The odds were 1 in a 100, and.............

This is my final posting for our "Great Americana Adventure" blog. I hadn't posted in a while because we've been at Diana and Emil's place in Hernando, FL for an extended period and had nothing of noteworthy interest to my blog followers. Emil and I spent some time on projects he wanted to get done. We laid a new floor in one of their rooms, removed a 7" sliding glass connecting doorway and replaced it with a newly constructed "Spanish Arched" passageway, and moved a wood stove to the other side of the home which required cutting and bracing roof rafters and trusses that were in the way of the thru-the-ceiling stovepipe.
During our final week there and just a few days before we headed north for home, we rented a pontoon party boat and took a cruise of about 7 miles (and 81 channel buoys) down the Homossa River and then another 3 miles of so out into the Gulf of Mexico. We dropped anchor out in the Gulf and enjoyed the antics of a half dozen or so porpoises frolicking around our boat.

Once we departed Florida, we moseyed on up to Washington, DC with plans to camp out in our tent at Greenbelt National Park for a full week ($8/night for us seniors) and visit all the touristy things we could fit in during our week's stay.

On day 1 we toured the Capitol building and were also able to sit in the senate gallery while the senate was actually in session. The title of this blog posting "The odds were 1 in a 100" refers to the fact that the senate is composed of 100 members (2 from each state) and during our visit there, our own senator from Maine, Olympia Snow, was debating a bill on the senate floor. Pretty cool.

On day 2 we returned to the Capitol and attended a live session in the House of Representatives that afternoon. In the forenoon, we visited and toured the U.S. Supreme Court. We actually sat within spitting distance of the 9 Justice Supreme Court bench (they were not in session this day but the lecture on the Courts operations was very interesting).

On day 3 we began visiting some of the Smithsonian's museums. Or first stop was the American Indian Museum. That was followed in the afternoon by a visit to the Air and Space Museum.

On day 4 we spent the entire day at the Museum of Natural History.

On day 5 we toured the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and observed our paper currency being printed. I learned that a stack of $100 bills reaching my height would have a value of 1 3/4 million dollars (and I have pictures to prove it). Next on our list for the day was our visit to the Holocaust Museum. Needless to say, a very moving experience.

On day 6 we hit 2 more museums, the International Spy Museum and Madame Tussard's Wax Museum. The wax museum actually had figures of each and every one of our 44 presidents (as well as persons famous in sports, music, and other fields of vocation). Below is a photo of Betty with Hillary and Bill Clinton.

Betty posing with her friends Hillary and Bill

On day 7 we toured the White House visitor information center and followed that up with a stroll around the Tidal Basin/Jefferson Memorial to admire the 3 thousand cherry trees which were in full bloom (albeit during a brief hail storm).

The Cherry Blossoms, Tidal Basin, & Jefferson Memorial

There were of course, many things we did not have time to see, i.e., American History Museum, the Pentagon, Arlington National Cemetery, Mt. Vernon, etcs. I'm sure one would need 3 or 4 weeks to see most of what Washington has to offer. Hopefully we shall return for another week of sightseeing in the not to distant future.
So now we leave Washington and head for Maine. Not more than 5 miles across the Maine state line, we saw our first snow (excluding the Grand Canyon - see earlier blog) and by the time we arrived at Cedar Lake the snow depths were still 2 to 3 feet. Welcome home, hey!
Oh well, our 5 months away were filled with wonderful visits with friends and family and many memorable visits to our nations natural landmarks and attractions. We traveled a total of 12,278 miles, passed thru 26 states, and returned home $14,533 poorer (but I only lost $8 in Vegas).

As the saying goes.......
"And a good time was had by all"

And the winner is.......

Howdy, Y'all – Long time, no post, hey?

Just didn't want to bore you with quiet visits with friends and family. Thought I should have at least a few significant events to write about.
Anyway, since my last posting, here's where we've been and what we've done.

When we departed Galveston Island, Texas, we left via a state operated free ferry system and rode the boat back to the mainland across Galveston Bay in a “pea soup" fog (de-ja vu the coast of Maine), disembarking at Port Bolivar. We then proceeded on to New Orleans, LA for a couple nights stay in order to stroll the length of Bourbon Street taking in all the sounds of New Orleans Blues music emanating from the never-ending row of pubs and cafes. Leaving New Orleans, we layed over one night in Tallahassee, FL on our way to Melbourne and a visit with our dear friends, Karen and Harry. Their hospitality was so embracing that we didn't leave for ten days. We spent our time with them living aboard their 43 foot Gulfstream trawler right on the Intra-Coastal Waterway.

