Happy Birthday for Mark on the Elk River

It might have been Mark's birthday, but there was no sleeping late this morning! We ate breakfast, dumped the tanks, and drove out of Crawford Lake State Park by 8:00. It was a two-hour drive to Big Elk Floats and Camping in Pineville, Missouri. We had arranged for a shuttle so we could float the Elk River. Isn't that what everyone wants to do on their birthday?

Mark drove our pickup and trailer to the take-out spot on the river, and then we paid the shuttle driver $40 to return him to the put-in spot. There was a time when we would think that was an expensive ride, but with the high price of gas it almost seemed like a bargain. Besides, that allowed us to launch our kayak from their private launch site, and end our journey at their private take-out spot.

We left at the head of the Elk River a few minutes after 11:00. We were scheduled for an eight-mile float that they estimated would take us 3-4 hours.

But the recent rains have increased the current and the water level. So we floated faster than average.

We might as well say it, because surely you have noticed how long Denisa's hair has grown this winter. It's the first time she's been able to pull it back into a pony tail for many years, and it just keeps growing!

We were entertained by the baby geese and hundreds of turtles and one snake (that's one too many!)  On this first camping trip of the year, we forgot to pack the good camera, so all we have are cell phone wildlife pictures. We completely missed the snake, but the slower turtles were better at posing.

We were also entertained by the only other boat we saw in the eight mile journey. The local high school coach was enjoying a day off of school to go fishing. He kept up with our float pace for a while, and we found out that there was only one high school in all of the fifty-mile width of McDonald County.

The wind was blowing out of the west at 8-10 miles per hour. At times it felt more like 20 miles per hour when it was in our face and we had to row against it. But the Elk is a winding river, and just around the next bend we couldn't feel any wind at all. At times we were going with the wind, and we floated quickly with the current. We had a few riffles in the water, and you can see water coming in over the bow of the kayak in the choppy water picture below. But overall the Elk River provides a family-friendly easy float in the southern part of Missouri.

We arrived at the "four mile pick up point" at 12:20. We were glad that we chose the longer trip today because we weren't ready to get off the river yet.

Coach told us that there would be thousands of people on the Elk River on a summer weekend. But we had the place to ourselves on a Monday in April. The big herons didn't even bother to fly away for one lonely boat floating by.

We knew we were close to the end of our eight-mile float when we crossed under the high railroad bridge . . . and could see the low car bridge ahead on the right.

Because the river was swollen from recent rains, we worried that there wouldn't be much clearance under the low water bridge.

But we floated under by laying down to avoid scraping our heads.

Just around the bend was our pickup and trailer--just where Mark had left them earlier on this birthday.

Also around the bend were some pretty orange poppies wishing Mark a happy birthday.

After we dried and repacked the kayak, it was a thirty-minute drive to our Boondockers Welcome host in Bella Vista, Arkansas. For those not familiar with this group, they provide free camping sites to fellow RVers on their private property. We pay an annual fee to have access to the maps and a method to contact hosts in the area where we would like to stay. Charles and Marcy welcomed us to their flat parking spot in their side yard. They also invited us over for something cool to drink. Denisa enjoyed the tour of Marcy's sewing room and also her quilting room. Before the day was over, Marcy invited Denisa back any time for a quilt-making session. They gave us good advice for the best local place to eat for Mark's birthday dinner. He even got complimentary peach cobbler and ice cream when they found out it was his birthday! Happy Birthday to the best wandering companion in God's great world!

We're On the Road Again!

We're on the road again! We had been planning this 12-day tour into the Arkansas Ozarks while we impatiently waited for winter to turn into spring. We went to early church, then loaded food into the refrigerator and freezer, and hooked the trailer to the pickup. After six months of the trailer being winterized, we were glad to flush the pink anti-freeze out of the water lines and start another season of wandering His wonders!

Our first stop was just two hours south at Kansas's Lake Crawford State Park. On a Sunday afternoon in April, we had our choice of 80 available sites, so we didn't even make a reservation. We thought we would save the $2.50 reservation fee, but found they charge a $3.00 walk-up fee. Bummer! We paid the $15 annual state park day-use fee when we renewed our Kansas tag on the pickup, and this was the first time we've used it. So we didn't have to pay today's $5 per day use fee. For some reason, it feels like we were spending more money than we were saving here at Lake Crawford!

