We traveled 'Alligator Alley' also known as I-75 from Fort Myers to the Florida Turnpike to Dixie Highway, (Side note: We lived just a few blocks from Dixie Highway in Homewood and my office was also on Dixie Highway.  Somethings you just can't get away from!!) to Everglades National Park.

We arrived late afternoon on November 16th, so our supervisor Ryan, showed us to our site in the housing area.  The sites are nice and big, and eventually will house 11 other camper volunteers.  We do have to becareful of our surroundings as there are diamondback rattlesnakes in the area.  Luckily so far we've only seen one on the main road.  We have a very nice FREE laundry right across the road from us, so that's really nice and convenienent.  Ryan had the next three days off, so we were on our own to explore the park and the town of Homestead.

The weather is still warmer and wetter than usual, so the sightings of wildlife are not as pronouced as it will be later into the dry season.  We have seen alligators and lots of birds, anhingas, egrets, herons and lots and lots of vultures (both black and turkey).  I will start posting pictures of them soon.

Sunday we started with our orientation and paperwork.  Being a government entity there is a lot of paperwork.  We hope that by tomorrow, it will be done and we can really start to work.  Fred's main responsibility will be developing his own tour of the Nike Missile Site here in the park.  In addition, he is interested in giving some nature tours.  I will be splitting my time between the main visitiors center and giving nature tours.  We will also be developing our own tours.  We have found out that Interpretive Tours are different than just tours.  Not sure yet how they are different, but we will learn all about it next week during our training sessions.

So far there are only three other couples in the campground and they all are really nice.  We hope that as the weather cools down and the mosquitos disappear, we will be able to spend more of our free time getting to know them.

So in closing:  To all of our family and friends near and far, we wish you a very, Happy and Safe Thanksgiving!!!

Family and Food

We had a nice visit with my parents in Fort Meyers.  It was so nice to see my dad after his health scare the week before.  There's nothing quite like being able to see him in person, and give him a hug to reassure yourself (and the rest of your siblings up north) that he looks and feels good.  Thanks for all your prayers.

So what did we do in Fort Myers???  We ate, and ate and ate.  I felt like a little kid again eating my mom's good cooking.  The only difference is that now we start out each meal with a cocktail!!!! Then there was breaded tilapia, beef stew, and best of all pork cutlets.   MMMMM Good.

We were also surprised to find our favorite pizza joint from Homewood IL has a restaurant in Fort Myers.  So once again we had Aurelio's pizza. 

During the day, we did projects around the rv or just hanging out with mom and dad.

We also are bringing my parents into the 21st century.  Out with their old 'webtv' internet and hopefully by Thanksgiving hooked up with a new laptop computer and wifi!!!

Fall Again and Again and Again

Fred and I were just commenting the other day on how lucky we are to be able to experience fall weather over and over again.

We were in Spearfish South Dakota in September when the colors in the canyon were changing.

We were at the pumpkin farm in Illinois with our grandson Jonas in October.

And then in November we were able to see the colors changing in Alabama.

We took a day off from our travels and visited the Vicksburg Mississippi National Military Park.  This was a pivotal battle during the Civil War.  General Grant's army lay siege to the town of Vicksburg which had a very important port on the Mississippi River.  After surrounding the town for 47 days, the Confederate Army surrendered and the North controlled the river.  This allowed Sherman to gather the necessary supplies for his march across the south to Atlanta.

In the park, there are numerous monuments dedicated to the armies from the states which participated in the campaign.  The majority of the soldiers were from Illinois, therefore, one of the most elaborate monuments was sponsored by the state of Illinois.

This was one of the monuments dedicated to the Southern States.

And of course, no trip to a National Park is complete without a picture of Fred!

We had a bit of unwanted excitement this week.  An almost flat tire...

During our travels we have developed several  routines.  One of those, is that whenever we stop, either Fred or I do a walk around the truck and RV to make sure that everything looks in order (tires, slideouts, stairs, bikes..). We had stopped for lunch around 12:30 and all was well.  At around 2:30 it was time for the afternoon potty break.  We stopped at the rest area in Port Charlotte Florida.  I exited the rv quickly (if you know what I mean!!) and Fred did the walk around.  When I got back to the RV he was on the phone with OnStar.  The back tire on the passenger side of the RV had worn down to the cord!!  Luckily with our Good Sam emergency road service, we had the tire changed within the hour.  We were also able to call Camping World in Fort Myers and order a new tire.  We've dropped off the old tire and on Wednesday when we leave town, we will stop by and pick up our new mounted tire.

