Weather Front Comes to Visit

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 30, 2023

No walk today as we had chores to do about the dehumidifier not working. So we packed it up and went to Walmart to trade it for another one. The return went very well and a new one was in the basket shortly. Then we wandered Walmart a bit and realized we could do most of our food shopping while we were there this morning. So we unloaded lots of shelves and headed for the checkout. It was busy but just as we walked up a checkout spot opened right in front of us.

Checking out went well and we even found where we had parked soon. Back at the Castle we sorted out our goods and put them away. After checking the purchases against the grocery list on the table we patted our self on the back for a job well done.

Then it was off to Burger King for lunch but as we went down the road the clouds started closing in on our area. Just before going inside the OFM took this picture of of the front arriving in town.

The weather chilled down a little but still was nice enough to get out and about with a bit of shopping. Back at the Castle we checked and a couple of mail order packages had been delivered at the office so we went over and claimed them.

Back at the Castle some coloring was done and some messing around on the computer was done.

Tomorrow we hope to get updated and CORRECT news on the future eye treatment plan. We will see what happens on that issue.

That is about it for tonight. Every one have fun preparing for the Christmas season that starts tomorrow. MERRY CHRISTMAS

Fighting Mold and Mildew

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 29, 2023

We made it safely through the freeze last night and had a beautiful bright blue skies again. Supposedly the freeze weather is over for a couple of weeks now.

Jerry our lunch buddy and the OFM went to his walking area and got in about a mile of walking at a good pace. It was nice to have a companion to visit with while walking for a change.

Walmart was visited by the teams and made a good bit richer before we left. The big item we got was a dehumidifier like the one we had last year that we sold when we headed for the desert. We hare hoping the lowered humidity inside the Castle will help with the OFM and his allergy troubles.

Now a question for our readers. The OFM is considering using canned cooked chicken and beef when we finally get to head out west. We have zero experience with those two canned meats and would like to know anything we might need to know about using them when boondocking out yonder. Please respond in the comments section if you have some advice for us. Thank you.

We will be glad when we find out more about the OFM eye troubles and what is going to need to happen. We are tired of making glorious plans and getting all excited just to have the plans blasted into nothing at the last minute again.

We plan to get busy with some Christmas present shopping tomorrow and see how it works out. In the mean time everyone have a lot of fun and Merry Christmas.

More Eye doctor Time Coming

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 28, 2023

33F right now headed for 25F tonight so we are running both elec heaters and planning on a blanket or two for the bed. Glad we are not boondocking tonight. We are not like the Boondork and find below freezing temperatures ok. But then he is a lot tougher fellow than the OFM is.

We did get out for a nice walk this morning in the 43F cold. The sky was a fantastic blue that really was pretty to frame the tree limbs as we were walking along the paths.

This field near the catfish hole was ready for action with the dry air.

And over to the right was some tables someone had borrowed from the old tables storage for some event. We did not find out what event.

We spotted a blue Heron on a tree limb looking for breakfast. It did not even acknowledge us as we crept closer to get the picture. I guess it was hungry.

And now for the eye doc report. The eye doctor is gathering the previous Huntsville doctors records to make a decision if she can work on the OFM or we will have to go to a local optomologist for more serious work than she is allowed to do as an optometrist. So now we know that we better not plan any travels yet until the doctors figure out what the OFM trouble is coming from. So all plans are now on hold until who knows when. At least we are in a decent location to spend the cold weather since the average low temperatures for their coldest month of January is only about 35F and the Arctic Fox can easily handle that especially with electricity available.

Oh well at least we have a nice campground to enjoy while we wait and try to have tooooo much fun.

Nothing and Everything

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 27, 2023

It was a clean out, throw away junk and read emails day. The temps were too cold for a good walk so we just worked on plans for our traveling future. It is supposed to be a bit colder the next two days then we get a lot better for temperatures.

Along the way we went by Super Walmart and bought some nice groceries and made an eye exam appointment for tomorrow afternoon. Then back at the Castle we researched more spots to travel to out westerly especially in New Mexico below 7000 feet elevation.

So in general it was a good mess around day with no particular goal to strive for.

