France

If any of you saw that movie, ‘If it’s Tuesday, then it must be Belgium’ then you know what I’m talking about.  We took a 2 week bus tour through France.  We saw about 17 towns in 12 days.  We took my 23 year old granddaughter with us and she seemed to enjoy herself.  First time in her life she’s been any further than about 150 miles from her home.  So this was a huge experience for her.
My favourite..a vineyard!
Chenonceau Chateaux

We did enjoy it although Ken and I both agreed that we loved Italy far more than France.  We will return to Italy but no so France.  One of the stops was Normandy.  That was very sad to see the rows and rows and rows of crosses.  We went to the American cemetery.  Would like to have visited the Canadian one but our guide said it was about 80 km away and was very small.  Apparently Canada shipped the majority of the bodies of the soldiers home to be buried and there is only about 2000 Canadian graves.  I can’t remember how many American graves there were but it just went on and on.   In it’s sadness it was also beautiful and peaceful.  And we saw Omaha beach where they came ashore and the German bunkers.
Normandy 
Honfleur
Mont St. Michel

That’s a long flight 7 hours to London, then another hour to France.  My rump was numb by the time we landed.  Most of the hotels we stayed at were average, but a couple of them, oh my.   Rustic is certainly an understatement.  And what’s with the twin beds in Europe?  Almost rolled right out of a couple of them.  So tired of living out of a suitcase.  Always so nice to come home.

We are discussing a river cruise in Europe.  Any of you taken one?  If so let me know what you thought of it please.

Our big 5er had the washer/dryer installed and all minor things repaired.  It’s winterized and sitting in the storage lot until we bring her home about 3 weeks before Christmas.  Then I start the loading for our sojourn south. 

Christmas is very quickly creeping up on us.  We’re hoping to get away the day after depending on the weather of course.

Until later…take care.

Safety Brake Cable Works !!!

Well we found out that the safety break away brake cable works.  The hard way.  As Ken was pulling out of our driveway he has to make a 90° turn out of the driveway and onto the street.  I guess we had the cable secured to the wrong spot because as he turned it pulled it out of the rig.  Instant stop!!!!!  Couldn’t figure our for a minute what the heck the problem was then it dawned on me about the cable.  Checked it and sure ‘nuff’ it had pulled it out as he made the turn.  Perhaps it caught on part of the hitch.  Anyway, he put the clip back in and away he went.  Nice to know though that it does work.

I closed up and secured everything inside the rig.  The RV dealer now has to correct a few small concerns we have and also install the washer/dryer combo.  They also noticed a gouge in the dining room table when it arrived so ordered another table.  As Jayco makes all their own cabinetry etc.  they had to make another table.  Supposedly, it has arrived and they will replace it with the damaged one. 

As I couldn’t winterize it because they are going to install the washer/dryer and will, of course, be needing to run water, I have asked them to do that for me this year.  We really do not feel like bringing it home again and parking it just to winterize.  We will do it in the future just as we did for the motorhome.  I do like having it parked in the driveway as I can run in and put stuff away as I come across things, but it really is just too big to keep it there all the time, and then we have to juggle between our car and the truck on the other side of the driveway.  No sooner have we deposited it back in the store yard when another pile of RV things starts to grow.  By the time we get it home again mid December the pile will be quite large. 

We were always very comfortable in our Class A but found that things just kind of ‘hung around’.   There wasn’t places to put the odds and sods that need to be used everyday so they just kind of sat here and there.  Now with this 5th wheel, we find that we have lots more storage and places to put things.  Jackie’s bowls, for instant, we now have a great spot out of the way to put them.  And Arthur’s litter box, once we park and the lounge chairs are pushed forward there is a whole ton of space behind them and that’s where I put his box, out of the way, visually and physically.  Great!   On our shakedown trip we found that we were very, very comfortable, much more than before.  So much more living room and kitchen space.  And I have always hated the bench kitchen table in the Class A and now we have table and chairs.  Who rah!!  Even in restaurants we always ask for no benches.  Funny everyone else seems to love them. 

