July 16th-24th - Fort Wayne, Indiana - Oxford, Michigan - Indianapolis, Indiana

On the 16th we headed to Fort Wayne Indiana for the first stop on a three-stop trip north. We driveway mooched at Jim and Marilyn's for three days. Jim and I were going to go to a car show on Saturday morning but Friday night it poured rain and the event was cancelled. We did get to go to the stock car races in Angola, Indiana, on Saturday night. It was a nice track and we had excellent weather. Sunday we all went to a winery in Fort Wayne. Here is a picture of Kelly, Marilyn and Jim at the winery. The wines were very good and we had a nice charcuterie board of meats and cheeses as well.

Monday Jim, Kelly and I visited the Fireman's Museum in downtown Fort Wayne. It was really interesting. Here is a picture of their oldest fire pumper in the process of being restored.

Here is a picture of how they hung the fabric hoses for them to dry between uses. The area is about three stories tall.

This is a picture of the museum, which is housed in the oldest firehouse in Fort Wayne. The section on the right was the original building, complete with stable areas for the horses. The firemen could be dressed and the horses hitched up in 90 seconds.

It is very nice museum with a number of old firetrucks and lots of firemen's memorabilia. I learned that even to this day the city does not provide food for the firemen who live there for days on end. The firemen weekly designate a "cook" for the week and he/she shops for food and divides the bill among the firemen. I also learned that the firemen provide their own bedding. They strip it at the end of their shift and take it home to wash it.

We had a nice visit with Jim and Marilyn and seeing some sites in Fort Wayne.

After three days in Fort Wayne we headed to Oxford, Michigan, to visit three of our Florida neighbors. They are three sisters and their husbands - Chris and Marj, Dave and Jean, and George and Janet. We circled the wagons in Chris's yard. It worked out well because the first night we had to take refuge in their basement rec room as a major wind, rain, and hail storm passed through. Here is a picture of the rain storm through the screen door. It was POURING HARD. Luckily the hail was only pea sized.

The next day they took us on a tour of the area and we went to a place in the Town of Metamora called Hoard House for lunch. Here is a picture of the plaque which describes it and a picture of the building.

The inside of the building was quite interesting. On the ground floor some of the flooring is made of sawed planks of wood carved to fit together to make a tight floor. Here is a picture.

Another part is made of slices of  tree trunks set in concrete. Here is a picture of a section of it.

Most interesting was the floor upstairs, which is the original floor from 1850, when the upstairs area was broken up into sleeping areas. You can see where the original walls were 170 years ago. It is now used as a dining hall. Here are a couple of pictures.

Here is a picture of the group waiting to order a marvelous lunch. They are on the left - Dave, Kelly, and Janet. On the right - George, Chris, Marj, and Jean. Great friends and a fun group.

After lunch we drove around the area which for decades encompassed dozens of huge gravel and rock pits. Most of these areas have now been turned into subdivisions with water filling in the old quarry holes to make private lakes. The area is now big horse country. There are huge horse farms throughout the area where horses are bred, boarded, traded, and ridden. Big money!

We left Michigan Friday morning and headed to Indianapolis for Kelly's nephew's delayed wedding reception on Saturday. Friday night Kelly's brother, Andy, smoked pork steaks and provided a nice meal for all the sisters and their husbands. 

Nephew Andrew and his wife Maggie were married during Covid and are now expecting a girl in November. Due to Covid the reception was postponed until this past Saturday night.  It was the first time all of the McKerrow siblings had been together in years. Here are a couple of pictures. The first is Maggie, Andrew, Andy, and Tana. 

These are the McKerrow siblings from left to right: Alexa, Nancy, Joan, Andy, Kelly, Mary, and Ann.

I can't remember the last time they were all together since they are from North Carolina, Missouri, Indiana, and Texas. It was a fun time.

Here is a picture of Homer at the campsite in Indianapolis. He's small and doesn't take up much space.

I thought the campground looked familiar when we pulled in and I later realized that is is where Jim and I camped when we went to the Indy 500 about seven years ago. I think we may have even been on the same site.

We had a nice trip home, arriving at 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, and then did all the unloading of clothes and food. I had several things to fix on Homer once home. One was the shower hose. The stainless steel cover had just untwisted so it was an easy fix. The showerhead is a high pressure. After I screwed the hose back to it water would barely come out. What the heck? I took it apart, blew through it, and some little calcium deposits, or sand, came out. It then worked great again.  

Another project was to work on getting the RV anti-freeze taste out of the fresh water. When I de-winterized Homer I ran a lot of water through the system to get the anti-freeze out but it wasn't enough. Although the residual anti-freeze is not poisonous, it tastes bad. We didn't drink the water but even brushing our teeth with that water we had a bad taste. I drained the water tank and filled it again adding two cups of bleach. I then ran water through all the lines and I am letting it sit for a day. I will then drain it again and see how it tastes. 