Sometimes we like those kinds of days. Have fun doing what you like tomorrow.

Kids Art Contest

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 26, 2023

We had a good day today in spite of some cold light rain. Nope to walking in the wet cold and we worked a little while and finished this next coloring.

It was a bit tedious to do but it was also a fulfilling bunch of education to gain.

When we went to the office to check on something, we noticed the Christmas time coloring viewing was beginning for younger kids. The OFM usually does the “get them interested first coloring and it gets hung in the office to get other kids interested. They have three age groups with 7 and up being the oldest. Normally the OFM coloring is the first one hung up but this year by the time I got the enticer colored and back to the OFFICE this evening there were two already colored and on display from the 7 and up group. It is wonderful to get something in the kidds hands beside a computer mouse or a phone. Anyway the first two on the wall were well done.

The two on the bottom line are the kids colorings. The OFM work is the top line. Tomorrow the office lady, Diane, will get it all up and running officially. And that takes care of the interesting part of the day. Now the OFM has to remember to call the eye doctor and set up a new appointment time that he can handle with his night blindness troubles.

As for as schedules are concerned, until something else changes it our departure date will be after Christmas sometime. Then we will head west on I-20 for where ever we land. Time to plan some having too much fun activity for tomorrow, MERRY CHRISTMAS.

Another Restart Again Again

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 25, 2023

Former Schedule of Travel Stops.

Night of travel day Location

11-27 Near Morton Ms.

11-28 Martin Creek State Park, Tx.

11-29 Birch Creek State Park, Tx.

11-30 Choke Canyon State Park, Tx.

12-01 Goose Island State Park, Tx.

That was the schedule for the start of the travels when the Teams went to bed last night.

During today, while testing myself, it became very obvious that the OFM Teams could not count on his eyesight to be safe in certain situations we could encounter. So we canceled all future travel towing a trailer that could end up with us towing after late evening or in the dark until the OFM gets his eyes fixed. Don Cole that means the Teams will not be in Rockport as we had planned. So you can have all the fish the OFM would have caught, if your boat can carry them.

We have to schedule eye exams when the office opens again after the holidays and get busy on the eye repairs as needed.

That means that we will have extra time for grand kids and Christmas things in December. So you can see it is not all bad.

We already are working on travels that start January 1 or there abouts that follow the cool temperature line heading north. Hopefully we can be in the proper places in New Mexico at the correct time of nature to grab more great pictures up there in my natural birth state.

Thats all we have tonight. Tomorrow we plan to attempt some pictures of how low the lake is as the authorities lower it to be ready for spring floods that always happen around here. So rest up and hang on, the OFM has plenty of more ways of trying to have tooooo much fun.

Day Of Changes

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 24, 2023

The morning chill was soon off set by the beautiful bright sun and fluffy clouds we had during the walk. And we tried out a slightly different route we can better handle wet weather in. Hopefully that will make a difference during the colder weather.

Wouldn't you know it, notice of a grandkid Christmas Concert came in and it required a change in our travel plans to go to it. As it happened we were able to get everything to work out by changing our plans a bit. We dropped Falcon Heights destination and changed to Goose Island State Park near Rockport Tx. The travel schedule had to change a little bit but it worked out well after all.

The lunch fellow and the OFM had a very interesting lunch discussion. We were both happy at the new changes in his life.

And that was about all there was to today and we think that was enough. Now let us all kick back and rest for a big day of trying to have tooooo much fun tomorrow.

Too long In One Place

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 23, 2023

The cold damp weather was very overcast today. When we got near the soccer field we grabbed this picture of the sun shining on the players.

We got in about a 2 mile walk but the picture pickings were slim. We thought this leaf was pretty neat the way it has developed. All the rest of them on the tree were ugly the way they had aged.

Along the way we spotted this rotting tree. We have been watching it for several years but it is a bit wobbly now so we got a pic of it inside and outside. Here is the outside shot.

Then we carefully stuck the camera inside with the flash turned on and got this in the first shot. We did not try again as the tree was wiggling around.

We ended up making some very good stoup that was pork chops, potatoes, rice and Lawlers BBQ sauce. It is not real good BBQ sauce but it is pretty good as salad dressing and stoup flavoring. It has a low level tanginess to it.

