12/14/2011 Pics of our Waco property

WE BOUGHT A NEW (TO US) 5TH WHEEL

Our little 25' Laredo was getting on Norm's nerves. He was feeling claustrophobic. We had planned to take this small RV on our Summer 2012 Alaska trip then sell it and buy a bigger RV. Norm decided just to "look" (wink, wink) to see what else was out there now. So, of course, he found a good deal on a newer, nicer RV. It's a 2009 34' Durango and she's a beauty, more of a luxury 5th wheel. It was for sale by owner up in Gainesville, TX. That's a 4+ hour drive for us. So two weeks ago we headed up to Gainesville on Saturday, bought it and spent the night in the new RV in the previous owners driveway. Then hitched up & headed home on Sunday. Norm spent several days moving our stuff over to the new RV which was parked right next to our old one in the RV park. We really like the new rv and there is a lot more room. The very next weekend we hitched up the small rv and took it up to our property in Waco. Now when we're up there we have a place to stay...nice. We'll still take the small rv to Alaska and hopefully sell it there before we head back home.

Over Thanksgiving week we stayed in Waco 3 days while we put a couple coats of paint on the new storage shed. We really enjoy our place up there...nice quiet country setting. One of our neighbors, Darrell came over to introduce himself. Very nice guy. We spent Thanksgiving at Bonnie's and had a real nice time. Danny fries the best turkey...yum..

Because we spent the night we had plenty of play time with the gkids. That Madison & Holden are so much fun. Cole also spent the night and it was good to see him to. We don't get to see him much so were glad he was off work and could spent time with the family.

10/19/11 WE BOUGHT SOME LAND

Ever since we realized we could not rid ourselves of ALL our possessions and put our stuff in a rented storage unit, we've been on the look out for an inexpensive piece of land. The very first property we looked at was in Waco, about 1 1/2 hour drive from Georgetown. It's 3/4 of an acre and has all utilities (septic tank, water meter and new electric pole, with 50 amp RV service!). It was perfect.....BUT we took to long to decide and the seller had a buyer by the time we got back to him. We've been kicking ourselves ever since. The only hesitation we had was that we wanted to be closer to our kids in Temple. That lot was almost an hour drive. We continued to look at other properties but the area around Temple is all incorporated and it's not legal to park & live out of an RV. We realized if we found a place it would have to be in the Waco area anyway. We drove up to look at other properties but they were very small and trashy, in trashy neighborhoods. Still kicking ourselves & realizing the very first one we looked at would have been perfect.

Imagine how surprised I was to see that first property relisted on Craigslist! Norm quickly called the seller and told him we would buy it. Apparently there was a tragedy in the family of the first buyer and he changed his mind about buying the lot. We drove up to Waco two days ago & closed on the property. We had a chance to talk with the sellers and they are a very nice couple that have lived in the area for 30 years. They have house in the same area as the lot and are planning to sell it and move back to Kentucky to be closer to family. Good luck with your move David, Brenda & Lisa! I hope we get to see you when you come back to visit your family. It's a 3/4 acre lot with some nice shade trees in a country setting. It will be nice to know we will have a place to come back to in the winter months.

Right after closing we went straight over to Home Depot and ordered a barn type storage shed. We'll have several months to get our stuff out of the rented storage unit and moved up to the lot. Then we need to get busy selling all the furniture we didn't sell before moving out of our house. I really don't like paying rent on anything. Waco is a pretty big city. It should have all facilities we should need (hospitals, medical, etc.) and plenty of opportunity for temporary employment. We look forward to exploring the city. For now we'll stay in Georgetown since I'm still working here. When we return in the Fall of 2012 we plan to live on the property. My brother lives in Arlington so we'll be much closer to him, under 2 hours as compared to 3 hours away. It's also a little closer to Tulsa where Norm's brother & family live. Here are pics of the lot:

Our 3 week RV anniversary

So far we are loving the RV life. The park we are in has lots of trees, very shady, and very quiet. Maybe when the weather cools off people will be outside more. But right now it's seems deserted. No complaints, we like the peace & quiet. It's very convenient to my work, I like that. The small living space is working out better than I expected. Norm has not had any problems getting bored, he's enjoying a more relaxed life. Norm has been coming up to the school to have lunch with me daily. The school has a pretty good buffet lunch that is inexpensive. We eat our main meal here and then eat light in the evenings, usually fruit. That's working out very well and we don't need many groceries in the RV. That good since our refrigerator is tiny and pantry space is small also. I plan to retire after the first of the year, and it can't get here soon enough for me. Some days I have a hard time concentrating on my work as my mind is a million miles away.

