Nova Scotia...sharing the good, bad the wet!

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Hello N

ova Scotia

...and then we had lots of rain!!

We found a wet spot on the floor in the RV!

1) We blamed Sam for peeing on the floor....(sorry Sam)!
2) We found water leaking from the light in the ceiling (seriously?)
3) We sent Bob on the roof with the FLEX SEAL tape-  Richele saw this on an infomercial and it fixes everything...RIGHT???
4) We are on pins and needles 'til the next big rain!

We decided to make the best of a wet day!

 1) We visited Grand Pre (the UNESCO Heritage site that is a monument to the Acadians (French Settlers in northeast Canada) and remembers the deportation of  the Acadians to the British colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia in the 1750's and 60's.
2) We went wine tasting at Le Caveau - OK, so that was nice.
3) We went to Wolfville - the cute Acadia University town...and Richele was able to connect with an old University of Iowa Friend.

Here's to a dry day tomorrow....

Bay of Fundy

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The highest and lowest tides in the world.  
They rise 13 vertical feet per hour and rise to the height of a four story building (depending on the phase of the moon of course).

Hopewell Rocks

Specifically the Flower Pot Rocks...and you wouldn't think tides are THAT interesting until you see the high and low of these tides in action

Fundy National Park

Wolfe Covered Bridge and Dickson Falls.. just a few of the beautiful sites.

Cape Enrage Lighthouse

Who knew Bob HATES bag pipes??

Reversing Falls

Saint John NB.  At high tide, the Bay of  Fundy reverses the flow of the Saint John river and pushes the water up river. At low tide (pictured here) the river flows back into the Bay with a vengance. 

Chocolate River

(formally known as the Petitcodiac River)
160 million tons of water from the tide changes mixes with silt from the mud flats and makes the water this chocolate color.

Creative Ministers and uses for Churches

Some creative ministers and merchants who save churches!

Good words to live by (Bob?)!

One of our favorite spots: great sights and a lakeside campsite with a view of the Bay of Fundy out our front window!   OK, we were without water at the campsite for a bit (not good)...but in general....AWESOME.

Off to Nova Scotia!

Ohhhhh Canada!!!

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Well we made it across the border...but not without some drama.  The GPS sent us across the one lane/smallest crossing in Calais, Maine. (There are 3 and this is one is mostly for locals - in cars).The US Border agent asked "what are you doing on this bridge?" and "You BETTER NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT COMING BACK ACROSS THIS WAY!" 
We weren't sure we would make the clearance at the gate house on the Canadian side, we had to evacuate the RV, we had to open the bedroom slide on a big slant, we had to figure out how to open the safe (which we have never used), we had a 3 person search team (who were all very nice) but they searched everything.   Sam didn't growl or pee on anyone - THANK GOODNESS!!

SAINT JOHN, NEW BRUNSWICK.
We are staying at a city park in Saint John (our first time trying a city park).  The camp "site" isn't great, but the location is wonderful. Bike trails, beach, dog park, spa and lakeside restaurant and cool views of the city.

The picture above:  Bob "contemplating" how the heck did I let her talk me into another bike ride with huge hills.  $#@%^^&*%

So much history in Saint John.  Beautiful churches, old buildings and garden parks.

The Saint John City Market (the oldest city market in Canada).

John Hooper's art work around the city.

RVing Canadian Style!

Acadia National Park

In 1919, it was the 1st National Park east of the Missippi.  The 41 acres were designed, built and donated by John D. Rockefeller Jr.  There are 17 mountain peaks, beautiful coastlines, lakes, ponds and salt marshes. 

The Park Loop Road

27 miles of amazing views!!! 

An lovely garden (est. 1961) with all native plants from the region.

The Carraige Trails

The original entrance to Acadia. There are 45 miles of carriage roads that are for horses, people and bikes only.  OK.. so very hilly and a great "heart pumper" on your bike, I can assure you!  

On Jordon Pond

Beautiful...and a dog friendly cafe for Sam.

Bass Harbor Lighthouse

Thanks for coming Paula!!!

LOBASTA!