Since this was a one-night stop, we left the pickup hooked up. On his first attempt, Mark backed perfectly into our spot in Oak Point campground. His RV driving skills weren't even rusty from taking the winter off! We have lake views in an uncrowded park on a beautiful spring day.  Since the pickup was still hooked up, our only choices for exploring the state park were on foot or on bicycle. We considered not bringing the fold-up bikes, but we were glad to have them as we started the ten-mile circle around the lake. Have we mentioned it's good to be on the road again? 

We stopped for lake views and rode the heavily shaded side roads to places like Lonesome Point.

We rode the paved road that goes all the way around Lake Crawford, and we only saw one other vehicle on this Sunday afternoon in April. We also stopped in at the butterfly garden. 

While the butterflies were few and far between in April, this hummingbird moth was sampling the pollen while Denisa snapped his picture.

We stopped at the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) museum to get information about this group. Crawford Lake was formed from a dam constructed by the CCC in the 1930's. We've seen many sights all over the United States that were built by these young unemployed men whose families were literally starving during the depression. In exchange for their labor, the young men were fed, clothed, and housed, plus paid $30 per month. $25 was sent home to their families, so they were left with $5 in "fun money" for the month. The CCC was formed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933 and its goal was to enroll young men into a "peace-time army, sent into battles against the destruction of our natural resources." The natural stone structures they built almost 100 years ago are still in use today. The old stone watch tower is now a museum at Lake Crawford State Park.

This area also included a little cafe with indoor and outdoor seating. Arriving in April meant that some of the facilities were not yet open. But the purple irises out front were open.

We also walked to the Farlington Fish Hatchery just a quarter mile from the lake. It consisted of 30 ponds that stretched as far as we could see. They produce 231,123 channel catfish, 162,888 largemouth bass, and assorted sunfish, bluegill, and walleye here.

With numbers like that, perhaps even we could catch some fish here. But this area was closed to fishing.

At this point, the only thing between us and our camp site was a two-mile bike ride that included crossing the low water bridge. Because of recent rains, the water was flowing swiftly over the road. There were signs warning to not attempt to walk through the water to cross the bridge.

About this time, we heard a loud hiss right behind Mark. He had a blow out on his rear bike tire! Now what are we going to do?!? The good news was that the green slime inside the tire sealed the puncture, and it had a little bit of air left. It would be better to walk his bike home, but not across that low water crossing. What are we going to do?

It made for a very interesting ride over the low water bridge. But we made it! Now it was Denisa's job to ride behind Mark, with instructions to yell if the tire got so low that it would damage the rim.

We had to ride across the dam and through the campground. Denisa yelled more than once, but Mark just kept pedaling. While the sealant inside the inner tube stopped most of the leak, Mark was riding on very little air by the time we got back to the trailer. Being on the road again does not mean that everything goes smoothly. At the end of our first day, we enjoyed a nice sunset over Lake Crawford--still happy that we were on the road again.

Home Remodeling and a VERY belated Merry Christmas

When we bought our house two years ago, we planned to do some updating. But when we moved from a motorhome and had no furniture, we had plenty of things to buy and plenty of decisions to make without worrying about the walls and floors. But it was finally time to update both of those things. After looking at the eleven-foot ceilings rising even higher over the basement staircase, and some interestingly difficult ceilings in our bathroom, we decided we needed professional help. So we hired painters instead of trying to do it ourselves (and then needing professional medical or psychiatric help). We didn't realize how thoroughly professional painters wrap everything in the house. Who knew they would shrink wrap EVERYTHING!?!?

We planned to stay at home during the painting, but then we found out that all of the floors and furniture were wrapped up. We decided to live in our unfinished basement to stay out of their way, but we hadn't packed bedding or clothes or food or . . . anything! We literally had to go buy underwear and toothbrushes because we couldn't get to anything in our drawers. Our kitchen was out of commission for the entire time. So we ate out for six days, trying all those new-to-us restaurants that we had been driving by for the last two years. 

We just survived the painting project, when the new flooring arrived. While we had hardwood floors in some areas of the house, we decided to change out the carpeting in the living room for oak floors as well

That meant that ALL of the hardwood in the house had to be sanded down so they could lace the new wood pieces into the existing floors to make a seamless surface. Since they were sanding everything down, we could also pick a new color of stain for the floor. They gave us several choices of stain.

But then we saw the natural wood, and we had second thoughts about that dark stain. We thought the natural color lightened up the room and was so lovely that we changed our minds. At the last moment, we decided to go with the lighter natural color. Denisa was living in the basement again during this project, but Mark was taking care of his Mother 400 miles away. We had to make some long distance calls to work up the courage to go with the newer natural color. This was before they applied the finish. What do you think?