We've been watching craigslist for a small piece of property and have gone to look at several within an hours drive of Temple. We found one property we really like but didn't move on it soon enough and someone else bought it. The others we've looked at were in pretty bad neighborhoods or very small run down towns. I think if we're patient we'll eventually find something we'll both be happy with. Yes, me, I said "patient"......sometimes I can be ")

Figuring it out and our intentions

Originally I thought we would get rid of all our stuff, but it became apparent when we got a contract on the house & started packing up, selling, etc. that we need something. Ideally we want to buy a piece of land close to Temple (our kids), 1 acre or less, with utilities so we can park there in the winters. And put a storage building on (or with a mobile home on it already) so we can store our stuff there and not pay a monthly storage rental fee. So we've been looking for something like that, but it's not easy to find, especially close to Temple. We'll keep on looking, there's no hurry. We do want to return to this area in the winters so we can spend time with our kids & grandkids.

Because we're not millionaires we intend to work temporary jobs. I have a great love for the National Parks and want to volunteer at some of those parks. Some of their positions provide an RV site and pay a little to boot. This would be ideal for us. We'll start applying in the Fall of 2012 for Spring 2013.

First week of RV living, my birthday & family reunion

So far, so good. Kind of seems like we're camping, which I guess we are, but we're not on vacation....yet. We've been working on getting more organized, maximizing space and purging anything we don't really need. The shady site we have has been really nice and helps a lot with keeping the RV cooler. Although the temps have droppped, into the low 90's due to the storms in the gulf, so we'll see what happens when the temps go back up. The Austin area has several large wild fires right now, one in Bergstrom burning over 34,000 acres, such a shame. Many homes lost and a couple of fatalities. The air quality is bad and has made me sick. I took off work Thursday & Friday with respiratory problems.

Strange thing about living in our small space...it's boring. I cleaned yesterday, took me about 30 minutes. Now what? I tried to talk Norm into going out, prowling around town (Red Lobster is having their Shrimp Fest!) but no go. He prefers to watch football today. Just as well, I'm still not feeling well.

We had our Conger family reunion last weekend. My brother surprised me by showing up! It was tons of fun and Bonnie & Danny were the BEST hosts'. Danny sure has it down when smoking brisket & ribs! YUMMY! And Bonnie made me a beautiful birthday cake, all Chocolate with gnache, she knows what I like! Thanks Bonnie & Danny, you are the best!

I was so proud of Madison. She helped with the younger kids and was the best little host. She has the patience of her mom and was so good with her cousin Trip. It was good seeing Al, Pat & their girls. Leah & Allison are absolutely georgous girls and so sweet.

SOLD!!

We closed on the house today! It was a bit touch & go for awhile. We were suppose to close on the 11th but the buyers had problems with their lender so started over with another lender. We've had more garage sales and purged stuff but were hesitant to move the rest to storage until we knew for sure the sale was going through. Last weekend we got confirmation (90%) that it was going to go through. Cole & a friend came over, Norm rented a Uhaul truck and we moved almost everything into storage and the RV. We stayed in the house until today, packed up our essentials and went to closing at 10:00. We are relieved that everything worked out, but it is bittersweet. Leaving our home for the last time, empty, felt sad & strange. No regrets, but it is emotional. We've been in that house for almost 17 years. I realized I have never, ever lived anywhere that long my whole life!

Monday Norm and Cole moved the RV out to the Shady River RV Park where we plan to reside until I retire in January. Then it's "North to Alaska" via Arizona, California and on up the coast through Oregon (to see my Sis!). Sorry Sis, you know how superstitious I am, I couldn't tell anyone of our plans until ...well you know, I'm afeared they'll not work out. Now that the house is sold we can go on our journey. But since it's to late to go to Alaska this time of year, we're waiting it out until early Spring.