Our First Night in Maine

The Lobster Pound

You pick 'em
They cook 'em
You eat 'em...Delicious

Ellsworth, Maine

We have a Visitor

Paula flew in to explore Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park for a few days with us - You can call Paula for a reference about her stay at our Inn on Wheels

Our trip to the town of Bar Harbor

AND a Good Humor Truck for Adults in the RV Park....
.......you hear the bell, you see the van ....What is it??
A homemade pie/cookies delivery truck.  
Notice that Bob had his wallet out!  

LIVE FREE OR DIE...(The New Hamphsire Motto)

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These guys are VERY serious about Freedom. We even had a little run in with one guy who threatened to sic his dog on Sam!!! Yikes

We haven't seen a moose...just lots of these signs.  I'm sure they are out there somewhere!!!??? And just so they know, we can't stop the big RV very easily....

Mt. Washington:  the highest peak in the Northeast and home of the world's worst weather.

Beautiful scenic byways around
Gorham and Shelburne NH

The water was so clear!

BIG CHAIRS SEEM TO BE EVERYWHERE!   Of course after Bob and I eat our way through the Northeast...these are the only chairs we will be able to fit in!

ahhh VERMONT!

We loved Vermont!

An Amazing Bike Trail in Burlington

10 miles of trails with such different views.... and a bike ferry (what is the deal with these ferries?!)

Bob finally got his ice cream....

gotta love Ben & Jerry's. 

Stowe VT

Cute ski town and Smugglers Notch through the mountains.

AROUND BURLINGTON....Crepes, Chocolate, Maple Syrup (most of the stuff we buy in the grocery store only has 20% pure maple syrup), beer and wine tasting, old barns on the country roads.  BEAUTIFUL! 

And  because you just might not believe it

• the TALLEST FILE CABINET in the  world (Burlington VT)
• very unusual motorcycle helmet!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? A Ferry????

THIS HAS BEEN A CRAZY DAY!!

Did anyone know there wasn't a bridge - RICHELE???
Here we are following the GPS route and it looked like a bridge until we see the "Car Ferry" sign.  UH OH!!!!  YIKES.... Lucky for us, the ferry could accommodate a big RV....phew...you just KNOW how bad that could have been!!!!     

So what would you do?

Bob sees this sign and heads to the door for Ice Cream.  
Hmm...No one answers the door!  As it turns out this ice cream place has been closed for years. 

What?

Take us out to the Ball Game......Cooperstown NY

Family memories.... 

Baseball Hall of Fame

My grandfather played in the majors for a few years in the early 30's. A Kren Bat with his name (John Pasek) is on it and is in the Hall of Fame. How special to hold his bat....

Cubs Win!!

2016 World Series! A great exhibit and highlight films!

In Town

(and around Cooperstown)

Lunch at the Ostego Resort Hotel on the lake

Cherry Valley Cemetery

Beer

Tasting

at Ommegang Brewery

FLY CREEK CIDER MILL:  All kinds of treats 

Glimmerglass State Park

est. 1963 after NY acquired 600 acres of land.  Hyde Hall Mansion and the lands were owned by the Clarke family in the early to mid 1700's.  

No...

We ARE NOT getting a friend for Sam!

Seneca Falls NY...who knew??

We took a little side trip today and had no idea....

Fight for Rights.

and now it's a National Park in Seneca Falls.

The Seneca Falls Convention was the first women's rights convention "to discuss the social, civil, and religious condition and rights of woman".  It lasted two days over July 19–20, 1848.

View fullsize

View fullsize

In the 1840’s the economy of Seneca Falls depended primarily on foundry work  (cast iron pumps and sail irons).  Hmmmm....

IRONS

Perhaps that's why so many women wanted to fight for better rights!

Filmed Here!

Every time a bell rings....

Great historic town!

but there are no falls in Seneca Falls...just FYI.

STILL LEARNING:  Today, I only had to jump off the RV once to check the bridge height to make sure it was high enough to clear.  Finally loaded the bridge height app!  

The Falls and the 4th!

SPECIAL NOTE:  Richele was born in Niagara Falls so visiting is always "coming home".  Special time with family was the most fun (Thanks to you all!!!  I love you).

Niagara Falls

You never get tired of the views and the rush of the water.

Our

Buffalo Side Trip

ANCHOR BAR:  Home of the original Buffalo Wings

ALLENTOWN:  A very cool neighborhood in Buffalo

NIAGARA ON THE LAKE, Ontario Canada

A beautiful town on the Niagara River/Lake Ontario wine trail.  The flowers in town were amazing and Canada was celebrating Canada Day July 1.