We did a bit more getting ready to roll on Monday. It looks like we will be fighting cold the first three nights out then it gets warmer and we are happy about that. We are having careful thoughts about if we will stay out here as long next year. The cold seems to penetrate the older OFM body worse this year.

In the mean time be careful about preparations since it has been so long since we last rolled to new adventures. We got here June 1 according to our records. Too much time in one spot we think.

Fresh Oil For Sierra

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 22, 2023

First thing this wet and cold morning was to go get Sierra some fresh oil to carry around in the engine. $75 later Walmart was richer and the OFM Teams were poorer. But a decent aside from that is the OFM did a bunch of walking inside the Walmart to get in about a mile in spite of the shoppers.

When we left the oil change the OFM finally remembered we have been planning on buying some more insulating foam to put in the front bedroom window again. So a quick turn and we were at Home Depot and they had what we needed, so now they are 12$ better off and we have foam to put into the window to keep the Castle warmer.

Here is a picture of the window and foam we like to have in it. We never open this window and the previous foam had been in it since sometime in 2009. Mold had started on the old foam so it was time to replace it.

The OFM needs his antihistamine to breathe these days but the OTC tablet size knocks him out if taken as manufactured. So the loratadine

tablet is cut into two pieces by hand. Then the OFM takes a half tablet twice a day and gets to stay awake when he is supposed to be awake and also gets to breathe to stay alive for a few more minutes. Cutting the pills into pieces is a very careful and precise operation the OFM applys to the tablet one at a time. This next picture shows the very precise method we have developed to get exactly half tablets to use.

Lunch was interesting since lunch buddy Jerry asked about solar panels. We spent about an hour explaining all about the panels and how he would use them if he decided to try his idea. The OFM enjoys teaching folks that want to learn.

At lunch there was a good bit of discussion about Thanksgiving dinner each of us was going to have. Jerry is not a cook. But the OFM has a great idea for himself for tomorrow for his lunch and it involves BBQ sauce. If we live through it you will get to see what happens tomorrow night on this blog.

And finally we have a new coloring to display that we finished a day or three ago. This is a small art work about 3x4 inches.

And now the teams need to get some solid rest to be ready to fight the cold wet outside weather tomorrow as we try to have tooooo much fun again.

Plans Made Again

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 21, 2023

EARLY MORNING REALIZATION

The OFM woke to more rain and minor flooding this morning.

He realized that he had been making travel plans for a Thanksgiving week without considering the crowds of fast moving folks on the roads during that time period. A couple of visits with local folks convinced the OFM it was the wrong time to travel the highways.

This evening already, we have a new routing planned and have made camping plans along the planned route to Falcon Lake Texas. It was astonishing how much easier it was to find sites where and when we wanted them for the week after Thanksgiving week than the week before Thanksgiving week. With the forecast calling for cold nights we chose to get electric sites at Texas state parks for the last three nights of the traveling. Once we get to Falcon Heights County Park it is all boondocking and free.

It feels great to finally (we hope) have all this straightened out as we close in on getting rolling again. If we get in our usual area, we will be about a mile and a half from the Mexico/Texas border. Goodness we do like the dry desert camping in Texas.

YUCK Reservations

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 20, 2023

We awoke to a sore and aching body for some reason, so the walk was gentle and only 1.9 miles. But the OFM was whupped by the time we got back to the Castle. So this morning was a gentle time of recuperation that was successful by lunch. We did get in a nice bit of coloring and experimentation and learning. Here is one of the small colorings that got a rework on some technique on application of solvent and colored pencil. It is not quite right yet but a lot better than it was before the effort.

After lunch the OFM took some ibuprofen and did a lay down for about a half hour. To our surprise he did not nap!

Then he worked on his coloring some more until after supper when the blog took precedence for attention.

We are a bit too antsy about getting gone but the reservations are made (YUCK Reservations) and paid already so we will abide by the availabilities. It will be very nice when we clear Rockport and can once again roll without having to plan places to stay weeks or months ahead of traveling.

