Thank goodness for French Onion Soup from Emily and Alex and for Katie for helping nurse me back to health!
I’m usually a pretty healthy person. But since we started our RV life I have gotten pretty sick twice. And I have to tell you, quarantining in 375 square feet isn’t the most fun I’ve had.
The first time was in Florida in Spring. I came down with strep, had 103.8 degree fever and spent 3-4 days pretty much sleeping. The good news that time was that once I was on antibiotics for a day, I could get out among people.
This time I was not so lucky. Tim and I are both double vaccinated and boosted, but early last week, I got the chills, then a fever. I thought – maybe strep again, but just in case, got tested for COVID. Yep. It got me. Again, two fun days in bed, followed by several days of some icky side effects from the Paxlovid they gave me.
I’m officially past the quarantine period now thank goodness. I have limited energy, but am working that up a little more each day.
I’m thankful for my little side-kick, Reba. She’s been keeping me company! (Tim got much less sick that I did and he’s out fishing with some friends this week.)
The wedding is over and all the little projects that come along with a backyard wedding are completed. So we spent this rainy day doing some fall organizing in our home on wheels.
When we packed everything into our Alliance 310 six months ago, I hung all of our clothes with the hangers backwards so that we could easily see what we were wearing and what we never got out of the closet. Not surprisingly, we wore only about half the clothes and shoes we brought.
Some of that is because we brought a some cold weather clothes and have worked pretty hard to stay where it was warm, but many of the unworn clothes were simply bypassed for favorites that we wore nearly every week.
We pulled everything out on the bed
Not sure where I thought I’d wear ten dresses or heels or eight pairs of jeans. Tim is getting rid of several sport coats, some sweatshirts and shoes he has not worn.
While I LOVE the fancy (and heavy) robe I brought with us, I rarely wear it and one of my girls can enjoy it while we continue our trip.
I kept the black hiking boots and the fancier heeled ones are out the door.
piles for Goodwill, trash and for our daughters to look through
When we packed up, I was sure I’d need all the bath towels. Now I know 4 will do it. We will be replacing our ten heavy towels with 4 fast dry towels in the next few days.
I went through the ridiculously deep cabinet in our bathroom and found that I do not need to buy lotion or hairspray or toothpaste or Q-tips for many, many months. I have plenty.
I can now see the back of my closet and can reach everything! Tim estimates that we are taking a couple hundred pounds of weight out of the rig.
I put all the hangers back in backwards and we will do this again in a few months and see how much more we can live without!
Emily and Alex’s garden earlier this year. Wait till you see the transformation!
I have not written a post in a couple of weeks. I apologize and I’ll get back on it really soon!
We have been in Aurora, Illinois helping our daughter Emily get ready for her backyard wedding. She and Alex have themed the wedding “wildflowers and wine,” and the decor is going to be thrifted. I’d call it boho style, but that is probably very old-fashioned of me.
We have weeded (2 acres) and mulched (10 yards) and power washed and mowed and trimmed. We have planted and watered and cut and dried flowers. We may or may not have cut one or two beautiful side-of-the-road tall grasses that would be perfect in a vase.
We have built a wedding arch and scoured thrift stores for furniture and glassware. We have used our F-350 to haul chairs and loveseats and rugs and chandeliers.
We have been shopping for a Mother of the Bride dress, got a shirt for Tim’s suit and checked that his tie will be perfect. We have bought jewelry and shoes, been to dress fittings, booked nail appointments.
And while we are here we have gotten some of Tim’s doctor appointments done and have found a wonderful new dentist who has gotten us all tidied up.
We will be here for another few weeks, but in that time I’ll get a few posts done from the places we visited on our Michigan/Canada trip!
Thanks for being patient with me – pics of the wedding in a few weeks too!!! 🙂
Many of you recommended that we take a trip to Cave Point County Park while we were in Door County. THANK YOU! I would not have found this beautiful place without your advice!
Cave Point County Park is outside of Sevastopol and sits inside the Whitefish Dunes State Park. The website says it is the only known county park to sit inside a state park. The park is just under 19 acres and sits on 900 feet of shoreline.