Phenomenal!

Our mutual friend, Hamp, gave us a great day of touristy stuff by showing us an 1800's “fish camp”, Sebastion Inlet State Park, a sea turtle museum, and the National Historic Landmark, the McLarty Museum, on the site of the 1715 Spanish Plate Fleet disaster. Nearly a dozen sailing vessels were sunk on the offshore reefs here by a hurricane in 1715. All were laden with treasure. Gold, Silver, andjewels bound from Cuba to Spain.

We also had a great day sailing with Dennis on his yacht and great evenings beating Denise and Hamp in a game of dominoes. Thank you to all of our friends for more wonderful memories.

When we finally left Melbourne we headed for Fort Lauderdale to spend a week with my brother, Bill, stopping on the way in West Palm Beach to go out to lunch with Nancy and Ernie, an ex-sister-in-law of Betty's. While at my brothers for 9 days or so, I did a few chores for him and Betty did a lot of cleaning for him. 

When leaving there, we traveled across “Alligator Alley” on our way to Arcadia

(near the Gulf coast) for an overnight visiting with friends and co-workers (with the North Maine Woods) Linda and Daryl.

After leaving Arcadia we moseyed on up to Hernando, FL via the very impressive Skyway Bridge spanning Tampa Bay for our extended stay with cousin Diana and Emil.

On launch day for the final flight of space shuttle “Discovery”, we traveled back to the Atlantic coast and Karen and Harry's boat, “EMOH” (”Home” spelled backwards). We left  Hernando about 5:30 am in order to arrive by their ships sailing time of 9:00 am. With half a dozen of us aboard, we set off northerly along the ICW for the three hour cruise up to the Kennedy Space Center area. We dropped anchor just opposite the space center's Vehicle Assembly Building and launch pad 39B. We then enjoyed a couple hours of drinks, snacks, and conversations with old and new friends. Just after4:50pm we witnessed the final blast off of Discovery into a clear blue late afternoon sky as it began it's chase of the International Space Station. 

Two days later, Betty and I left the boat before daybreak and with lawn chairs andfull coffee mugs in hand, we drove to a public park beach and sat on the shores ofthe great Atlantic Ocean to await a gorgeous sunrise.

Harry reaching to catch beads

Later in the day, we drove up to Cocoa Village with Karen, Harry, Sheri, and Clyde to revel in Cocoa's version of the New Orleans “Mardi Gras” celebration complete with Louisiana cuisine, Cajun music and a grand parade that included the traditional tossing of thousands of beaded necklaces into the crowd. The next morning we headed back to the Gulf Coast, Hernando, and Diana and Emil's place.

Next up, a fishing trip into the Gulf of Mexico. 

We plan on starting back north the last week of March with a six night stay tenting in a national park just outside of Washington, D.C. We'll spend the week there seeing all the sights, monuments, museums, etc that we can fit into that week. We hope to take in a session of congress and of course tour the White House.I emailed my local congressional representative this morning for White House tour tickets. You need to do that nowadays about a month in advance in order for the government to complete background checks prior to your visit.

Oh, and BTW, the winner of my little trivia questions about the two photos at the end of my previous blog posting was.............

KATHY! Harry got them correct also but Kathy beat him out with the right answers

sooner.

For those of you that have asked for our cell phone numbers, they are.......

Betty: 207 731-5573
Linwood: 207 731-3164

Til I post again, have a great day.

7,443 and rolling

After returning to Linda;s from Las Vegas, we spent a couple of nights resting up, loading the car with everything we had left there before departing for the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas (tent, sleeping bags, etc.), said our tearful goodbyes, and headed east.

 Our next stop was to have been to visit the Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico but Betty kinda decided that she didn't really care to go any further underground than the required "6 feet" we all must resign ourselves to some day. So we altered our itinerary and visited the White Sands National Monument instead. The White Sands expanse of 99% pure gypsum dunes encompasses an area of about 295 square miles and is part of the White Sands missile range in New Mexico. It is definitely a very unique landscape. Where we plow snow back in Maine, the National Park Service here plows gypsum (hydrated calcium sulfate) to keep the park's loop road open for visitors. The dunes are snow white, can be taller than a 2 story house, and, as I said earlier, are composed of 99% pure gypsum.