So we are really looking forward to taking this monster south this year.  The truck is so much more powerful than our gas Class A, and hills don’t seem to bother it at all.  Where as the motorhome would literally slow to a crawl on any significant hill.  In hindsight if we had to do it all over again we would have bought a diesel Class A right from the start.  But we are loving this 5th wheel or 5er as we call it. 

So until later then…take care.   Be safe out there.

No, we haven’t fallen off the face of the earth

Click on any picture to supersize it...
We’re still here.  It’s been hectic to say the least.  I don’t know where summer has gone, seems like we were just opening the pool, planting flowers and now poof, it’s almost gone.
We took delivery of our new 5th wheel.  It’s beautiful or so we think anyhow.  It’s like a small 1 bedroom apartment.  There is so much more cupboard space in the kitchen.  Less so in the bedroom, but that’s ok much prefer to have more space in the kitchen.  Now learning how to park this monstrosity of rig is a whole ‘nother’ ballgame.  Not so much park as back it up.  Oh lots and lots of fun.  We had the fellow at the RV place who takes care of parking all the RV’s there on the lot to give Ken a lesson.  It was very helpful but nothing is going to be better than just experience.  It just fits in our driveway, just.  But we only park it there when parking it up for a trip.  Otherwise we store it at the RV security lot.
We had a shakedown trip planned for the 14th, 15th, 16th of August, but on the 11th I had to take Ken to the emergency at the hospital.  Turns out he had to have an emergency appendectomy.  Good grief, that was a surprise.  He was in there for 3 days.  The horrible part was that from the time he entered the emergency entrance to the time he was diagnosed was 8 hours!!!  8 freaking hours it took them to find out he had appendicitis.  They could have ruptured in the mean time.  Gee Whiz !!!!!  As soon as he was diagnosed he was whisked away to surgery where they found they were close to rupturing.  That put the kibosh on our shakedown trip.  So  I rescheduled it fro the 28th, 29th, 30th of August instead.  We just got back today.  It was grand, just grand.  So much room.  We’re getting better at hitching it up, takes time but we’re getting there.
Just a couple shots of inside…
  Excuse the mess
Jackson and one of his ‘babies’
Couple of lazy guys!!
and this is Jackson’s favourite spot..watching the world go by the door.
This year we are here for Christmas.  But leaving right after for Florida.  Sure hope the weather is as good as it was last year.  It’s always iffy at that time of year.  Could run into a snow storm.  YUK !!
Until later then..take care.

It’s been a longgggggggg time!!!

Yes it’s been a long time since I blogged.  We have been busy up to our ying yangs.  But I always do find the time to read up on those blogs I follow.

First we decided to trade in our Class A and get a 5er.  And yes, we did just that.  We wanted a Jayco Pinnacle, and hoped to get a slightly used one but since they have only made the Pinnacle’s since 2011, chances were slim to none.  And it was none.  So we ordered a brand spanking new one.  Which of course meant that we had to wait for it to be built but the beauty of that was we could change a couple things we really wanted changed.  Such as…we did not want carpet in the living area so we now will have vinyl tile.  YEAH!!!  And strange to some people I know, we did not want a king size bed.  So YEAH they are putting in a queen.  We find that we just don’t use all that bed space, and also I would have to go out and buy all new sheets, blankets, comforters etc.  PLUS it does give us a little more space in the bedroom area.  The part I don’t like is that I had to buy it without actually seeing one first.  Mind you I hit every web site going that was advertising one so I could see what it looked like.  The model is the Pinnacle 36REQS. 

Now of course we need a truck.  Having never owned a truck I had absolutely no idea what we needed etc. but the good guy at where we bought our 5er filled us in.  We need a 1 ton diesel, dually not required but would give us a better ride.  We also need a crew cab due to a very large golden retriever who calls us Mom and Dad.  We really didn’t want a new one, due to the cost $$$$$$$ kaching!!! so went looking for a 2009.  We looked, and looked, we had a car dealer looking, they looked, and looked, the RV people looked and looked.  Lots and lots of gas 3/4 ton.  NOPE, not going to happen.  Finally spotted a 2011, Ford F350XLT that already had a 5er hitch installed.  It was significantly more than we wanted to pay, but it fit the bill.  We haggled and got him down a little bit.  It’s a dually.  It is one honking big truck!!!