It was not easy to get Reba to the shore, but required momma duty.
Reba made it into the water more than once and she had a blast.
It’s COLD Mom!
The trail we chose was along the rocky shoreline. It was a short hike that went in and out of the county and state parks – Reba and I ended up going about two miles. The trail was well defined, but filled with roots and rocks, so Timmy stayed back for the second mile.
On our own – Daddy quit a mile back!
There is a dog beach inside the State Park, but it is another mile or so hike each way to get there and back. Timmy was having none of that. Reba and I will come back another time. Maybe at some point in the future the powers that be will consider a parking area closer to the dog beach.
I think it’s required to go to a fish boil when you visit Door County, Wisconsin. If not, perhaps it should be.
At a traditional fish boil, the Boil Master will not only cook your delicious, butter drenched whitefish, but will tell you the story of how fish boils came to be a tradition in the area.
Our Boil Master said that whitefish boils were likely originally done to feed the Scandinavian workers who were logging or doing other work in the area. It was a quick, easy and inexpensive way to feed a large group of hungry workers.
We had our fish boil at the Old Post Office Restaurant in Ephraim. The restored building was the site of Ephraim’s post office in the early 1900s. They use Lake Michigan whitefish that is delivered every other day by a local fisherman who has been providing fish to the area for decades.
Timmy’s plate at Old Post Office. Coleslaw is his favorite – it’s gone!
With dinner you get two huge whitefish steaks, red potatoes, a wonderful sweet onion, coleslaw, homemade breads and fresh baked Door County Cherry Pie.
If (shame on you) you don’t want to try the whitefish, you can ask for chicken or ribs as an alternative. But try the fish – drown it in the amazing butter. You will be glad you did!
We thought we made a good choice when we went with a table and chairs instead of a booth option when we purchased our RV. A tiny booth was never going to fit our larger than average bodies. However, because the table was attached to the wall we could not adjust the space for a comfortable eating/working spot.
So the table became a dumping ground for anything we brought into the RV that we didn’t feel like putting away immediately. The only useful part was that we removed two of the four chairs and put our dog’s crate on the recliner side of the dinette. The top of the crate sort of served as a side table for the recliner.
We either ate at the picnic table outside, at our camp chairs/tables or even in our recliners on occasion. I was doing work for my blog, project and board work in my recliner with my I-pad or phone stacked on a pillow – it was comical.
We decided to remove the table and replace it with a much needed desk.
I forgot to take a pre-picture of what the table looked like before we removed it, but here is a link to a pic on Alliance’s site. Imagine Tim and I trying to squeeze in there. LOL.
I searched for a desk we could assemble inside the RV that was sturdy but not terribly heavy. We found one on Wayfair. The IKEA desks we found were nice and light, but were either too wide or too narrow for the space we had. And I wanted the desk to be as large as possible.
Here is our after picture!
New desk is in!
One drawback was that we no longer had room for Reba’s crate. She used it on occasion, but no more than once or twice a week and we no longer crate her when we are out. So, instead of the crate we chose to not install the file drawer that came with the desk and we put her bed into the space below the lower part of the desk. It worked perfectly. She still has a little quiet, enclosed space to escape to if she feels the need.
Here are a few more pictures and a close up of Reba’s little nest.
I have stashed the cords so they are not a temptation!
If you are interested in checking out the table with all the included parts you can find it here:
We do not have an affiliate agreement with Wayfair and do not receive any funds if you end up buying one. But we would love to know if you decide to do something similar! 🙂
We did store the table and three chairs we removed in case we ever were to sell the RV, but we have no plans to do that anytime soon!
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We threaded through the Needles Highway and a nasty thunderstorm on our way to Mount Rushmore. But when we arrived, the skies cleared, the sun shone and it was a magnificent sight to see.
As you walk into the gates you are greeted by the flags of all 50 states.
majestic
We took our a short hike that got us a little closer to the monument and that took us to the studio where they have the smaller replica.
I now own a Mt Rushmore sweatshirt, the storm dropped the temp quickly!