All the dune area is surrounded by mountains. In the photo to the right, Betty is just cresting the top of a dune. Notice how small our Ford Explorer looks down below. Most of the native desert creatures (lizards, toads, etc) that live here have evolved to a white coloration instead of their normal colorations of browns and greens when the same species is seen elsewhere in the traditional desert areas. A very unique place, indeed.

A couple of days after leaving New Mexico we stopped over in San Antonio, Texas to stroll the downtown "Riverwalk" and explore the mission "San Antonio de Valero", more famously known as "The Alamo". Contrary to some comments I had read on the Internet about visiting the Alamo, Betty and I both enjoyed the 3 to 4 hours we spent there. Perhaps it's because we have a greater appreciation of history than some of those "bloggers". The historical write-ups and the historical artifacts were very plentiful and very enlightening. They even had Davy Crockett's beaded vest and his long rifle as well as Jim Bowie's famous knife. The history of the whole complex and the eventual siege of the mission by Mexico's president, Santa Anna, and the defense of the mission by volunteers from nearly every state in the union was fascinating to read about. The defenders numbered 189 men and held off Santa Anna's Mexican army of 6,500 men for 13 days before they were finally overwhelmed and annihilated.

Our next stopover, by Betty's suggestion, was Galverston Island off the Texas coast in the Gulf of Mexico. It is here where I am writing this blog post (we leave in the morning for New Orleans, LA). Today, we viewed 2 documentary films. One regarding Jean Lafitte, a pirate who established a colony here and raided both American and Spanish sailing vessels and the other about the destruction of Galverston on September 8th, 1900 by a ferocious hurricane. It was the largest natural disaster in American history. 6,000 people perished out of a population of 37,000. One third of all buildings were obliterated.



Next, we went aboard an off-shore oil drilling rig, the "Ocean Star" and toured the four levels of the oil platform, learning how deep sea oil drilling is done. Very fascinating, very educational, and very enlightening (especially with the "Deep Water Horizon" oil rig disaster in the Gulf happening less then a year ago fresh in our minds). There were no apparent effects of that spill impacting the beaches here on Galverston Island.

So, after having an expensive lunch at "Joe's Crab Shack", we headed for the beach to see how we fit in our newly purchased beach chairs. We had heavy rains the night before, woke up to morning fog, but the warm sun broke through by the time we hit the beach on the Gulf of Mexico side of Galverston Island.

As you can see, it's "just another day at the office" for Betty

Now, here's two problems for you to ponder....... (on the right, I'm in a "basket" used to hoist men and gear from a delivery boat 100 feet or so up onto the working deck of an offshore oil drilling platform).

What is the name of this very rare life form?

What is WRONG with this picture?

That's it for now folks, meet you on "Bourbon Street" in New Orleans.


p.s.: if anyone gets both trivia answers correct, I'll send you a surprise gift.


    Love Y'all !!!



Oh, yeah. Regarding the title of this blog posting ( "7,443 and rolling" ). Today marks the 2 month anniversary of our departure from Maine. In that time we have added 7,443 miles to the old Ford Explorers odometer reading and we still have a good 3 months to go. Gotta keep drilling for oil - need the gas!

Viva, Las Vegas!

Since our last blog post, we have left Flagstaff, AZ and the Grand Canyon area headed for Hoover Dam and then 3 nights in Las Vegas, NV. After "Vegas" we will begin our trek easterly with a 2 night stop-over at daughter, Linda's, in Morenci, AZ to pick up a major portion of our traveling gear which we had stored there.

When in Las Vegas, I gave some thought to continuing on to Los Angeles and the Pacific Ocean cause it was only 200+ miles further west just to say we've been there. But, we decided to head back toward the Atlantic coast and Melbourne, FL instead.

                       (Just can't wait to hug Karen and Harry & Diana and Emil).



Anyway, our visit to Hoover Dam was a little disappointing. The structure itself was quite impressive with a height of 756 feet, Lake Meade at 110 miles in length and with 550 miles of shoreline behind the dam, and the dam's discharge sending the Colorado River coursing through Black Canyon below was pretty awesome.

The cost for us to tour the insides of the dam totaled $67. But, what's inside a dam? Not much for the money. Just the generator turbines and concrete. Concrete and more concrete. The dam is 660 feet thick in concrete at its base and 75 feet thick at its top. My recommendations.... - see it from the outside for free, skip the $30/person inside tour.