Now all we have to do is wait for the 5er to arrive.  We already had a planned trip (if you follow my blog you should remember my yearly July trip to celebrate my sister’s BD with her) and really didn’t want to cancel it.  So we don’t know what rig we’ll be taking.  If the new one hasn’t arrived by then we’ll take our old one.  Feel sad about our ‘old beast’ but we need some more room and this 5er fit the bill.  I must go out and take a picture of the honking truck sitting in our driveway to show you, but the picture of the rig will have to wait.

We have a lot of work ahead of us to get things out of the old and into the new.  They said they would park them beside each other and we just have to shift everything from the old to the new.  The RV place is going to show Ken how to hitch, park, backup all that good stuff you have to do with a 5er.  He’s a good driver so I’m sure he’ll pick it up really quickly.  And I’m a good backup director so between us, we should, hopefully, have no problems.  I thought our Class A was tall but this guy is even taller.  A little anyway.

Friends that we met while in Emerald Beach RV resort who fulltime have come up to Canada for a month.  We have had then over for dinner a couple times, went to Black Creek Pioneer Village, the CN Tower and we’re going to Niagara Falls in a couple days.
 

Well that’s just about caught up.  In between all that we had a bathroom gutted and 4 week renovation done.  Worth it though, very pleased with the outcome.

Well until later then..take care.  Drive safe. 

Updates

Not a lot has been happening since we got home.  You tend to very quickly settle into the routine that you had before you left for parts ‘unknown’.  Which, in my books, is just fine.  It’s still a little cool to be doing any real yard work such as planting.  Did some cleaning up but that’s it.  Jackson keeps looking at the pool with great longing.  Poor bugger.

The rig is now back on the storage lot.  We are very seriously looking into trading in the motorhome and buying a fifth wheel.  We are in negotiations right now so it depends on the price.  We are looking at the Jayco Pinnacle either the 35 LKTS or the 36 REGS.  Of course that means we have to purchase a truck to haul it.  Also looking at a 2009 vehicle.  We would like a GMC, diesel, double cab.  Must be a big double cab for Jackson.  We love our motorhome, but we also realize that a fifth wheel does have more room inside and also more storage room.  As our motorhome is gas it tends to not have as much ‘basement’ storage as a diesel tends to have and we feel that we really need more room.  We’re at capacity now when we go south for several months.  Inside it’s pretty good for storage, not great, but pretty good.  And after being stranded a couple years ago in Flagstaff while they did some mechanical repairs on the rig, at least if something like that happened again, they can take the truck and we’ll still have our home.  Also the gas motorhome doesn’t handle mountains well and we want to go back to the US southwest.  But we won’t take the motorhome, it really struggles on some of those mountains.  I know diesel doesn’t because I have seen them go flying by us on the hills!!!!  So we just have to sit tight and see what kind of prices they come up with.  It will be very hard to say goodbye to our ‘beast’.  She is really beautiful (at least we think so)  and she has sheltered us from major rain storms, snow, major wind storms, umpteen tornado warnings and watches, cold weather, very, very hot weather.  And she has handled them all well and kept us cozy.  I hope she is loved as much by any new owners she will have as we have lover her.

One of my good friends passed away almost a month ago.  Karen was just 55 and full of beans and life.  She developed lung cancer, fought it bravely for a few years, thought she’d won, but it came back and she was gone very quickly.  Her cancer was the kind caused by inhaling herbicides.  She, as a child, had been stationed at one of Canada’s military bases with her family and the government was doing some ‘testing’ with agent orange.  You can read about it here http://agentorangecanada.com/.  I didn’t have a clue about any of this as I also was stationed there during that time period with my ex husband.  Now we didn’t live on the base as she did, we lived in Fredericton which is several miles away.  She lived right on the base.  There are all sorts of actions going on now with that due to so many people getting sick and dying.   There was no funeral, just a grand celebration of life for her.  There had to be around 250 people there which spoke well about how people felt about her.  Much, much better than a morbid funeral, in my opinion.