We have been restrained by physical and mechanical difficulties since August of 2022. we think all of our restraints are cleared out and repaired or at least manageable again to where we have the freedom of restraints while out rolling trying to have tooooo much fun again.

Holler Through The Door

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 19, 2023

Tap, Tap, Tap gently on the Castle door. OF course nobody knocks on the Castle door unless the OFM is changing clothes. So he hollers through the door that he will be there in a minute. The nice lady was waiting when the door was opened to a clothed OFM thank goodness.

She is a very pleasant blog reader that happened to be here in Point Mallard and tracked us down. We had a bit of chat and then the OFM noticed her husband still in the truck and we all had some more conversation and hope to meet again tomorrow morning when their doggy gets walked. The OFM thinks it will be a very nice visit and is looking forward to it.

When we turned onto the maintenance road next to the soccer field it showed us a beautiful day.

And the rest of the day was just as nice and cool.

Some plant has these big red berries each year but this year a huge amount of them have shown off in bright red all at once. They are really pretty and glowing when you are up close to them,

Towards the end of the walk we caught this picture of sunlight coming through the leaves from the back. On top of that the four leaves are each in a different phase of turning colors. We thought it was a neat picture of mother nature at work.

And then as we were on our way back the sun angle had changed and this side path opening became very attractive to the OFM. Maybe some of our readers will like it also.

More piddling with art stuff, lunch with Jerry and a bit of getting ready to roll next Sunday occupied our afternoon. Even the 20# propane bottles were checked to see how much we have remaining in them. One bottle is full. The other we have been using for several months. The best we can recall we switched to it early this year. When the OFM held it up and swished it around it was obviously over half full still so we will not need to fill it before we roll. When we are on hookups the only LPG we use is a stove burner on very seldom occasion when we cook stoup. Electric is used for comfort heating and heating water in the water heater since elec is included in our monthly $580 bill.

Tomorrow will be a good day for trying to have tooooo much fun. 

Getting Ready

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 18, 2023

By this time next Saturday we should be all coupled up and ready to roll south early the next morning. Then the next night will be a boondock along side I-20 just past Morton Mississippi.

But in the meantime we had to get through this day. During the early part of the morning walk the OFM started feeling pretty nasty and soon after we turned back for the Castle. It was feeling like a bad case of flu like symptoms by the time we got back to the Castle.

The OFM sat around a bit sipping cheap root beer trying to figure out what was going on. Finally he took two Ibuprofen tablets and laid down for about an hour. When he awakened he was doing better and quickly went on to a rating of Just Fine. We have no idea but the rest of the day he was fine. Anyway we just accepted that today was a 1.25 mile day and went on with our rat killing.

A good bit of time was spent considering what we will be doing after visiting Rockport TX. for a couple of days, We do not know yet. But we did a bit of food shopping including a nice deal on some boneless pork chops. Then more considering our travel opportunities in the future.

We finally figured out that it was supper time and got out the Cobb Salad bowl we purchased this morning and a small tub of yogurt to eat. As usual cheap Walmart brand root beer was the beverage.

Now we just need a good nights sleep and to get busy trying to have tooooo much fun.

Foliage Colors Again

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 17, 2023

A little brisk at first this morning so the OFM switched to a baseball cap for warmth on his bald head. Some of the regulars on the trail noted the change in head wear. It made for nice discussions while on the trail.

Today we noticed a special feature of this area. A couple of weeks ago we thought the color season was over. But lately there has been a lot of color again. The difference is one kind of vegetation would change leaf colors for a day or three and fall off the tree or other foliage. Then another model of foliage would change and repeat etc. This morning we had about three different color items. One on their last day or two. Another in full glory. And yet another just starting. But there are still a couple of full green items going strong. So our fall show is lasting several weeks. Here is three different colorations for you. The first two are different trees showing off and the third is some ground cover attracting attention.

Then when we got back in the campground we grabbed a shot from the back end of the loop we are on. It looks like a lot of other large campgrounds in the USA. We are the last site on the left as the street turns left.

We got lucky in that the curve fits the backing curve we need to slide the Castle straight into its site with no hassle at all. And any minor adjustments we might need are on the driver side in plain view while backing. It is darn near to being a miracle it seems to us.

