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| Happy Memorial Day |
We began our fulltime RV lifestyle in June 2015 thinking we would do it for about three years to see everything we wanted to see. Well here we are at the end of year three and we have only seen about half of it. There are ten states in the contiguous United States that we have not camped in with The Bus. Our rule is we must have spent at least one night camping in The Bus to earn the state sticker. Delaware and Connecticut we somehow missed in our travels back east and I don’t think we are motivated to go back just to say we did it. This summer, we are hitting the northern tier states some politicians call “Fly Over States.”
We stopped at Lake Charles State Park in Arkansas for a few nights after leaving Alabama. I purchased a three-day fishing license, but failed to catch anything. We visited the local mostly abandoned town of Powhatan, AR. We toured the museum there and walked around the old buildings. This little town was once bustling with pearl prospectors digging mussels out of the river.
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| St Moritz Schnitzel |
Our next stop was at Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. We camped at the US Army FAMCAMP located on the southern end of the lake. Ft Leonard Wood, MO is about an hour south of the lake and I received some training there back in 1984. In fact, that summer was my 21st birthday and I ate at a German restaurant near the base. I was surprised the restaurant was still there and ordered St Moritz schnitzel just as I had 34 years ago. It was great! We stocked up on supplies at the commissary and headed back to camp. The campground marina rents jet skis, so Pattie and I thought we would relive some of our youth by renting one for an hour. We blasted across the lake at speeds over 50 mph! While it was fun, we both looked at the pontoon boats when we returned and remarked how comfortable they looked.
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| How we felt riding the jet ski...you know, young, thin, hair |
Next it was off to visit the Amana Colonies in Iowa. As I drove through Iowa and looked across endless fields of young corn sprouting up 3-4 inches high, I reaffirmed the thought I had in 1984 the first time I visited Iowa. America's true power is in these fields and the men and women who work them. Since I was driving, I was not able to take pictures; but, the rural farm houses with tractors and equipment outside, the church steeples rising from towns in the distance, the homes with American flags and banners flying in honor of Memorial Day was a picture of America those that fly over these states will never see or understand. We camped close enough we could ride our bikes into Amana to visit the museum, shop, and of course eat another great German meal.
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| Many shops in Amana with homemade goods |
Onward to the north trying to escape the 90+ degree weather in Iowa, we arrived in Eagan, MN. We spent three nights here just south of the “Twin Cities” and visited the Mall of America. It was an all day hike of its own. We shopped very little since we don’t need anything and have nowhere to store anything. We enjoyed the Fly Over America 4D video ride and lunch at Bubba Gump’s .
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| Mall of America |
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| Momma says... |
We are still looking for that cooler weather so we are headed to North Dakota next.
Thanks for keepingupwiththejonesrv!
RV tip: Locking gas caps can be a pain, but a fellow camper told me a story where a friend of his was camping in Washington State and someone put something in their fuel tank that basically destroyed the engine. He said some radical environmentalist have been targeting large RVs and suggested we take precautions. So, I found the correct type of caps and bought two keyed alike. Maybe it will save us some grief.
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