Two Weeks in Florida

Leaving our rig at the Escapee Park in Livingston, we flew to Miami. Our first week we stayed on Key Largo at Anchorage Resort and Yacht Club.

On the southeast side of Miami, along Biscayne Bay, we visited the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and toured Charles Deering's winter estate.

A day was spent at the Everglades National Park. From the Flamingo Visitor Center, we took a boat ride into the mangrove swamp and saw many birds.

We came across this large American Crocodile. The Florida Everglades are the only place in the continental United States where you can find crocodiles in the wild.

From our Key Largo condo we drove the 100 miles south to the end at Key West. This is a slow, beautiful and interesting drive crossing many bridges and narrow keys. There are lovely views of the water and beaches on both sides.

Ernest Hemingway called Key West home for ten years. He lived in this house from 1931 to 1939. He found peace and also, great physical challenge in the turquoise waters that surround this tiny island.

This is the Little White House, inside the Truman Annex. It was the vacation retreat that presidents, Truman, Eisenhower and Kennedy used during their administrations.

Our second week was spent at Fisherman's Village Resort Club in Punta Gorda. Virginia's sister Cathy along with Cathy's husband, Jim, joined us for the week. Together we visited the Edison & Ford Winter Estates and Sanibel Island.

One of the high points of the week was time with Aunt Florence in Sarasota.

Continuing Our Trek South

After leaving Branson, we spent four nights at Maumelle Army Corp. of Engineers Park outside of Little Rock, Arkansas. This park was very nice and also was designed to accommodate big rigs. We saw the sights of Little Rock, including the State Capital Building, the Presidential Library and the Zoo. From Little Rock it was a days drive to East Fork A.C.E. Park in Wylie, Texas. We stayed about a week and visited with family and friends.

Continuing south to Jim Hogg A.C.E. in Georgetown, Texas, we visited our daughter and her family.

On Thursday we took our two Granddaughters to a Pumpkin Patch in Elgin. Later, Hannah and Julia enjoyed being able to carve their own pumpkins at our campsite. It was a very fun day.

Saturday was our day with the boys. We took them to Evergreen Farms in Elgin.

We all had a delightful day taking a hayride and a train ride, eating a picnic lunch and playing Pumpkin Slingshot and Pumpkin Hunt. Jacob and Logan really enjoyed being big boys and riding with Grandma and Grandpa on the "Tractor" Train.

Departing Georgetown on Monday, October 22, we made the 4 hour drive to our home park in Livingston. This is our first time to actually stay at our home address at Rainbow's End ESCAPEE Park.

While here we were able to pick up our mail from the Mail Center rather than having it forwarded. We even got to vote in our home precinct instead of voting absentee ballot. We discovered that there is no usable TV signal here, but there is an ESCAPEE library on site with DVD's to borrow.

Branson, Missouri

We arrived at Table Rock Lake State Park on Friday, September 21. This beautiful Missouri State Park has some sites with full hook-up, 50 amp electric and a long level cement pad. The park is located just south of town.

We visited Wilson Creek National Battlefield, just south of Springfield. The Battle at Wilson's Creek in 1861 opened the Civil War in Missouri. There is a Visitor Center, Museum and a five mile auto tour loop.

One day we visited the brand new Dewey Short Visitor Center and took a guided tour of the Table Rock Lake Hydro Electric Dam, which was built in 1952.

While in Branson we visited the Titanic Museum as well as seeing the Acrobats of China show. We spent time with friends from Santa Ana, Joe and Barbara, who have a beautiful home in the hills. We toured the city and the College of the Ozarks with them.

Escapade 2012 - Sedalia, Missouri

We attended our first Escapee Escapade the week of September 16 at the Missouri State Fair Grounds in Sedalia. There were 1011 in attendance and 574 rigs. Five one hour time slots were available each day where you could choose from an assortment of session topics. The evenings were completed with live shows from Branson presented in the fairground arena. We saw Yakoff, the comedian, one evening and the tenor George Dwyer on another. On Wednesday evening, we were entertained by an Escapee led Hamo-rama. We were pleasantly surprised to meet up with some friends and fellow Escapee members from Santa Ana, Sam & Betty, Keith & Gail, along with Bill & Michelle. It was a very busy and informative week.

KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI

We departed from Arapaho NWR on Thursday, September 6. Driving for two days and covering 750 miles we went through parts of Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa and into Missouri.
We hadn't spent any time in Kansas City, MO, and thought that would be a great place to visit before going to Escapade in nearby Sedalia. We parked at Basswood RV Resort north of the city for a week.
Since we were in the "breadbasket of the country" we stocked up on fresh fruit and vegetables at City Market, the downtown Farmer's Market. There were 170 farmer stalls full of local produce, crafts and Amish baked goods. We found some wonderful, picked ripe tomatoes, green beans and peaches, along with homemade blueberry jam, oatmeal bread and cinnamon rolls.
While downtown we walked over to The Treasure of the Steamboat Arabia Museum. The 171foot long steamboat Arabia sank on the Missouri River in 1856.
She was carrying over 200 tons of brand-new merchandise, dishware, jewelry, guns, tools, food and clothing to supply frontier stores along the river. It wasn't until 1988 that a group of treasure hunters found her remains lying 45 feet underground, 1/2 mile from the river's edge. The museum displays her entire cargo still intact 150 years later. It is absolutely amazing to see both the quantity and quality of this pre-Civil War merchandise. The picture on the left is of the paddle wheel. http://www.1856.com/
We love to visit Zoos and Kansas City is no exception. In our opinion KC has a very good zoo. It is an older zoo, but they are keeping it current with nice new displays and habitat.




http://www.kansascityzoo.org/





We had an interesting tour of the KC Harley-Davidson Vehicle and Powertrain Operations. This extensive tour is free and very interesting. There is a strong emphasis on quality. It is refreshing to see heavy industry at work in America.