We have a bit cooler weather coming very soon and the wet front is arriving as we type. The weather is supposed to be a bit less than perfect but still workable for the next few days. We are thinking lately it is time to get out and try some more Mexican food pretty soon. That might be a good way of trying to have tooooo much fun again. We are pretty good at that you know.

Careful Preparations

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 16, 2023

It was another wonderful walk this morning but the sun was so bright it overwhelmed the camera abilities for most of the pictures we took. This was the third picture taken and the sun is the glaring bright splatter in the picture. The pics after this one were all washed out enough to be worthless from the brightness. This is the first time in all our years of photography to have this happen.

After the walk we started to straightening up some of the storage areas of the Castle. Mainly we were looking for more stuff to get rid of before our next travels got going in a few days. We ended up getting side tracked by winter items.

The Castle has carried us through many camping temps in the less than 25f range without a trouble at all. But we feel it is still smart to make sure we have the right gear with us on new adventures. Just last Christmas time here in Point Mallard we had three days of 3F mornings and 17f days. Since we had electric heating available it was not a big deal for the Castle. As most of our readers know we got rid of the onboard forced air furnace several years ago. Now we heat with elec when it is available or LPG gas when no 120 volt plug in is available.

We plan to be boondocking on the Rio Grande this winter where we could have a few cold days like a couple of years ago when we got caught in a week of low teens temperatures for highs. As we plowed through our supplies that were in the front right closet we found us to be in pretty good shape for the cold weather if it happens again.

We have a very short list of items to add to replace things that looked a bit worn.

After a year and a half of being hamstrung by personal injuries and failing parts of the Castle it almost feels odd to be getting ready to actually be a rolling RVer again. But we still have to be cautious since the OFM is a lot older than before and the Castle has been on the road for over 16 years now.

But we still are planning trying to have tooooo much fun again.

Chilly Day

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 15, 2023

A fairly busy day it was for the Teams. This morning the walk was a mite chilly, so the rain jacket the OFM carried with us was very welcome to cut the breeze back.

Our final (for the moment) travel plan was finished and turned in to the office so they will know to watch the empty site and keep folks from camping there and giving us trouble when we return.

Some more work on the latest coloring was done. This next coloring has lots of gradient shading and is taking a lot longer than we expected it to take.

In the meantime enjoy this new coloring named Yellow Lillies.

.

And last and far from least we hopped to it this afternoon and made five meals of chicken stoup. To our surprise it turned out very well.

So now we need to start preparations for the trip back down south into Texas to meet old friends Don and Patsy in Rockport. We are supposed to arrive November 29 for six days.

After that we plan to find the Rio Grande River and boondock near it for a few days then head back to Alabama to be there for Christmas time.

OFM Adventures Birthday

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 14, 2023

Today is the celebration of starting Old Fat Man Adventures sixteen years ago.

Everything on Sierra and the Castle worked today for a major change and it was wonderful.

The morning started a little early with a fantastic walk we did not expect. We took the maintenance road around the golf course for a total distance of about 3.2 miles. The OFM body held up fairly well to our surprise. Maybe the cool weather is helping.

The sky was a wild beautiful scene for us this morning and held its ground until nearly lunch time.

The walking path has been getting some of the old falling down trees removed since we last were on this trail. Several trees that needed to be gone are now gone. We grabbed this nice picture of the path about a half mile along our route.

This part of the hike and bike trail goes along the Tennessee River rather than Flint Creek but we get fewer views of the water. As it worked out we missed all the river views. However later in the winter this bench has wonderful river views when the brush still in the way looses all its leaves. That trail marker says 2.0 miles we think.

The rest of the walk went very nicely all the way back to the Castle.

Then this afternoon we finalized our upcoming trip back to the Texas coast and then the Mexico/ Texas border. We plan to leave on 11-26 and return before Christmas. And there you have all the excitement in our life for the day. Time to rest so we can go wild tomorrow.