Back Home!

Neither one of us has felt well since we got home. We wanted to have a garage sale this weekend but we haven’t been able to get going on that. I can tell this move is gonna be a tough one. It’s HOT, we don’t have the energy and are over whelmed with all that needs to be done.

Pagosa Springs, Colorado

July 22-24, 2011

We left Creede and drove over Wolf Creek pass. The grades were 6% which was pretty scarey for me, but Norm handled the rig very well. We're settled at "Happy Campers" RV Park just outside of Pagosa Springs. This is the complete opposite of the Creede RV Park we were just at. Now I know I said I didn't like the stoody campgrounds, but this is a little to trashy for me. While it does have FHU, it's not worth $30 a night. Luckily I found a coupon for 1 free night in some of the literature we picked up at a visitor center in Gunnison. This park is right on the highway, noise all day & night, sites are unlevel, junk everywhere.

The one things I told Norm I wanted to do in Colorado is soak in a Hot Spring. So, the loving man he is, went of of our way to take me here. Last night we went to "Pagosa Hot Springs Resort". For $20 each we had a choice of many tubs with different temperatures to choose from. A bit pricey but it was a nice place, and they gave us the senior discount (55+) which was about $17 or so each. I'm not sure how I feel about getting that since I'm not quite a senior yet, but I took it. I'm sure I looked ancient considering the girl that checked us in was probably 12.

The weather here is warmer, probably mid 80's, seems hot as compared to the 70's we had up the Gunnison mountain. I already wish we were back there. Today we check out the town of Pagosa Springs (I saw a very pretty river walk from the Hot Springs last night). Then Sunday we'll start heading back home with a stop in Santa Fe, NM. They have a real neat mission there that Norm wants to see. It's only 150 miles from here so we will make it a quick stop then continue on down the road. Hope to make it to Santa Rosa to stay the night. We'll see how far we make it. Again Norm wanted to make reservations, but I don't want to be committed to HAVING to make it somewhere. Haha, this is so funny, if you know us any at all you'll know I'm usually the one with all the plans, reservations, every day planned out. Now Norm's the one thinking ahead, go figure.

Creede, Colorado

July 18-21, 2011

The Mountain View RV Resort is very nice, very nicely layed out with a lot of sculptures and water features surrounded by mountains. It's pricey, but there's not much to do around here so we won't be back. It's pretty far from anywhere. We took a driving tour up Bachelor Loop to see the abandoned mines. Then another day we set out to find Phoenix Park Falls. That was a VERY rough, narrow road. I would not drive that road again in our truck. ATV is more like it. At the top of the mountain there is a fork in the road, we took the left and that turned out to be the wrong one so we missed the Falls. I wish they have better signage, or any signage at all would be good. This road intersected into Bachelor Loop and I was relieved we did not have to return the same way we came in on. We stopped by the Forest Service office to ask about the Falls and that's where we found out that we should have taken the "right" fork in the road to Phoenix Falls. Oh well, I'm not going on that road again!

7/5/11 WE GOT AN OFFER ON OUR HOUSE!

I have to back up to the day we got to Bryce Canyon. We got a message from our realtor that he was expecting an offer on our house. Sure enough the next day we got a call the offer came in. It was a reasonable offer so we accepted! Our cell service was spotty so we did the driving around “can you hear me now” thing. Then went looking for internet connection so we could check email, look over the contract, electronically sign & return to the realtor. We are sooooo excited. It’s been on the market about 2.5 months and only been shown about 7 times. We feel very lucky as some folks have their house on the market over a year. We’re still trying not to get to excited because we know anything can happen between now & the closing date, but it’s hard not to. We’ve decided to continue with our vacation plans but cut it a few days short so we can find storage, pack, sell and find a place to live. Thank goodness our son Cole is taking care of things around our house while we’re gone, he’s been a big help. He also has found a room to rent from someone he knows. Looks like things are falling into place!