Before leaving on the trip I put new batteries in the fire alarm/co detector but it didn't seem to work consistently when I tested it. I pulled it down and it was dated March of 2006 so I decided it was time to order a new one. It will arrive in a couple of days. It is identical to the old one so it will be a simple install. 

Our trip was 1412 miles and Homer ran like a top averaging 8.3 miles to the gallon at 65 mph with the AC on. I'm going to schedule him in for an oil change (only due to the length of time since the last oil change), a parking brake pedal adjustment, and a lubrication of the cruise control system, which stuck on me once.

Our next planned trip with Homer is to the "King Biscuit Blues Festival" in Helena, Arkansas, in October if it isn't ungodly hot. The venues are outside and Home sits out in a field in the sun all day. Last year we left early because the heat was so oppressive we couldn't enjoy ourselves either at the venues or sitting around Homer. Hopefully this year will be cooler weather. We've gone in the past when we needed blankets to sit out.

 

 

June 8 - 12, 2021 - Trip to Bemidji, Minnesota, a Little More Fishing, then Home.

On Tuesday we decided to take a trip into Bemidji, Minnesota. It is the largest town around with a population of about 15,000. We first went to the Visitors Center. Paul Bunyon and the Blue Ox are a big deal in Bemidji. Here are a couple of pictures of Kellen there. (You know Grandma and Grandpa made him do it.)

We then headed to the city's Science Center which was really nice but clearly low budget. Kellen got to hold a couple of the reptiles. This one is a large lizard. Notice the blue tongue.

This one is a legless Lizard from Europe, two thirds of its body is tail.

After checking out various exhibits we walked out to the nearby dock on Lake Bemidji. The Mississippi River flows from the headwaters into Lake Itaska. From there it flows North into Lake Bemidji. Here is where it enters Lake Bemidji.

The river crosses the lake and then flows South. Here are a couple of pictures of it heading out of the lake.

Unfortunately there was no place to pull off the road to view the Mississippi starting its flow South. It is certainly not "The Mighty Mississippi" up here.

Here is a picture of Kelly, John, and Carlene out fishing on Thursday. Unfortunately, not a single bite for Kelly or John. Carlene caught one. Just too hot.

We decided to leave on Friday, rather than Saturday, so we could get settled in at home before Kelly flies out to California on Tuesday to welcome the arrival of our second grandson. Kellen and I will later either drive out or fly out. 

Whenever we make trips there are things that break or need attention. I already posted about the emergency window bracket coming off allowing the window to flop. I fixed it today with a couple of pop rivets. Here are pictures of the project. The first is the "non-broken" side.

The second is the area of the window where the bracket is attached.

The third is the bracket pop riveted back on - good for another 15 years.

I then decided to pull apart the shower skylight because the plastic trim was breaking loose on the corners. The shower skylight has a shade over it. The shade has not worked since we bought the rig because the string had broken and someone retied it making it too short to open and close. It was permanently closed. Here is a picture of what it looks like now.

I replaced the strings that move the shade and it is good as new and ready to be reinstalled once the new trim piece arrives.  Here is a picture of the current trim piece. As you can see three of four corners are broken off. Plastic is just crap as it ages.

I thought maybe I could repair the corners but there are other cracks in the trim as well. A new one should be here in about three days from Amazon.

After getting home I found that the generator is still not running well even though it was worked on before we left by a local mechanic. I am going to find a place to have the carburetor boiled out and rebuilt. If upon reinstalling it the generator still does not run correctly I will bite the bullet, pull the generator out and buy a new one.  A new one will be nice and smaller, but it will not be built in and thus not nearly as convenient as a built-in generator has been. 

June 5th - 6th - Fish Fry and Window Issue

Saturday evening we had a fish fry to sample the Northern Pike and Walleye we have caught. It was excellent.

The lighter colored fish in the large pan is the Walleye.  John did a great job of frying the fish and potatoes. There wasn’t a bite left.

Yesterday was extremely windy almost all day. Kelly was in the RV and kept hearing a flapping noise. She  noticed that the front emergency exit window was flapping in the wind. Upon investigating we found that the locking bracket on the window had fallen off. Luckily it was laying there for a repair. The two mounting rivets had both pulled loose. Here is a picture of the window. The top portion is the emergency exit.

You can’t tell in the picture but the bottom right side is loose. We can’t drive home like this so duck tape to the rescue.

 

This fix works for NASCAR repairs so hopefully it will hold for us until I get home to make a repair. I never travel in the RV without duck tape and baling wire. I have used both on multiple occasions over the years.