Happy 4th of July!

Cleveland Rocks!

We spent the last few days in the Cleveland area and had a great time!! We struggled with WiFi but we had fun!!

We LOVED the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame....the only thing we needed was a dance floor!

Amazing music of all kinds, great displays, a great American Bandstand Highlights movie - So Cool!

Punderson State Park, OH
A beautiful state park with full hook ups!   Scenic and peaceful....beach, golf course and there was even a haunted manor...

Cuyahoga Falls National Park!

Beautiful park between Cleveland and Akron OH. Some highlights: a 12 mile bike ride along the beautiful Towpath Trail, Brandywine Falls, Beaver Marsh (although we didn't see any beavers...ONLY TURTLES!)

Chagrin Falls OH

A GREAT Main Street town that we just found! Cute shops and amazing flowers and patriotic decorations!

The
Winking
Lizard

A great place for lunch (it reminded us of Harrold's in AZ!)

DID YOU KNOW????
Don King's boxing camp is in Orwell OH.  We couldn't figure out what all those ornate concrete sculptures were doing in the middle of very rural OH....

On the Road Again

After 5 fun weeks in the Chicago area with family and friends, we're off!!!

We visited The RV Hall of Fame (who knew?...thx Rick)

For our friends Joe and Cathy!

The canned ham!

Bob's Airstream dream!!??

The Coronation...

....of Richele as Queen of the RV (although we are still waiting for the crown to arrive).  Richele's subjects (Bob and Sam) aren't quite on board with all this YET!  (Thx Margaret!)

A Sunday Departure

We left on Sunday to try and miss all the construction delays...we almost made it !!!

Sauder's Village, Archbold OH

A very pretty Western Ohio farm community and RV park (as you can see!)

Dessert!

Thx Susan!

We  

We made it to Chicago!

There's no place like home! There's no place like home!
We'll be here for a few weeks now.  We dropped the RV off in Nappannee, IN for some warranty work (and while we were there, we took the Newmar Factory Tour to see how our RV was built - that was pretty cool.)  We have now crashed in on Richele's parents for a few weeks. The blog will be on pause for a little while...Bob doesn't want this to be Christmas Letter Blog.....but I can't help it a little.  

We met Scarlett Elise. She makes 5 on the grandchildren front!

We are also celebrating 4 graduations this year:

GAVIN BUCHANAN - from Junior High and heading to Palatine High. Go Pirates!
OLIVIA SOJA - from University of Michigan. Heading to Gambia for 2 years with the Peace Corps.

JACK BUCHANAN. from High School. Heading to University of Iowa.  Go Hawkeyes!

and not pictured.
GAVIN FAITZ - from Preschool heading to Kindergarten!  Awesome! 

Another night of storms...Tornado warnings this time!

We made it to Iowa yesterday!

Dodged some big storms on the way but struggled with high winds the whole drive.  

Destination:  Sleepy Hollow RV Park in Oxford, Iowa. 

Local Farm Stand:   
Where you can buy a pound of fresh organic asparagus for $6.00!

Dinner at the Ox Yoke Inn in the Amana Colonies...this was a favorite place to eat when Mom came to visit Richele at the University of Iowa.  

The Amana Colonies - a National Historic Landmark.  
It was one of Americas longest lived communal societies. There are 7 villages on 26,000 acres of Iowa farmland.  A true treasure. 

And then the storms rolled in and the tornado warnings started.  I'm pretty sure tornados target both mobile home parks AND RV parks!  We dodged another night in the men's shower room. 

A couple of crazy days!!

We arrived in Nebraska 2 days ago

We spent that first night in North Platte.    

The home of the world's largest railroad yard (which you can view from the Gold Spike Tower) and Buffalo Bill Cody.

Did you know that Buffalo Bill got his name after killing 4,280 buffalo in 8 months? We didn't - and I think I would have preferred not to know. 

Last night we spent the night in Greenwood Nebraska.  

The severe weather watches and warnings were nuts.  WHAT WE LEARNED: If the sirens go off, all campers and their pets must go to the men's shower room for shelter.  Let me just say that it's a pretty small place for lots of pets and people and it's the men's shower...ick...THANK GOODNESS THE SIRENS DIDN'T GO OFF!  It was a little scary though- we had lots of rain, thunder, lightening, high winds and hail.  