All Fixed Now

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 13, 2023

What a day it has been! Yep another of one of them days again. No walk again due to an early truck repair appointment. We were right on time and so was the Pep Boys shop in Decatur. They did what they promised in the time frame they promised and with extremely pleasant conversations and answering the OFM questions. Their price seems high though but Sierra is running just fine again.

This got us to thinking of hitting the road tomorrow so we went to trying to line up reservations on the week ahead. BIG DON'T WORK out on the reservations. Thanksgiving folks have them all made. So we will do some more planning to see what we can come up with.

The OFM spent an hour or so trying to reset the clock in Sierra from the information in the owners manual. We got nowhere with that. So onto the Internet to see what we could find out and immediately found a bit of a video explaining and showing what to do. Ten minutes later Sierra's clock was set properly again. The manual used generic terms and assumed the owner knew what certain knobs were named even though the knobs had no name printed on or near them. The video showed the dash board and identified the knobs and from knowing that the reset was a two minute effort and very easy. Basically all the trouble was caused by a badly written vehicle manual.

Tomorrow we plan to do a serious rethink of our situation and make some decisions about travel in the near future. Also the OFM NEEDS to get to the grocery store since we have almost no food left in the trailer.

At least we have all the repairs to vehicles complete now so that headache is over with. Now we can focus on out future plans and the wild fun ahead of us soon. Have tooooo much fun if you can,

Splattered Plans Again

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 12, 2023

What a day it has been! As of about 1500 this afternoon we cancelled our planned trip again. There is trouble with Sierra that will hopefully have Sierra safe and reliable to roll across the country after a day at the truck hospital tomorrow. Perhaps the over 140,000 miles on it is contributing to our delay but we will wait until the truck doctors finish their work tomorrow and are sure it is safe.

Then this morning we went to tell the campground folks of changes in our plans due to Sierra and ran into my old neighbor here in the park. He is an eye doctor of many years and was following the OFM and his eye troubles from when he tried to knock his right eye out of his head in August of 2022. He asked about my eye recoveries and we talked a bit then he looked at my eye up close. His next words were something like you need to come see me at the office where I have the right equipment to tell you what is going on. He and the OFM have a mutual respect for experience in fields of work of folks. The OFM had been thinking of looking him up for help already this morning and there he was. So now we will be heading over to his place in Arab Alabama to get a new opinion on what to do with our eye troubles.

Well that takes us out of travels until the OFM feels like we can safely travel again.

And this is how the second set of travel plans got blown away today. So everyone let us just relax a bit and get a good rest tonight so we will be fresh for the next pile of trouble we have to battle.

Interesting Day

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 11, 2023

The interesting day continues. It is only 1702 and flat out dark outside. This morning this was our first look at the start of the day.

So we just went on over to the family home for a nice visit and lunch out. We went to Phil Sandovals original restaurant and the food was its usual style, FANTASTICALLY EXCELLENT. Five very full folks came out of the place doing heavy duty wobbling from eating it all.
During the fun visit the OFM's fantastic DIL, Melissa, showed us a picture of the pumpkin carving she did for the Halloween decoration. We think it is great. 

We spent a couple of hours after getting back from Phils just visiting and seeing the new kid projects at work. It was a grand visit. The OFM said his goodbyes before we left since we would not get back there before we leave Wednesday morning.

However on the way back to the Castle, Sierra had the engine cooling fan on screaming past like the engine was overheating. But the temperature gage showed the engine water at normal temperature. This happened about three years ago and it turned out to be the temperature gage sending unit mounted on the engine. The OFM checked it and found the spot was beyond his repair abilities nowadays. So now we have to get Sierra repaired before we leave.

We plan on getting busy with the repair search first thing Sunday morning and see what we face. We really want to make our leaving date of Wednesday morning.

In the mean time the OFM has been touching up several colorings and we are hoping to get them done very soon to show on this blog.

We hope everyone has a great Sunday of trying to have tooooo much fun.

Pure Free Spirit at Large

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 10, 2023

It is pitch black dark at only 1726. We really have to watch the getting dark too soon mess these days. But at 0600 this morning it was well into bright light for rolling. So we tried to get in an early walk. The cold, light misty fog and the nice cool breeze was a bit too much for the OFM so we just made one loop around the soccer field for a total of .92 miles and went back in to escape the bad chill we had from the walk. The heavy clouds continued until right at lunch time we had a couple of hours of sun and then back to the cool wet cloudy conditions again.