June 4th - 5th - Lake Critters in Addition to Fish

Yesterday and today the weather turned really hot - up to 98 degrees each day. Quite hot for Minnesota. Because of the heat the fishing has slowed up as has our desire to get out in the boat in the heat. We have fished in the morning with limited luck. I caught one this morning that was a size that had to be thrown back. Carlene and John caught four smaller keepers.

Kellen has been entertaining us in the afternoon riding a water bike and getting up on a paddle board. Here are a couple of pictures.

One of the other creatures on the water, which we don’t see in Missouri, is a swan family that swims by every morning. Parents with six youngsters.

One of the adults is tagged on the neck. We don’t know if it is the male or female. It is interesting to see how they feed the young. They kick with their feet to stir up stuff on the bottom and also duck their heads down in the water to stir stuff up for the babies to eat as it floats to the top.

Another creature up here that we don’t see in Missouri is the Loon. Most move around individually searching for food but sometimes they are in pairs. They are beautiful birds. It is amazing how long they can stay under water. On the boat tour the other day they said they can dive down to 30 feet easily and have been known to dive up to 230 feet deep. We also learned they cannot walk on land.

The last creature to catch our attention is a turtle who came out of the water to lay her eggs on the beach in back of the cabin. Here is a picture. Fortunately so far nothing has dug up the eggs.

The hottest days are supposed to be over. We have AC in our RV but the cabins are not air-conditioned so they get pretty hot even with fans going. Fortunately it cools down at night and everyone has been able to sleep.

 

May 2021 - Two Week Fishing Trip in Minnesota - May 29th - June 3rd.

May 29th grandson Kellen flew in from California to join us on a two week fishing trip in Minnesota. We picked him up in St. Louis and immediately headed north. We made it to a KOA campground in Waterloo, Iowa. A long day. He had started out at 3 a.m. in California. We were lucky to get a campsite for the night because it was the Memorial Day weekend. The place was crowded. Here is a picture from our rig. Campers as far as you could see.

We were tired from driving all day and went to bed early. We also got up early Sunday and headed north. The directions John gave us to the resort in Minnesota were great but we missed the resort entrance and had to back track a couple of miles. We got parked, set up and visited with Carlene and John before turning in for the night.  There are only about six campsites.  Here is a picture of our site.

Carlene and John rent a three bedroom cabin because their kids and grandkids join them later on. With a bedroom not being used until their kids arrive they offered to let Kellen stay with them rather then sleeping on the blowup mattress in the RV. Here is a picture of their cabin as it faces the lake.

Monday morning Kellen, John, and I went fishing for Northern Pike. We did well. Here are some pictures of our catch.

They were fun to catch. The next day I got one over 28 inches, you are only allowed two that size the whole season. Monday afternoon Kelly, Carlene, and John went out. While John and Carlene caught a few Kelly didn’t catch any.

Tuesday Kelly and Kellen went out fishing with John and really did well, getting well over 15 bites. Kellen caught two over 28 inches so he has caught his limit of the big ones for the season. Kelly caught several she had to throw back because were not large enough but she also caught a couple of keepers.  Here is a picture of their catch.

Wednesday we took a day trip to Lake Itasca State Park where the headwaters of the Mississippi River begins. Here are some pictures of us walking across the Mississippi there.

It was great fun. Afterwards we ate some lunch and took a ride on the “Chester Charles” boat  around Lake Itasca and to the head waters. Here is a picture of the boat and the headwaters from the lake side.

A couple pictures of the boat riders.

After the cruise we walked to the “Old Timers Cabin” which was built using huge fallen logs in the park. The logs were so big it only took four high on each wall. Here are some pictures.

John caught a Walleye. They are hard to catch so he was thrilled. Here is a picture.

John has also caught the largest Northern Pike so far. Here is a picture.

This morning John and I went out and caught a couple of pike. Then the ladies went out with John and did quite well. Kelly caught a monster but it broke her line.  Carlene caught a big one over 28 inches. Here is her picture.

This morning, Thursday, it is starting to get really hot. The next couple of days may be record breaking heat. That won’t help the fishing. John said we are lucky they have been biting as much as they have been so far. We are having a blast. We are all going out to eat tonight to celebrate John and Carlene’s 54th Wedding Anniversary. We are glad we get to celebrate it with them.

May 2021

The week of May 9th we had our first campout of the year with the Carri-Yals club. It was held at Whittington Woods campground at Rend Lake. It was a little chilly all week long but luckily we had an activity room we could use to have our meals in. The cooler weather made for great campfires.  Here is a picture of the group after touring the Information Center at Rend Lake. Celina is missing because she left early to attend her grandson's graduation in Oklahoma.