Also my nephew, my sister’s son, who is 49 has been diagnosed with non Hodgkin's Lymphoma and has been given 2 months to live.  So sad, so terrible.  I don’t know what to say to my sister to comfort her.  It’s very difficult.  We just have to be there for her.  He never married and has no children so he’s going home with them to spend what time he has left.  We come to expect the order of things that our children are still here when we leave this earth.  This is not the order of things.  It’s something I hope that I never have to live through. 

On a brighter note, Ken and I have booked a 2 week bus tour to France in September.  We are going to be taking my 23 year old granddaughter, Danielle.  She has just finished college and I think this will be a wonderful trip for her.  We took a bus tour several years ago to Italy and it was the best vacation we have ever had.  So great to leave the driving, hotel bookings, luggage, tours and everything else to someone else.  We walked our buns off on that tour which was great because we ate like pigs and didn’t put on 1 ounce.  As Italian food is our favourite, you can just imagine the meals.  I fell in love with Italy and hope to go back, but there are just too many other wonderful places to see first.  I will probably say the same thing about France after we return!! We’re all looking forward to it.

Some friends that we know from Panama City Beach and who fulltime are slowly heading this way for the month of June.  Tom and Linda and their Yorkie Reggie will be staying in a campground just a few miles from here.  They have never been to Canada and have a list of things they want to see.  #1 on that list is Niagara Falls, I’m told.  It will be nice to see them again.

Well my brain seems to have dried up, I can’t think of anything else.  We’re patiently waiting for somewhat warmer weather so we can start our planting.  The yard looks forlorn and naked without flowers and blue sparkling water in the pool. 

Until later then…take care.

HOME!!!!

We left Monroe, Michigan on Sunday morning just before 830AM.  After stopping for gas first thing we were on our way.  We stopped once for Jackson to go potty and that was it.  We rolled up into our driveway just past 130PM.  It was a good drive,  no rain, traffic was great.  The stop at the border hardly was that.  The fellow asked us when we had left Canada, (November 27) how many people on board (2 people, 1 cat, 1 dog) any liquor (bottle of wine in the fridge) and we got a Have a good day.  Thanks mate, Ken said and we were through.  Gotta love those Canadians, a lot easier coming home that’s for sure.

At first I was just going to empty the contents of the fridge and do the other stuff another day, but once we got going just couldn’t seem to stop.  Took us around 4 hours to empty the rig.  I have a process, fill a huge bag, bring it in and put that bag away before loading up again.  Works well for us as there isn’t tons of stuff hanging around then it’s a ‘where do I start’ moment.  I had laundry up to the yinyang.  Thank goodness I have those huge front loaders. 

Now all that is left is to give it a good cleaning and we can drive it over to the storage lot.  Tonight it’s going to be cold and I really don’t want to winterize again, so I’m going to put heat lamps in the water bins and turn the gas furnace on low. 

Sure is just wonderful to be home.  Jackson just about went out of his mind and Arthur acted like he’d never left.  Fun to get away but there really is ‘no place like home’.

Till later then…take care.

On Our Way

We left Foley, Alabama just after 8 AM on the morning of Wednesday, the 21st.  Our first stop for the night was Calera, Alabama.  Tonight we are just outside of Nashville.  It rained on and off on the way, and just after we settled in here, the skies opened up.  Right now it is just dreary and not raining, but there is more in the forecast.  Tomorrow night our planned stop is just outside of Cincinnati, Ohio.

I think we’re all glad to be heading home.  Jackson is bored out of his cotton pickin’ mind.  Even Arthur appears to be bored.  It was difficult for me after being home for a few days to attend my Dad’s funeral to return back down to Foley.  Ken said I should stay home and he’d drive home by himself, but I think that would be just plain stupid.  I am the navigator, the dog settler, the double and triple checker of things.  As it was the 3 of them were very lonely and very glad to see me.  Nice to be needed….

There will be an awful lot of unloading once we get this baby in the driveway.  Many, many trips in and out.

Well, until, later…take care.