Thank goodness for your routines and our guardian angel.  This could have had a disastrous ending, but thankfully it was only a minor delay.  So to all of our RV friends out there,  Please walk around and inspect your RV everytime you stop.

We are now at the Fort Myers Beach RV Resort for a week.  This is a good place to stay while we are visiting my parents.  It's sooo wonderful to be able to spend some time with them.

On the Move

We finished our visit back "home".  It was a bit odd to be staying at Fred's parents house which is just a half block from our former residence of 18 years.  I guess it was good that neither Fred nor I had any real desire or yearning for the old house.  We were both a bit curious as to the changes that they made to the backyard, but in all the time in Homewood, we never mistakely pulled into the driveway!!!  It solidifies the fact, that we made the right decision about full timimg.

We were really glad to be able to get back there and spend time with family and friends. It was also a good time to check in with our doctors for routine checkups.  Thankfully, overall we are healthy.  I was able to spend a girl's night out with my dear friend Alyson, who I worked with, and helped her celebrate her birthday.  We were able to spend a week with Fred's sisters Cyndy and Gayle who came in for Esther's 93rd  birthday.  We spent time  with our grandkids, Samantha and Spencer and Jonas, it's great to see them so happy.  They do grow up so fast. (I can't believe that Samantha was able to read to me two complete books!!)  And the last night there, we spent the evening with my best friend from college, Jan and her husband Bill. 

But now it's back on the move and going down the road.  We are heading for Florida via Kansas.  After Fred's accident last January, we started thinking about our new life style on the road.  We live in our house and if anything should happen to it, we'd be homeless...  So we are being proactive and have started to look for our next RV.  It took us almost two years to decide to buy the Titanium, so we are starting to do our homework now.  When we were looking last time, we were also interested in the Hitchhiker Discover America RV by NuWa.  They are made in Chanute Kansas so we left the Chicago area and headed southwest.

We left Chicago on Sunday October 31st.  We stopped in Bloomington and had lunch with our friends Joe & Vicky Harbison who we met on our Alaska caravan in 2003. (This is the best part of rving, meeting people who become life long friends.) They will be down in Florida this winter so I'm sure we will see them again soon.  We stayed at a cute campground in Edwardsville IL called Red Barn Rendevous.  We had stayed here back in 2006. Monday, it was on to and through Missouri to Kansas City.  We arrived in Chanute Tuesday early afternoon, but they only give tours once a day at 9:45.  So we settled into our campsite and enjoyed our first meal ever at Sonic!! Chanute has a great little city campground. No frills, just water, electric and a dump station, but the price is right.  The first two days our free, then it's $10 per night.

We toured the NuWa plant on Wednesday and we were very impressed with their product.  The only draw back is that most of their rv's our preordered by people so it takes 10 -12 weeks to get one.  We planed on leaving on Thursday, but heavy rain and wind kept us in place for one more day.  So instead we did laundry and went to the movies.  Footloose...  good movie, but I still like the original version best!

Friday was a perfect day for traveling.  Sunny skies, mild temperature and beautiful fall colors.  I have been doing most of the driving this trip and I never realized how hilly western Arkansas is.  I'm sure I would have enjoyed the scenery more, if I didn't have to pay such close attention to the road.  Now I know how Fred feels most of the time.  I just hope that with my driving he was able to relax and enjoy the view!!!  (I only heard him gasp a few times!!)  And the view was spectacular, I wish I would have been able to pull off and take some pictures.  The colors were amazing. We stayed at Ivy's Cove RV Retreat.  They had the absolute best bathrooms that I have ever seen in a campground.

In six days we have driven through six states, (IL, MO, KS, OK, LS, AR. MS). Today we arrived in Vicksburg, Mississippi (I couldn't resist spelling that out). The drive from Russellville AR to here was not very exciting.  Lots of plowed cotton and tobacco fields.  We haven't seen a lot of wildlife on this trip, surprisingly the most common thing that we are seeing are hawks. Today alone, we saw at least 50 of them.  Fred said he saw some armadillos, though I never saw them... We will be touring some Civil War sites in the morning.