Getting back home I got to work again on the carburetor issue with the generator in Marge. I have dumped several bottles of carburetor cleaner in it over the last two months with no improvement in performance. It starts and runs fine but surges whenever the load is changed. I had a local mechanic look at it and he determined that it definitely is a carburetor issue. (Thank you ethanol.) 

The generator is out of a 1985 motorhome so getting parts is a real problem. There have been several different carburetors used over the years on this size generator. After much searching on the internet, and studying the carburetor while on the generator, I finally found "Walbro" stamped on the carburetor and contacted that company. They said that that carburetor hasn't been made for 35 years. I would need to send them the number stamped on the carburetor flange to determine a rebuild kit. They didn't have any kits anymore but could tell me what kit to order if I could find one on the internet. They told me where to find the carburetor number. I couldn't see the number anywhere so I had to pull the carburetor off to find the number.  Here is a picture of the carburetor. The number I needed was stamped on the very bottom edge.

I emailed the carburetor number to Walbro and they told me the kit I needed. Luckily I found one on the internet and ordered it immediately because they only had two kits left. I received the kit in a few days and I am now waiting for the mechanic to pick the carburetor and kit up for rebuilding. The carburetor will need to be boiled out then rebuilt. I'm hoping he can get started on it this week sometime because we will be leaving for two weeks to go fishing in Minnesota.

Grandson Kellen graduates eight grade on Friday in California and on Saturday he will fly into St. Louis to go with us to Minnesota. We will pick him up at the airport and head north. It will be great fun. Big fish pictures to follow!

April 2021

The end of March I had Marge washed and waxed in Florida. Our RV site in Florida is under a huge oak tree. The whole winter leaves drop, then pollen pods drop, then acorns. This all makes for an ongoing mess on Marge's roof and sides. This was the first time I ever let anyone else wash or wax her. Two guys did it in four hours. It takes me four days or more. Of course they didn't buff it, etc. like I do but it will provide protection for about six months.

The trip home from Florida was uneventful except for a huge traffic delay about 30 miles south of Atlanta that slowed us down an hour. We never did see any reason for such a lengthy delay of traffic. The delay put us in downtown Atlanta at rush hour. While traffic was bad at least it moved at a decent pace. 

We stopped for the night north of Atlanta at Cabella's and stayed on the parking lot. This worked out well since when leaving in the morning we didn't have to go through Atlanta rush hour. We arrived home around 3 p.m. and spent the next hour unloading all the food and clothes out of Marge. 

After spending several months in Marge there are always things that need to be repaired, improved, etc. While in Florida the porch light quit. I did a post on its replacement. In Florida I did not have the proper materials to seal it properly. I have removed it and sealed it at home. 

One of the things that has been bothering me is the lenses on the "scare" lights on each side of the fifth wheel have yellowed considerably from age making the entire RV look "old". I ordered new ones and installed them. Here is a before and after picture. 

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Over the course of the winter the LED lights I installed several years ago over the sink burned out. I wasn't impressed with their lack of longevity. Aren't LEDs supposed to last 50,000 hours? Not these. I'd be surprised if they had 500 hours on them. I ordered different ones. I also learned from the installation of the old LEDs that they generated too much heat to be boxed in. I want something bright for this area so I ordered LED flood lights that are made to go on the front bumper of an off road vehicle. I mounted these externally using the brackets they come with. I installed them both on the wooden mounting box I had built some years back but I didn't like that because the light is still in back of you when you are working at the island. To remedy this I attached a wooden arm so that one of the lights extends over the island. We will try this set up for a trip or two. If we like it I will make an nice "L" shaped wooden box for the lights to be mounted to permanently. Here is a picture of the new temporary setup.

I still can't get the generator to run right. In fact today it burned up my converter/charger so I will have to buy a new one. I have the name of someone locally who may work on these generators. If that fails I will pull  it out and buy a new inverter generator. It won't be nearly as convenient but it will work for the limited times we use it.

A couple of years ago neighbor John in Florida gave me a folding table with a plastic top. Something had burned a hole in the top so I patched it with Bondo. My Bondo repair cracked so I worked on it again. This time I broke out the burned area and placed screen in the hole to help hold the patch. I also spread the patch out wider to strengthen it. We will see how it holds up.  When I patched it last time I painted the patch beige to match the rest of the top. The beige showed every little spot so we decided to paint it gray. We will see how this patch and this color hold up.

We didn't take the big under cabinet fridge to Florida this year and decided an outside fridge is quite handy. The under cabinet fridge is large, old, and heavy. It was hard for me to load and unload so I bought a used mini-fridge the other day for us to take next year. It is much easier for me to handle and is plenty big enough for our cold drinks. Here is a picture of it cleaned up and ready for action.

I'll keep you posted on the generator and converter/charger.