GUNNISON, COLORADO

7/13/11 GUNNISON, COLORADO
We arrived in Gunnison, no reservations and not really knowing where we would land. Most RV sites do not have hookups in this area. We stopped by the BLM office in Gunnison for a map & information to some of their parks & dispersed camping. They have many campgrounds NE of Gunnison up the Taylor Canyon (Drive 10 miles to Almont, hook a right, their campgrounds are dotted all the way up the canyon, about 20 miles long). The first several were full. We made it about 18 miles up and found “Lake Campground” just across from the Taylor reservoir. It’s the biggest with 64 sites and they had 1 level pull through left. Apparently they book up many months in advance but have several non-reservable sites. They do have some with electric for around $22, we got no hookups for $18 a night. We’re staying 5 nights here. A nice place with beautiful views of the lake with mountains in the background and pine trees all around but a bit far from everything. The first day we toured Gunnison. 2nd day we drove on up the mountain to a little ghost town “TinCup” then drove down a pass called “Cumberland Pass”, an 8 miles long rough dirt road that went up to 12,000 feet. It was very nice and we saw snow on top of the mountain, it was chilly! Around 60 degrees. Our campground is about 8,100 feet with day temps in the 70’s, night time in the high 30’s. A nice place to stay with cool temps but a bit far from all attractions. Even the town of Gunnison felt hot so we were glad we are staying up on this mountain. Our 3rd day we took it easy at our campsite all morning then went on for a drive down another pass called “Cottonwood Pass”. It’s 12 miles up a mountain with good roads as compared to the Cumberland pass road. The top of the mountain is 12,000 feet. This mountain is on the Continental Divide. We took a short hike to see the amazing views.

BRYCE CANYON

07/5/11 – 7/11/11 BRYCE CANYON
Bryce Canyon is the most amazing place either of us have ever seen. We stayed 7 nights in a campground within the park called “North Campground”. No hookup, $15 a night, nice shady with lots of trees but very unlevel sights. The few level sites they have were quickly taken. We had a heck of a time finding one we could maneuver our 5th wheel into due to the pine trees locations. A few to many trees to have to squeeze through. We thought it was expensive considering there were no hookups. We were without cell phone signal also, except for Norms old trac phone, it worked speratically . But it was nice staying inside the park. They have a shuttle bus that runs throughout the day. The first day we drove up to the highest point, Rainbow point. The views were magnificent, but they were at every point. Throughout the week we took many hikes. They have easy, moderate and strenuous. We started out with easy the first few days until we could acclimate to the higher altitude, then moderate hikes. Our last day we took the bus from our campground up to Bryce Point to go on a strenuous 5.5 mile hike that took us down into the floor of the canyon to see the hoodoos up close. We made a day of it and just took it easy, stopping to rest often. The hike took us about 4.5 hours to complete. We took sandwiches and stopped a little more than half way through the hike to rest while eating lunch. The weather was perfect, cloudy most the time with the sun breaking through here & there. We caught the bus back at Bryce Point and got out at each stop to have a 2nd look at each look out view point, as if to say good bye to this awesome place. We hated to leave such a beautiful place with such awesome cool weather, but after 7 days we had seen everything there is to see here and it was time to move on.
We left out Tuesday, 7/12/11 to head towards Gunnison, Colorado. Spent the night at a campground near Grand Junction, Co with FHU (Nice, all the running water we wanted, electricity and high speed wifi and cable tv).

Page, AZ

Instead of taking I-40 we took a scenic route to Page. Highway 264 out of Gallup, NM goes through Hopi Indian territory. The road was a bit rough and the scenery was okay in places, but I do not suggest this route due to the road condition, and the scenery was not that great. There were a few canyons we drove by that “wowed” us a bit, just not enough to justify the long rough road.

We got into Page about 5:30 last night hoping to see RV Parks advertised along the way. Only one advertisement for Lake Powell RV Resort, sounded expensive, but after not seeing anything else we called them. No availability. They gave us the name of another park called Page Lake Powell campground. They did have a spot so we hurried over. This is a nice park (not on the lake like their name indicates) but the RV sites are not level. We had to unhitch the truck in order to level up, bummer! Lot of trouble for one night. They take Good Sam & AARP, we got the site for $20 FHU. We needed electric due to the hot weather in order to run the AC. It seems Page only has these 2 rv parks. We hope to boondock once we get up to Bryce Canyon in cooler temps.
Since we unhooked the truck we decided to go out to eat. There’s a family owned Mexican restaurant 1 mile from our Park. It was delicious, some of the best Mexican food we’ve had. And boy were they busy. We got back to the camper & could see the July 4th fireworks from our camp site, it was very pretty. Page is a very pretty, clean town. Seems like a nice place to live (if it didn’t get so blasted hot). We see a lot of boats in town, the lake must be a good recreation lake.

