Another Year, Part B

So we left Maine and headed west to Buffalo first to visit our son, Jason and Joanne, Jax wasn't there unfortunately.  We were fed wonderful food and had a nice time.  Joanne didn't get back until the last night from a business trip, but we got to visit with she and her parents, Joe and Donna then.

After a too quick visit we made our way down to Western PA to Greenville to visit some family from Jan's side of the family, her cousins' MaryBeth and Susan, and their respective husband's, Jim and Bob.  We had a wonderful time, laughed so much our bellies still hurt when we left, served 2 wonderful dinners to include the first time for Jan and I for Walleye, and it was everything and more from what we heard, excellent!

left to right; Moi, MaryBeth, Jim, Jan, Susan, and Bob

Then to our painting appointment.  We arrived prearranged on a Sunday evening and were provided power.  We expected to be there for a few days while we discussed exactly what they were going to do as well as matched the paint, so we were totally unprepared when at 1030am the next morning were told they were all set to take it in the shop!  We didn't even know where we were going, the only thing planned for the next week or two was to go back to Atlanta so I could have my sore shoulder, and my worsening hip looked at.  Startled, we packed like crazy, for who knows how long and off we went, south, but with no idea where, we figured we'd look at it over lunch and wing it from there😀

We made a big loop down through Kentucky, Atlanta, and back over 11 days.  The AirBnBs and VRBOs had ups and downs, but mostly good.  At my doctor's appointment I got a shot in my shoulder which really helped me out and learned I had osteoarthritis and would need a new left hip.  We had a wonderful visit with friend's John and Diane to include a bourbon tasting, delicious dinner, and a fire!

It was a lot of fun and although we hated to leave we needed to get back to Indiana.  They ended up extending it 2 days right at the end, but it was worth it, we were very pleased with the job they did.

Our beautiful shiny rear end!

One more thing to attend to in Elkhart and that was to fix our leaking fitting on the slide system under the step, we got it all accomplished by swaging on a fitting and section of hose.

Then we had a horrible moment while still in Elkhart, Jan went into our freezer full of seafood  from Maine and meat that we had picked up at a market on the way to find everything thawed and about 75 pounds ruined.  We initially blamed the paint shop and were afraid that had unplugged us along the way.  They said we were plugged in the whole time, and we agreed with them because once we cleaned it all out, took days to get the odor out, it didn't cool.  It must have picked that exact time to quit, bad news, but we've had that freezer in constant use since 2005, and the company said we could repair it.

Then up through Michigan through Petosky and Charlevoix and over the Mackinac Bridge.

Meanwhile on our travels, I was being plagued with the cruise control being intermittent or just not working at all.  I tried some troubleshooting from some info I had gotten a long time ago from one of my forums, but it was inconclusive, so I called the company, and was told they had no tech support😡  So I made a command decision and bought a new controller from them, installed it and it did nothing, so the next thing I did was replace the clock spring in the wheel, no joy from that either, so I told the company I wanted to return the controller.  After being interrogated by several different departments, I sent it back only to hear that they evaluated it and it worked fine and would send it back to me as they did not do refunds!  This is VIP wheels and I can't say enough about what a horrible company they are!

Now we are in Montana.

We got the freezer part, replaced the cooling unit, working like a champ, and then went into Yellowstone at a bright and early 0430am.

Jan making early breakfast BLT's in Lamar Valley

Lunch stop overlooking the Firehole River

Coffee in Mammoth

Then over to Missoula where we caught back up with Karen and Tom.

We went to the Bison Range north of town, beautiful views and several bears.

A small example of how pretty they keep the campground, Jim and Mary's, it's like a botanical garden.

We said good bye to Karen and Tom and headed to one of our favorite places in the whole country, Ennis, and were so disappointed with what the new owners had done to the park, junky sites, one right next to us, constantly parking dogs that turned out to belong to the staff, unreal, we won't be back.

Still the incredible view, but they ruined everything else

We even cut our visit short and took a real financial hit, and made our way south to Henry's Lake, also with incredible views and no barking dogs or junk piles:-)

Then it was down to Heber City, UT, just outside of Salt Lake City and one of our favorite RV parks, Mountain Valley.  Also where our very favorite Vietnamese restaurant in the country has several locations, Oh Mai:-)  It's an unassuming place, but has the best Banh Mi's and awesome pho!

It is an area of stunning views, amazing vistas, and after being visited with the first snow, incredible.

On to Montrose, CO, another favorite, especially in the fall with the colors, and a fantastic sideline Gnarly Tacos in Ridgway are superb!  Both are views from our site.

Another highlight is Last Dollar Road from Ridgway to Telluride, an awesome scenic drive.

We took a ride over to Gunnison's Black Canyon.

On to Durango and good bye to our Rod Vault, the fly fishing isn't going to fill up our lives as much as before going forward, and we were very happy to have someone buy it who really appreciated it.

Jan wanted to do her favorite hike while we were here, Spud Lake, I was unable to accompany her this year with my hip issues.  She had a gorgeous day for it and only encountered a couple of people, great hike!

After we drove up to Molas Pass and then to Andrews Lake for a picnic lunch.

And, of course, some food while there.  We happen to think Durango has the best pizza we've ever had at Fired Up, it's a personal preference, we actually even went twice:-)  And then later to another place we like Akami Poke and Noodle.

We then moved down to Santa Fe for a quick stay, had a beautiful sunset, and also, food again, had the best green chili cheeseburger in the entire world at Santa Fe Bite! followed by a fantastic Heuvos Ranchero breakfast the next morning before we left at the famous Pantry.

Then, drive, drive, drive, about 1875 miles to our detour in Florida to see 2 doctors for my surgery clearance interrupted by a quick visit with Kelly and Brian in Texas, while there we did manage a great lunch at a new sushi place Kelly found.

While in Florida we ran over to the mall in Sarasota to purchase a new knife set.  We have always used Henckels and Wustoff for years and years even though they can be challenging to keep sharp.  While in Florida last season we sent off the 5 knives we use the most to have sharpened, they ruined our knives!  We are trying now to find a knife shop that can repair our knives and bring the edge back to the correct angle.  Meanwhile while we were in Buffalo visiting Jason, he showed us his Shun knives that he was really impressed with, and so were we, so we picked up a small set of Shuns. They cut like magic.

Then since we were already in Florida we made another detour over to the Jacksonville area to renew our driver's licenses, have to do it in person every other time, and our registrations.  Even though Green Cove Springs is our domicile, we had never been there:-)

Got that done, and headed north to Ellijay, GA where we still are and plan to be until Jan 9th.  I am doing well with my recovery and out patient PT, that will continue through to the end of Jan when I plan to be released and we'll make our way to Florida for 2 months.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!