Several folks have travel plans for today to go to far away grand kid events. Most are taking their home with them. That makes an RV seem more worthwhile in their minds.

The OFM spent a good bit of time this afternoon trying to see if there are any plans we need to make for after Rockport Tx in another week. So far we have not found anything special to attract us to anywhere in particular. So that leaves us as free spirits starting Nov 23 with no special plans. So we will see what happens as we run around looking to have tooooo much fun.

TOOOOOOO OLD to waste time.

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 9, 2023

As we were walking this morning and considering our near future and rolling out next week, we realized we are at the moment that we need to take a careful inventory on everything to be sure we are well stocked for the new adventures. So after the walk we started to inventory food and other things to see what we needed to replace or add for the couple of boon docking nights and one campground night next week. It turned out that so far we need several things and tomorrow we will hit up the Walmart to get fully supplied for four days of rolling down to Goose Island. This will be a good refresher course for the more westerly traveling where stores are less abundant.

Then when we get to Goose Island we have five days to practice camping again to be ready for the big loop in the west. We do not plan to be in any really cold weather but it might sneak up on us so the OFM has been refreshing his small brain about how we kept warm in our many adventures in the past. This blog sure helps with that chore.

Our testing of the 12volt systems is showing that they are all in great shape. The batteries are showing full capacity like when new and the solar panels are putting out near maximum design charging to the batteries. We think all the LED lighting is a major help with that electric usage drop since our early days of boondocking in 2007. This is feeling rather exciting since we have been stuck here for an extra four months waiting our turn in the repair shop.

We are definitely excited to be on the verge of getting to roll down the road again. We lost eight months of travel time with the fall that damaged the OFM right eye over a year ago and then this year the repair shop delays of right at four months. A whole year gone and the OFM is tooooo OLD to be wasting years instead of trying to have toooooo much fun.

URGENT MESSAGE Today

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: November 8, 2023

An interesting day to say the least. So start at the beginning with the morning walk. A beautiful day for walking with slightly cool temps and very nice breezes. The OFM's tee shirt and shorts was just right for brisk walking in the bright sunshine of most of the day.

We had a few chances at nice scenery and the OFM managed to photograph three scenes that came out adequate. Exactly where the scenes are along the trail we have no idea. But here they are.

A little color in the foliage was nice to view and the sunlight made it very nice.

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On along the trail and a curve or two put the sun in a different part of the sky and we got these nice reflections on the ripples on the water. We thought it was rather nice.

Sure enough right after another turn in the trail we had another sun angle that made this nice picture.

It was nice place to stop a few moments to enjoy the warmth of the sun again.

But now we get to talk about nature. We have had the same egret at this lagoon for several years. She has had a couple of nests of babies over the years and was the Queen of the lagoon for sure.

Three days ago we saw an egret body floating in the lagoon and showed no trauma like a bullet wound or tangled in netting or fishing line or anything not natural. So we kept an eye on things and nothing came along to bother the corpse.

As we neared the end of today's walk we took this picture of a younger and way smaller egret now hunting in the deceased bird's lagoon. That is the previous egret's corpse in the bottom right of the photo. We are really hoping what we witnessed is just the natural way life happens in the wilds of Alabama.

Now for the NEWS. We have a reservation at Goose Island State Park (GISP) for 11/18 thru 11/21 we made yesterday. This morning after the walk, we got on the Internet to check for messages and we had an urgent message from GISP notifying us that the drinking water at the park is being repaired during a two week period of which we will be there 6 days. The park recommends we come in with a full fresh water tank because they cannot guarantee they will have city water available anywhere in the park during our stay. We will have electric and access to the dump station and all other features of the park. Six days should not be any trouble for us in our highly boondocking capable rig but it sure can be a trouble for many campers to not have the park water supply available to keep the rest rooms and showers functioning. So maybe we will have a peaceful stay there with less folks than expected. We will see.

And that brings us to the end of another wild wonderful day of trying to have tooooo much fun.