A fun stop...

On a more positive note, before we left town in the morning we stopped at the Bakers Candies Factory Outlet.  Bakers Candies was founded in 1987 and is the official home of  Nebraska's famous chocolate meltaways.  Most of you will think I picked our Greenwood RV park due to it's proximity to this store..but we just happened upon it - really.  

...kids in a candy store. 

We had not heard of Bakers Candies but after sampling the candies we will certainly remember Bakers Candies.  

On the Road Again and HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY MOMS!

Yesterday we spent the morning in Grand Junction CO while the alternator was being replaced and then around noon started on our journey to the Breckenridge area. Yesterday was a good day!

We took time to smell the roses in Grand Junction!!  We found a wonderful park and a Botanical Garden, we took a bike ride, saw beautiful "underpass art" and a prairie dog! Breakfast outside with some colorful music and musicians.

The trip to Breckenridge was spectacular - even though we got a little too close to snow for this Arizona girl . We have beautiful mountain views from our RV Park.  

Today we spent the day bike riding and strolling the very cute town of Breckenridge. Another good day!
 

So it's not all fun and games for us right now...but we're hanging in there.

Well....we had to cancel our stop in Moab UT and we had to head directly to Grand Junction CO...the closest Freightliner Service Center...sigh. We had and issue with our battery and as it turns out, we need a new alternator...WHAT THE HECK IS THAT! (Thank goodness Bob knew and it's under warranty.)

Well, this was the start of our day.  Problems with the battery.  Can you believe the service center even has view???

So we had to spend the morning having coffee and tea at Starbucks and strolling Main Street in Grand Junction, CO. 
A beautiful little Main Street town.

Sam at the helm....what the heck is going here??? We're off the plan and and I'm stuck in the car rather than our RV.  Off to Breckenridge tomorrow...WE HOPE!

Amazing Places to visit!!

Pictures don't do it justice.  Travelling this part of the country is just beautiful... I hope you can all put it on your "to do list".   We had some rainy and cloudy days but it didn't dampen our views.

Monument Valley Utah!  Everywhere you go there are wonderful views:  all the Western movie backdrops; the Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, Goulding Lodge and RV Park with magical views.   

Four Corners Monument. The only place in the US that 4 states touch.  Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah.  Kind of cool, and we were there.

Mesa Verde National Park.  A world heritage site and a time capsule of ancient Pueblo culture.  4,000 archeological sites, 600 cliff dwellings in sandstone cliffs.

AND OUR CONTINUED REALITIES...we are all pretty tired after our first few days.
- We had to tear down and set up camp in the rain.  Ponchos are not fashionable!!  
-  Beautiful red sandstone turns to crazy red mud when it rains.  Sam's paws were red and it's really tough to keep all that mud out of the RV (especially for a neat freak!)
-  The Colorado Rockies has WHOLE new meaning for us.  We became very friendly with the Glass Repair Wizard in Cortez Colorado.  We had 2 chips in the BIG RV windshield and 1 long crack in our car windshield after being hit by rocks.  UGH!!.  
- It's hard to do your blog when your Verizon service only has one bar :(

We're on our Way!

Yesterday was the BIG day! We're on the road and ready for our big RV adventure. We bought the RV in December, we've been on a crash course to learn everything we can about driving and living in our new RV (and we're still learning).  We've taken a number of practice runs with friends and family this winter and now we're ready....we think!?  

Our first stop -  Monument Valley, UT.  It's breathtaking.

OK, so really needed this at the end of our first day!
Day one was a little stressful...we ran into some very small gas stations that were hard to maneuver, the refrigerator was on the fritz, Richele smashed her laptop screen when pushing out the slide (that was an expensive day, but thank goodness the hard drive was saved), our campground neighbor jumped out of his RV to talk to Bob when he was trying to hook everything up so it took us a lot more time to get settled.
Phew....

Our Summer Plan:  May - September
- Monument Valley and Moab UT
-Mesa Verde CO
- Breckenridge CO
- Chicago (for a month)
- Niagara Falls and Cooperstown NY
- Vermont
- Maine and Acadia National Park
- Off to Canada: Halifax, Nova Scotia,
   Prince Edward Island, Quebec City, Montreal
- Return to the Midwest
- Back to Arizona in early October!