This photo is looking downstream into Black Canyon from the top of Hoover Dam.

The Las Vegas Strip

Then it was on to Las Vegas for a 3 night stay at the "Santa Fe Station" Hotel and Casino. We spent our 2 days walking the Las Vegas Strip and visited about a dozen well known casinos (Caesars Palace, MGM Grand, Planet Hollywood, Mandalay Bay, The Mirage, etc.) taking in their free show events, eating good food, drinking good beer and good coffee, admiring the elegant architecture, and straining our ageing leg muscles (the "strip" is a couple miles long - and it's down and back yet).

The "Venetian's" canals

This photo to the left was taken inside another of the casinos we visited, The "Venetian". You could ride in a gondola both inside and outside the complex. And of course, the gondolier would serenade you as he propelled the boat through the interior "canals". Pretty cool.









Photo to the right.......

My favorite bar stools. Found in the "Rain Forest" cafe at the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino.







So, as I post this blog update, we are back at Linda and Jim's in Morenci, AZ after a 514 mile drive yesterday from Las Vegas. Will do some laundry, repack the Ford Explorer, go rock hounding tomorrow and head out on Thursday morning for the Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, then perhaps "The Alamo" in San Antonio, Texas, and for sure, an overnighting in New Orleans, LA with an evening on Bourbon Street. For the coming week, we'll be heading into the rising sun as we travel I-10 from Arizona, through New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and into Florida.

Until I post again.........

                      
                             "Viva, Las Vegas"!
                                              (She's a table dealer at Caesar's Palace)
                              (She might have taken my money, but I took her picture, Ha!)

The unexpected "24's"

Linda and the
 "Monster Truck" she drives

So to continue our journal from my last blog posting, we have been at my daughter, Linda's, for nearly 3 weeks in Morenci, Az. Had a great Christmas and New Years with her and husband Jim. Watched any and all Patriots and Cowboys football games, gained about 20 pounds from Linda's superb cooking, and thoroughly enjoyed time spent with Jim (even though he had to work on emergency call-outs more than normally expected). We left Morenci on January 4th and headed up to Flagstaff for a 3 night stay.

Betty (wish you were here Lynn)

Our first excursion from Flagstaff was to visit the Grand Canyon. In one word..... AWESOME! Betty and I hiked about 2 miles along the canyon rim (elevation, 7,120 feet at the rim - 6,000 feet down to the river) and took about 65 pictures (which I won't bore you with). We also viewed an IMAX film presentation documenting the first transit down the Colorado River thru the canyon in open boats by John Wesley Powell in 1869'ish. Dizzying!

On our second day in this area we drove to the town of Sedona (on strong recommendations of my daughter, Nancy, who had been there). I have to say, in everything I have seen so far in our 5 1/2 thousand mile venture to date, across many states, Sedona is the absolute highlight, and I fully expect that our 5 1/2 thousand mile return trip to the east coast, will confirm that nothing could or will surpass it. Thanks, Nancy, for encouraging us to visit Sedona and the "Red Rock Canyon" area. I could really live there, it's probably as close to heaven as I'll ever get.

Oh Yeah, about those "unexpected 24'S".......

#2  -  We are staying for 3 nights at Santa Fe Station Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas in a "Deluxe" room that sleeps 4 for a mere $24/night! Can you believe that?

#1 -  The temperature at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon just a few days before our visit was -24 degrees (that's a MINUS 24 F or a -32 degrees C) - I still can't get my head around that. Here I am in the American Southwest, maybe the Arizona Desert, and looking forward to visiting the Grand Canyon and it's 24 below zero? Cool hey! I know it was 60 degrees warmer back in Maine ~ 35 above. Actually, on the day we left for there it was only 9 below. Our day there was great though and very comfortable. Sunny, calm winds (no wind chill), 10 degrees when we started the hike and it reached a balmy high of 38 by the time we finished our hike along the rim.

Tomorrow, it's on to Hoover Dam and 3 nights in Las Vegas. Stay tuned........... and Yahoo!

p.s. - If ya'll care to send me some money, I'd be happy to "invest" it for you in Vegas.