Home Sweet Homewood!!

It's been an interesting two weeks "back home".   We were able to stay with our oldest daughter Julie and her family in Chicago (Though trying to find parallel parking in a Chicago neighborhood is a challenge!!).  We went to the Pumpkin Farm in South Barrington with Julie and Jonas.

I got to help with the pony ride.

 It is much more fun to see something like this through the eyes of an almost three year old.  What a great place, pumpkin farms have changed alot since Fred and I were kids.  Besides the pumpkins, there was an animal land that would put some zoos to shame.

  We were able to feed the giraffes.  My they have long tongues...

A pumpkin eating dinosaur. (No joke), a corn maze, which was harder than I expected, camel rides and pony rides.  We had a blast!!!

We even got to see Jonas play socceer.











We were able to surprise our other set of grandkids, Spencer and Samatha with a quick visit one day.

On Sunday we were able to see Samantha play socceer and visit with our older grandson Spencer, Andy and Kristina and Andy's parents, Sue and Marty.

 Watch out, this girl can run.  She scored 2 of the 4 goals that day and still had so much energy afterwards.  Oh too be young again.








Our daughter Julie is expecting their second child in December, so Papa Fred and Gigi helped set up Jonas' new big boy bed.  The big truck was helpful in transporting all 15 of the boxes that made up his loft bedroom set.  Thank goodness Fred is so handy, as it only took a 1/2 day to put it all together.  Jonas has slept in it every night since then.

We also had fun craving a pumpkin.

After a week in Chicago, we are now staying at Fred's parents in Homewood.  A half block from our "old house".  It was nice to see the old neighborhood, and the changes to the old house, but we are SO glad we don't have the responsibility of a brick and stick any more. We have enjoyed visiting with former neighbors and friends.  It's also been nice to eat some good pizza!!!

We've seen all of our doctors and for the most part have gotten clean bills of health.  One small snafu though, Fred badly sprained his ankle while taking his treadmill test.  The heart is fine, but the ankle will take awhile to be back to normal.  In the mean time, I think Fred likes being chaufered around by me. 

We celebrated Fred's mother's 93rd birthday this past week.  It was so nice to be able to have his sister's Cyndy and Gayle here at the same time as us..  We have so much fun and laughs with them!!!

We have a few more days to spend in Illinois, catching up with old friends and eating at all of our favorite places.

On the Road Again

We have finished our assignment in South Dakota and our now heading back to Illinois (In the past I would have said heading home...can't say that any more!!!)  We left Spearfish on Monday October 3rd.  We left the RV in Rapid City for some minor repairs. (To fix a problem from Fred's accident in January and some other minor things).  We were able to spend several days in the Midland-Milesville SD area with our daughter Jen.  It was so good to see her and to see how excited she is about her job as a Vet Tech with Golden Vet Services.  We only had a small honey do list to help her out and help her prepare for her first winter in South Dakota.  We were invited to her landlord's Rick & Marlis Doud for dinner one night.  We were able to have some home grown South Dakota beef from their ranch!!!

We finally picked up the RV on Thursday afternoon, and of course there was a problem....  The work they did on the front of the RV looks great..however, when we hooked up we realized that the marker lights on top did not work.  After an hour of troubleshooting, they determined that they would have to pull the whole front cap off the RV to see where the problem was, at a cost of $95/hour and at least 6 to 7 hours of work.  We decided that it wasn't worth it and we just won't drive at night!!!

Our plans to leave on Friday were delayed due to high winds (sustained winds of 25 gusts to 60mph!!) So we spent an extra day in Rapid City. We finally got on the road on Saturday, Oct 8th.  We travelled uneventfully to Sioux Falls, SD where we had a nice dinner with our friends Tom & Shelly Wray. On Sunday we travelled through Minnesota and Wisconsin and saw some beautiful fall colors.  We spent the night just south of Tomah WI. Monday we again realized why we like the west... no traffic... As soon as we got near to Madison WI we started seeing alot more vehicles. Thankfully, there wasn't much construction.  Fred was finally able to get his bbq fix in Janesville, WI where we stopped for lunch at Famous Dave's!!!  We arrived at our campground (Pine Country, Outdoor World) in Belvidere on Monday afternoon.  We set up camp and spent a quite evening before heading into Chicago to see the families.