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We were able to find a nice doggie daycare near our campground so we were able to spend a couple of days exploring the National Parks and monuments in the Black Hills.
First up was Devil’s Tower in Wyoming.
We followed our GyPSy app from Spearfish and made a fun stop in Aladdin, Wyoming at the General Store. We would have never found it without the help of our friendly navigator!
Yes, population 15!This place is filled with treasures!
After a pit stop and a cherry soda (Tim) at this eclectic store, we headed towards Devil’s Tower. The drive itself was incredibly beautiful and then, in the distance….G – A – F – F (octave) – C.
Over 50? I’ll bet you are humming the Close Encounters song by now.
We knew we wanted to do one of the hikes around the tower. And I was shocked and thrilled when Tim said “let’s do the 2.8 mile hike” instead of the one mile paved hike around the base. Our GyPSy navigator had told us that we would get some amazing views on this hike. He forgot to tell us that this was no simple flat hike. And apparently we forgot we were in the BLACK HILLS!
Luckily we were prepared with plenty of water thanks to a hiking backpack Emily got me for Christmas last year. You carry a bladder of water and there is a long sippy straw handy!
The hike started out simple and then we started going downhill. Which also was not so bad.
Looks like a simple little hike, right?Timmy keeping up nicelyHe’s still smiling!
Of course what goes down eventually has to go up!
and upand up
Lots of rocky steps, no railings and about a 450 foot elevation change. By the end of the hike, we were both gasping. Remember the base of the tower is already 4250 feet of elevation.
Timmy stopping to make some friends – and catch his breath.
Are we there yet?It has to be right around the corner….Oh, crap
I’ll just lean here for a minute or five.
My celebration was a bit premature –
The guidebooks call this an intermediate hike and for some people it probably is. For us, there were moments we were not 100% sure both of us would make it – but we did! 🙂 Next up – Badlands!
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The cheesiest thing we have done in the Black Hills, but one of the most delightful too!
We spent a couple of hours at Bear Country USA and got to see some incredible creatures up close. Bear Country USA is a drive through zoo or maybe more like a mini drive through safari.
You pay your $20, get your instructions to keep your windows up, and drive through various sections of grasslands that are filled with elk, pronghorn, mountain lions, bison, wolves and of course black bear.
A few of the sections were either empty or their inhabitants were good at hiding. But the black bear section more than made up for a missing mountain lion!
There were dozens of them, just roaming around, stretching, sleeping. Some of them were HUGE!
Right outside our window
After the drive through portion, we could walk through a section that was more like a traditional zoo. This area was filled with small animals and…the BABY BEARS!
They keep the babies with their mothers for the first three months until they are weaned and then they move them into this bear adorable bear kindergarten until they are old enough to be able to be in with the adults.
While we were there, a ranger stopped by to feed the babies some carrots. They were delighted with the treats!
When you get to the Black Hills – I highly recommend doing this fun tourist trap experience! 🙂
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The stark landscapes and beautiful skies blew me away when we were in the Badlands. This was the day that I decided that I needed to upgrade from my I Phone 10 and get a “real” camera. Looks like we will have to come back when I get one!
We started the day with a stop at a prairie dog town. Our GyPSy navigator told us about the little side drive to get to them and also that the fleas prairie dogs tend to wear can carry the Bubonic Plague. I stayed a reasonable distance away, while watching whole families try to entice the critters with Cheetos so they could get real close!
I’m not that closeI Phone has a zoomLooks like he’s used to humans!
I understand that at one time, there were more than 2 billion (B) prairie dogs in the region. There were certainly hundreds in the area we stopped.
The Badlands got it’s name from the Lakota Indians who called it “mako sica” or bad lands according to Wikipedia and our app navigator. This area is known for high winds, lack of water and a challenging to navigate terrain.
While the Badlands is a National Park, Reba was able to join us on this adventure since most of the day was spent in or very near the truck. She loved posing for posing for pictures and showing off the scenery.
Here’s a video of one of the most spectacular vistas!
:29 seconds of the Badlands!
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