After surviving another six days with our home in complete chaos and the holidays quickly approaching, we didn't have much time or energy to do much Christmas decorating. But we still went to two different Christmas light displays.

We celebrated Christmas early in Tulsa with our youngest son and his wife. The grinch also made an appearance.

Then we had the traditional Christmas Eve fondue meal at our oldest son's house in Kansas City. We've been blessed to share this holiday with our daughter-in-law's family for many years.

They have another tradition of hiking to a high spot to sing "Go Tell It On the Mountain." We had a lovely Christmas afternoon for a hike near Kansas City. We wish you a VERY belated Merry Christmas as we all hum along to "Go tell it on the mountain . . . that Jesus Christ is born."

Autumn Camping--and other family activities

We got home from our two-month RV trip right after Labor Day, but we still had plenty of warm autumn weather to do some fun family activities. That would include a camping trip with some of our favorite people to celebrate our grandson's fifth birthday.

We left the RV at home this time, because we were staying at a tent-only campground at Chickasaw National Recreation Area near Sulphur, Oklahoma. Their web site said that the camp sites were too small for RVs, but we found several that we could have fit into comfortably with our little trailer.

We can't express enough  how much we missed our trailer during that two-night camping trip. We might be too old to sleep in a tent. We also found that our borrowed tent had a little leak during a deluge one afternoon.

We left that campground for the six-hour drive to Houston. We have made it an autumn tradition to watch our favorite band members perform in the Texas regional competition. We visited our nephew and his family in The Woodlands in October to watch the band sew up another first place finish.

The large Texas high schools have impressive bands that march hundreds of talented musicians. It's some of our favorite entertainment enjoyed with another group of our favorite people.

We had to rush home to go trick-or-treating with our son's family.

You can tell that we are cool grandparents because we recognize that Carter is dressed up as Rumi, one of the lead characters in the animated hit movie "The Huntrix." That braided purple hair was a work of art that her mother got up extra-early to blend with her natural hair before school that morning.

Our son and grandson were also characters from another famous kid movie--Space Jam.

Autumn Major league baseball was in full swing, and we were home for some games at the Kansas City Royals field.

We were also home in time for the beginning of football season, where our son took our granddaughter to her first University of Oklahoma football game.

Our son is a proud alumni of OU with his B.S. and M.D. degrees. He took Carter on a campus tour that included one of his favorite places--the library. He's doing some early recruiting to sway her to consider the University of Oklahoma as her college ten years from now.

Before we had to winterize the RV, we wanted to go on one more camping trip. We made the trip to Missouri's Weston Bend State Park, where that big golden tree made our little trailer look even smaller.

Our special guest for this camping trip was our grandson, Eli. He and Grandude did some tree-climbing . . 

and we all hiked through the golden forest.

Grandude is known for his dare-devil hiking, and Gram was happy to have help to keep him from getting too close to that steep edge. A careless misstep on this trail could result in a bad tumble all the way down into the Missouri River.

Maybe Grandude was a bad influence on Eli, as he seemed to climb a lot of trees during our trip.

When we weren't hiking, we were hanging out at the playground, fighting dinosaurs, or competing at an exciting game of "splat" at our campsite.

When the sun went down, we cooked hot dogs for dinner with a hearty dessert of smores.

During fall break, we had some beautiful weather for a family trip to Tulsa. We spent a day with Mark's brother and sister-in-law at their home in the country.

They have go-carts for their grandchildren, and we had a great time driving them too.

A good time was had by the little kids and the big kids too!

Tulsa was a great place to visit because our youngest son and his wife live there.

Besides go-carts, we used their kayaks for a spin around their pond.

They also have three horses, and these three cowgirls took a ride around the pasture.

Carter loved the big and little farm animals during this trip.

Thanksgiving brought more family time, where we all made the trip to the Oklahoma panhandle to spend the holiday with our mothers--and many of our younger relatives.

Again, the horses and pony at this ranch were a favorite form of transportation.

While we are no longer traveling full-time in our RV, this autumn found us traveling 370 miles to Chickasaw National Recreation Area, 352 miles to Houston, and 690 miles to get home for Halloween before driving 227 miles to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and 269 miles back home for a camping trip at Weston State Park. Then it was 392 miles to the Oklahoma Panhandle for Thanksgiving, and another 392 miles to get back to our house. While we are no longer traveling full-time in our RV, that total of 2,692 proves that we are still traveling many miles!