Headed to Bryce Canyon today. The weather is predicting thunderstorms in Page as well as Bryce Canyon. Let’s hope it’s not a total wash.

Albequerque, NM

We headed out from the house Saturday around 9:00 and drove to Post, Tx. Stayed at an RV Park we'd stayed at last year called the 3G RV Park. Post is located in North Texas, very small, nice park. Just a plain gravel lot really, but only $20 with full hook ups. Since it's so hot we needed electric to run the AC.

Sunday we left at 9:00 and drove longer than we like. We stayed just West of Albequerque at a Casino RV Park (Route 66 Casino). Parks in Albequerque seemed to be running around $30 a night, more than we want to spend. After passing through we started seeing signs for a Casino, $10 FHU! So that's where we're at. It's not a real big park, but not many rv's here. You have to go inside the casino to get a membership card (free) to get the $10 rate, otherwise it's $20 (still a good deal for FHU). You also get a voucher for $10 worth of free gas, so really it's like staying here for free. They have a large gas station across the street with the best price on diesel we've seen for a while, $3.67. We checked out the Casino restaurant and they were having a 2 for one special. We ate steak & shrimp for $14.99. Not the best meal I've had, but pretty good. I'll try to take pics to post before we leave this morning.

We plan to make it to Page, AZ tonight. We'll stock up for 10 days of supplies for our stay in Bryce Canyon.

Trip to Colorado

We leave this Saturday to head up to find cooler weather. We'll be gone the whole month of July! First stop will be Taos, NM for a few days then over to Red River, NM. Our daughter & family will meet us there for a mini reunion. After that we'll go on up to the Gunnison, Colorado area. Anywhere it's cool. The weather here in the Austin, Tx area is just over 100 these days.

We have not made any reservations, we just want to go on the fly. We've got the generator and everything set up so we can boondock. I'm hoping to do some hiking, reading and see some beautiful country. This will be our longest vacation ever.

Our New Rig

Actually it's our used new rig we purchased last summer. The F350 truck we bought new.

Setting up auto-pay & e-statements

In an effort to go out on the road full timing I need to cut down on our paper mail as much as possible. I have been setting up all the bills I possibly can on e-statements. Although I have been paying bills online for a few years, I am now setting them up to auto-pay in full each month. We have most bills that are automatically charged to credit cards each month. This gives us points with the credit cards that we can use for airline vouchers, cash back or other incentives. I had been paying the credit card bills from my on-line bank. Now I have them set up with the individual credit card companies to auto pay from my bank account in full each month.

We received a letter from one of our credit card companies that said our account had been compromised (apparently a data base breach on their part) so they were closing our old account and would send us a new card. This was a HUGE hassle because I had just set up several bills to be paid automatically with this card about 2 months ago and just now was confident everything was taken care of. Now I've had to go back into all those bills and change the credit card information. As usual when you set up payments like that it may take 4-6 weeks to take effect so you have to be SURE the payment is made, or make it manually until the auto pay is set up. Otherwise a bill may slip by without payment leaving you with a late fee as well as finance charges. Not to mention this credit card in particular I had set up to auto pay from my bank each month. In the process of issuing us a new credit card they did not get our auto pay set up and payment was not made. I was on the phone several times with several different people in order to resolve the $50 late fee and finance charge. After several days it was finally resolved and the charges reversed. Boy what a HASSLE!!! I hope this doesn't happen very often!

Other than the above snafu I have notice a big reduction in our mail. I had gone online a few months ago to optoutprescreen.com to sign up for opting out of junk mail.

I do NOT want to get out on the road & have a bill slip by without getting paid and be charged with fees. We plan on having some kind of internet connection but I know we will be staying in places where we may not be able to get a connection or we may just get busy & let something slip by. We're getting one step closer to our dream :)

Another piece of furniture SOLD

Last week Norm posted several pieces of furniture on CraigsList. We got a few inquiries and one person came by to purchase the round dining table. One down, several to go, but it's progress.