Tumbling Tumbleweeds

So, since my last posting, we have left Little Rock and crossed the rest of Arkansas, all of Oklahoma and on into Texas, stopping for the night in Amarillo. I had suggested to Betty that we stop off in Oklahoma City as we passed through town and renew our passports just in case we wanted to visit Mexico when we reach El Paso or maybe the Bahamas when we get to Florida. A "no go". If you recall, the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City was bombed by terrorist Timothy McVeigh. She just didn't want to go there. I can sympathize with that. We'll renew them someplace else later.

I-40 through the later half of Arkansas, all of Oklahoma, and all of northern Texas was deserted of traffic for 100's of miles. Even more desolate than driving I-95 between Old Town and Medway. Amazing. Once we entered New Mexico the traffic density didn't change, but, the scenery sure did. All through New Mexico and on into Arizona the mountains rose thousands of feet on either side for hundreds of miles as we made our way south on I-25 to the town of "Truth or Consequences", New Mexico. Not far north of TandC, we had passed the site of the worlds first atomic bomb explosion which occurred on July 16th, 1945 in the northern portion of the White Sands Missile Range. We left the Interstate system not far south of TandC and heeded easterly toward Arizona and Linda's. We had to cross a mountain range, the Black Range and chose "Emory Pass" at an elevation of 8,228 ft which would put us into "Silver City, AZ" for the night. Our plan for the next day was to visit the "Gila Cliff Dwellings", a national historic site located in the Mogollon Mountains about 45 miles north of Silver City.

The next morning broke with the forecast of snow (over the local TV stations) for the Albuquerque area and northerly. We were over 200 miles south of the snow threat area, and, I thought, in the clear to visit the cliff dwellings. But, Betty was too anxious about driving up into higher elevations with the threat of snow in the state so we opted to head on to Linda's instead. We arrived at Linda's in Morenci, Az about noon'ish on Thursday, Decenber 16th.

After only one day of R&R, we headed off to Tucson. Linda wanted to do a little Christmas shopping there.
We spent the night in a motel, ate well, and had a very nice evening together.

I picked up a "Floozie" at "Big Nose Kate's" saloon

On our way back the next day, we detoured a bit to visit the town "To tough to die", Tombstone, AZ. We spent a few hours there walking the streets once walked by Wyatt Earp and his brothers, Doc Holliday, the Clanton's and the McLaury's, and "Big Nose Kate" (she was the saloon manager and lover of Doc Holliday). We witnessed a live reenactment of "The Gunfight at the OK Corral", had a beer in Big Nose Kate's Saloon, intended to visit "Boot Hill" but missed the stage couch ride and didn't have time to wait for the next one, and bought a copy of the local newspaper of the time recounting the events of the day, the "Tombstone Epitaph", October, 1881.

On the way back from Tucson to Morenci we passed through an area called "Texas Canyon". Photos will be forthcoming but it sure looked as though Dundee has been here. Some of you will know to what I refer (the monoliths he built of stones at nearly every campsite we stayed at on our canoe trip down the Allagash River).

Linda and Jim's home is beautifully decorated inside and out for this Christmas season and they make us feel so welcome. We look forward to spending some time here with them, certainly through New Years.

I have pictures ready to upload into my blog, but not tonight. It's Southern Comfort time. Stay tuned, I will try to add some photos in the next day or 3.   :-)

Oh yeah, the reason for the title of this blog posting, "Tumbling Tumble Weeds". When entering New Mexico, we stopped at a visitor center to pick up a state map of New Mexico and while Betty was doing so, I stayed near the car to have a cigar. Tumble Weeds were rolling and bouncing across the desert tundra in front of me and I really wanted to have one as a souvenir. So now picture this, the Loon is out running across the desert with a cigar in his mouth chasing a tumbling tumbleweed. Watching me would have brought a chuckle to you're face, I'm sure. In a 20mph wind, boy are they fast! Couldn't catch up with one. Maybe next time (when the breeze is less than 5 knots).

That's it from here for now -

The trials and tribulations at "Talking Rock"

Arrived at our daughters cabin in the Georgia mountains about noon on Sunday, Nov 21st. in a place called "Talking Rock" (named by the local native Indians because whenever they yelled at this large rock face, it would "echo" back).

Beautiful cabin in which Betty and I spent most of our time alone during the week but with family on the weekends. Had our traditional Thanksgiving feast on Sunday, the 28th with 16 at the table.