We visited Independence, MO, Harry S. Truman's home and presidential library.

The Truman home is now a National Historic Site, donated by his wife upon her death. A National Park Ranger provided a guided tour of this beautiful home built in 1885.
Inside the presidential library there is a full scale reproduction of the Oval Office as it appeared during the Truman years. Although Truman was not always popular at the time, he is now rated by historians as one of the top five best.
The Money Museum is located in the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. We watched as millions of dollars were loaded into machines that separated and shredded the worn bills and identified counterfeit bills. Five to seven counterfeits identified daily.


Hallmark's Corporate Headquarters has a Visitor Center with displays depicting the history of the company.




Around the corner from Hallmark is the newly opened Sea Life Aquarium.

www.sealifeus.com




On our last day we visited both the "Toy and Miniature Museum" and "The National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial". The horrors of five years of trench warfare were well documented. This was a first class museum complete with galleries, two movie theaters, and interactive exhibits. The museum is under the 1926 Liberty Memorial Tower. Admission includes an elevator ride to the top of the 217 foot tall tower offering a beautiful view of the skyline.

VACATIONING IN SALT LAKE CITY

IRON BLOSAM LODGE, SNOWBIRD, UTAH
We were able to work ahead on our hours so we could take our last week off to tour the Salt Lake City area. We traded for a lovely time-share condo at 8,000 feet in Little Cottonwood Canyon, Snowbird, Utah. We had a studio with a full kitchen and large bath on the 11th (top) floor. The balcony overlooks the mountain and ski slopes. There was no need for AC in our Condo, just opening the door allowed the cool mountain breeze to blow through. The drive up the canyon east of the city included a 9% grade. It was very beautiful with the changing leaves.

KENNECOTT BINGHAM CANYON COPPER MINE


After church on Sunday, we took a self-guided tour of the world's first open-pit copper mine. The mine, opened in 1903, supplies 15% of the world's copper needs. This massive pit mine has yielded more than 19 million tons of copper as well as gold, silver and molybdenum. Enough material has been removed to create a pit that is more than 3/4 of a mile deep and two and a half miles wide.
This 18 foot tall tire is from the huge trucks that remove the rock. If you look closely, the small dots at the bottom of the mine are some of the huge trucks. This helps with perspective of just how massive this pit is!




On Monday we took the mass transit train, UTA TRAX, downtown. We toured the extensive Temple Square gardens and both Visitors centers.

At noon we attended a 35 minute organ demonstration. This is one of the largest organs with 11,623 pipes in a near acoustically perfect room.



After Temple Square, we walked up a steep hill to the Utah State Capital Building.





This panoramic view of the city is from the front porch of the Capital Building.


After visiting Bear River National Wildlife Refuge on Tuesday morning, we drove to Golden Spike National Historic Site near Promontory, Utah.


This is the point where the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad connected the East to the West on May 10, 1869. This is an exact replica of Union Pacific Engine No. 119. Over 143 years ago, two locomotives pulled up to the one-rail gap left in the track. After a golden spike was driven in the last rail, the country was connected. Although we didn't have time to wait to see the engine operate, we could hear the water and steam gurgling in the boiler.

The following day we drove downtown to visit the Tracy Aviary. One of the world's oldest public aviary, opened in 1938. More than 400 birds from around the world can be seen, including 135 species.
We also saw a free-flying bird show.
This pair of black-necked stilts were willing to sit still to have their picture taken.




After the Aviary we stopped by the University of Utah Ute Stadium where the 2002 Olympic Cauldron is located.






Virginia was honored to light the Olympic flame.


Thursday found us in Ogden. We discovered the Union Station Museums, which actually houses three museums in one, a Railroad Museum, Browning Firearms Museum and a Classic Car Museum. We really enjoyed all three.


After lunch in the Ogden historic district, at Karen's Cafe, we toured the Hill Aerospace Museum at Hill Air Force Base.
On the way back to our condo we drove the 5 mile causeway to Antelope Island within the Great Salt Lake. We discovered some great bird watching along the causeway. We saw thousands of California Gulls, Phalaropes, Black-Necked Stilts, American Avocets, Eared Gribes to name a few. Around the island we also saw chukar. The island also has a large herd of Bison, as well as big horn sheep, prong horn antelope and mule deer.

The Nordic Ski Jump in Park City was quite a site. They have both a 120 meter and a 90 meter jump. The view on the right is from the top of the 120 meter jump.


During the 2002 games the park hosted bobsleigh, skeleton, Luge, Nordic ski jumping, and Nordic combined events.
They offer bob-sled rides on summer sleds (with wheels) for $60.00 a person, which works out to $1.00 a second. The sleds are piloted by professional drivers. Reaching speeds up to 80 miles per hour and 5 G's of force we chose not to partake.

We decided to take a 120 mile detour on our way back to Arapaho NWR in the hopes of seeing Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area. We didn't spend much time there, but at least we saw it. This may be a good place to explore more thoroughly in the future.