We spent some time with the grandkids this weekend, took Madi to a little splash park in Temple. When we left I told Madi "that was fun", she said "told you!". Holden (2 years old) can now say Memaw very well, and says it all the time now. I love it! He got a tan while down on the coast last weekend, now looks like a little brown berry. Those kids are so darn cute!

My bro's visit

My brother Wes came down from Arlington, Tx to visit over Memorial Weekend. It was a treat seeing him. We kept busy shopping and running around. Stopped by the Smart Car dealership to get a good look at these tiny cars. Norm wants one to go in our future ToyHauler. Cute little cars, seems to be the only one that may fit inside an RV toyhauler. Also took a drive down to Buda, Tx to look at a few RV dealerships. No toyhaulers in stock that we were interested in. Spend a couple hours inside Cabella's. That place is huge and amazing. I love it!

Norm is posting stuff on craigslist. Still a lot of stuff to get rid of.

Earth to Earth, Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust

Our hearts have been heavy these last few weeks as Norm's mom just passed away, only 4 months after his dad. I think she died of a broken heart, after 60 years of marriage I can only imagine it would be difficult. We've been in Tulsa for the memorial service and getting the house cleaned out of all their worldly possessions. Some kept, some given to family, some sold, more disposed of. It really makes you think....everything is so final....time flies by way to fast and then it's just gone. It's hard getting older, even harder losing the ones we love. I saw something at the graveside service that I've never seen before. They had a basket with doves inside. After the pastor performed a short service, Norm & his brother opened the basket of doves, up poped their heads, looking around for a few seconds, then they took flight, up...up...up into the air, circling around a few times, then they flew back to their home. I did not know doves were trained in that way. It was the most beautiful, sweet thing I have ever seen. And so appropriate. I remember right after Norm's dad's funeral, his mom saying "I guess he's up there flying with the birds". The doves symbolized the both of them, flying high in the sky, with the birds they loved so much. What a outstanding send off to two special people who meant so much to so many.

Sister-in-law & the beach (Rock Port, Tx)

Norm's sister Debbie flew down from Wyoming for a visit and we took her to Goose Island State Park in Rock Port, Tx. Hauled the 5th wheel down there and I was able to get my beach walking fix I've been longing for. Poor Deb, allergies attacked her as soon as she stepped off the plane in Austin, she was sick the entire time. We had no agenda, just rest and relaxation. I like those vacations.

More home improvements

Last weekend Norm & Cole rented a larger chain saw and a stump grinder so they can do a few more improvements to our property. We had two large trees out in the front that had died. When we cut them down we were left with huge stumps. Looks a lot better now that the stumps have been ground down. Our house has been on the market one week today, so far no showings. It's hard work keeping the house clean!

Our current RV

Last summer, when we thought it would be another 8+ years before we actually went "full timing", we decided to go ahead & buy a small used 5th wheel and truck. Norm found & bought a brand new 2010 F350 diesel dully pick up. Then I found a reasonably priced 25 foot Keystone Laredo 5th wheel. This would be our "starter" home. One week after we purchased the rv we set out for a week in the mountains of New Mexico. That trip went well and we learned quit a bit about our little home on wheels. In November 2010 we took it up to Tulsa, OK to see Norm's family. That was the last time we saw Norm's dad alive. He passed the very next month.

In the beginning....

One year ago Norm started talking about buying an RV and traveling when we retire. I sort of agreed, "yeah, yeah, sounds good", that's way off in the future. But through different circumstances we decided to go through with it. One reason being we want to travel while we are still healthy enough to do so. Norm is 55 and I'm 51 years old. We have known many people that have died young, or worked until their health no longer allowed them to travel and enjoy life. Norm's health has definitely declined in the last few years as his job has become increasingly stressful.

I came home a few months ago and said to my husband "Let's do this thing"! We decided to put Norm's dream of travel into action. The last few months we have been readying the house to put on the market. We've had several garage sales and cleaned house. Norm & our son Cole have been working hard clearing off cedar & scrub on our 3 acre lot. Three days ago our house went on the market! We are soooo excited. More later.