The cabin sits quite high up on a hill overlooking a passing creek. In fact, there are at least 40 steps to negotiate when descending to sit by the creekside fireplace at happy hour. One evening I was headed back up to the cabin when I lost my balance after only eight steps up. I managed to spin myself around and pretty much stay vertical as I careened out of control in a downward rush. I made the eight steps but lost it when I reached the flats at the bottom. Now horizontal and with still significant momentum, I continued to roll and within 8 or 10 feet or so, I dropped off the "cliff" (maybe four feet) and landed smack into Longbranch Creek. The back of my neck/head struck a football sized rock. My collision with the rock did about as much damage as my earlier collision with a moose. Nothing! They say a cat has 9 lives, I have already bested that.

Just 2 days after my fall, Betty tried to outdo me. This beautiful cabin has a nice loft and a rather long and steep stairway connecting the loft with the lower living room. I heard this clunk, clunk, clunk noise and when I turned, there she was face down and head first crashing down the stairs being fetched up at the bottom by a cabin wall. I feared for a broken neck, fractured wrists, or at minimum, damage to her recently operated on toes. Thankfully however, she came up laughing. She's a tough nut to crack as well. Perhaps Talking Rock is is a huge meteorite from deep space. An iron meteorite emanating a powerful magnetic field that effects the gravitational pull of the planet in the area of this cabin which causes human beings of the older generation to fall flat on their faces.

Since things run in three's, here's another one for ya. After the computer meltdown I had, I was at a Best Buy store to buy a new wireless laptop. On returning to my car, I couldn't get the ignition key to turn to start the car. By the time Triple A got help to me, I had missed our granddaughter Mary's evening musical performance. Rats! But at least Betty was in attendance. Betty was also treated by Lynn to a performance of "Cirque-du-Soleil in downtown Atlanta. Very much enjoyed.

Speaking of granddaughters, we were able to see Jessica and great-granddaughter Lillianne off for a three year stint in Germany with Ryan, her army husband.

At times I thought I must be still in Maine. For most of the 18 days we were in Georgia it was pretty nippy. Had snow flurries and saw temperatures in the teens. Brrrrr.

Left Georgia on December 10th headed for Memphis, Tennessee to spend a couple days with with a long time friend that Betty used to work with many years ago. Patty and Barry had brought their Memphis canoe club to Maine a handful of years ago for a week and I had the pleasure of guiding them on a few river trips.

The evening we arrived they took us to the famous "Peabody" hotel (built in the 1930's as I  recall) where they treated us (I mean me) to a $13 glass of wine. Thanks Barry. It was in the lobby that we got to witness the really weird "marching ducks". Five live ducks that spend the day swimming around the lobby water fountain. Every day at around six p.m. they exit the fountain and "march" down the hallway on a "red carpet" to board an elevator for the ride up to their "penthouse" on the roof of the hotel for the night. Still weird.

Then we moseyed along Memphis's famous "Beale Street" headed for famous "Blues" musician, B.B King's blues club. Here we savored a superb meal of the best of Memphis bar-b-que and an evening of great blues music. Thanks again Patty and Barry for everything you did for us. We'll never forget it.

Elvis's grave site at "Graceland"

We headed out again on December 12th but stopped after only 18 miles or so to spend a few hours touring "Graceland", the Memphis home and burial place of the "King of Rock 'n Roll", Elvis Presley. Toured the entire mansion, saw his well known "Pink" Cadillac, boarded his 4 engine private jet (named "Lisa Marie", after his daughter), and paid our respects at his grave site. Arrived in Little Rock, Arkansas that night with the intention to visit the William Jefferson Clinton Presidential Library the next day.

The "Oval Office"

Spending the forenoon at the presidential library in Little Rock, Arkansas was a real pleasure. Replicas of the Cabinet Room and the Oval Office were special highlights. We hit the road again after lunch to cross the rest of Arkansas and have now stopped for the night somewhere just off I-40 about 65 miles into Oklahoma. We should cross the rest of Oklahoma tomorrow and overnight somewhere in northern Texas. All is going well (except for the outside air temperatures - I thought 17 degrees in Georgia was a bit chilly but it will near 9 degrees here in Oklahoma by morning). I saw moments ago on the Internet that it was 46 degrees in Maine (makes me wonder if we;re traveling in the right direction).

Okay, this gets my blog post pretty much up to date (except for pictures - will add some soon, after I figure out how to do it). Gonna quit now and watch the football game with a beer in hand.

Stay tuned.