In The Midst of History

We pulled out the bikes today and did some exploring only to find out we are in a historically significant location here in mid-Missouri. The small town we are camped next to (and part of the State Park), is called Arrow Rock. It sits on the west bank of the Missouri River. This was a very important river town in the early eighteen hiundreds. Many thousands of pioneers crossed here to move from the crowded eastern states to the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase and to points west. Steamboats used this port to deliver supplies to the west. Louis and Clark also travelled through this area after beginning their explorations in nearby St. Louis. They travelled up the Missouri River and eventually into Montana, Idaho, and into Oregon to the west coast. St Louis, MO. is where the Missouri, Mississippi, and Illinois rivers converge and that city was an important fur trading and agricultural port for the midwest.
The area we are in was the home of the Osage, Fox and Sac Indians. The early settlers traded with the Indians and learned about the territory from them. Daniel Boone also moved here after raising his family in Kentucky. Daniel Boone's sons ran a successful salt producing business here and the area is known as Boone's Lick. The Boone's Lick settlement is across the river from where we are camped. This area was also important during the Civil War and was a hotbed of disention between the Union and Confederate beleifs.
The visitor's center was like a museum with artifacts from the Indians, the early settlers, the civil war, and medical supplies used by the famous doctor Dr. John Sappington who developed and mass marketed quinine pills nationwide to successfully treat malarial fevers. This was also the home of famous artist George Caleb Bingham who painted scenes of river life and politics.
So much for the history lessons. Pull up Arrow Rock on the internet and you will be surprised at all the rich history here. We were!

We made Missouri

We are in central Missouri between Kansas City and St. Louis. As we drove through Kansas City I couldn't help but think about all those great Barbecue Restaurants you see on TV. It has been interesting watching the landscape change. Driving through Kansas it was very flat and open in the west and hilly and treed in the east. The farmland in Eastern Kansas was fabulous. The fields were either green and lush with grass or if plowed the soil looked dark and rich. Missouri looks a lot like Michigan farm country, although it is a bit more rolling. Everything is green and it looks like May in Michigan. The leaves are mostly developed and the grass is vibrant.
We had a good change in the weather today. It was finally warm and sunny and the wind died down this evening. Nancy and I celebrated our 38th anniversary with a great grilled steak, baked potatoes, a good bottle of wine and later we had a nice campfire and were able to sit outside with no bugs and warm temperatures. We are spending three nights here and then will continue our journey east.

My internet signal is too weak here so pictures will have to wait.

I hope all is well with you as you are reading this post. May God bless!

Moved Today

We moved a bit further east today and are now just north of Dorrance, Kansas. We are in an Army Corp of Engineers campground on Wilson Reservoir. This is a modern campground with about 150 sites and most have electric hook-ups for $8 a night! The campground has a lot of sites right on the lake and the views are really nice. We are perched high above the lake on a bluff. This lake is well known for fishing and there were a half dozen boats on the water today.

I am surprised at the wildlife here in Kansas. The campground we were at last night was over run with deer and pheasants and the park we moved to today has the same. We saw turkeys on our way to the freeway this morning. On a walk after dinner this evening we saw three pheasants and heard others crowing. We also saw five deer in the fields across from the park.

We plan on staying here for two nights to be sure the severe weather that is ripping Arkansas has a chance to move east.

We are camped above the lake. Look close at the top of the hill.

This is a view of the Wilson Reservoir. The Army Corp of Engineers built the dam in 1964 to control flood waters. 

On the MOVE!

Hey Dorothy, we made it to Kansas!

We are on the back side of the southern plains storm that is causing flooding and tornadoes through the Midwest. We made it about half way across Kansas with no problem except cloudy skies. We are in Cedar Bluff State Park for the night, then will move a little further east to spend two nights at an Army Corp campground for two more days. That will give the storm time to move east and will give us some good weather.

Hope everyone is doing well.

Dave and Trevor at dinner time last week. I stayed with them Tuesday night before Becky took me to the airport on Wednesday.

Becky and Trevor on Wednesday morning.

Ben and Kate getting ready for their busy day.

This is one of the last critters we saw in Colorado. A cow with ear rings!!

Our Last Day in Colorado

We spent Easter Sunday at the Cheyenne Mountain Campground and had a relaxing day catching up on our paperwork and making plans for our return trip to Michigan. We plan on getting back on May 6th. We "Skyped" with the kids today and wished each other a Happy Easter. This is the first time we used the Internet to have a conversation where we could see everyone on the other end of the computer line. All of the kids were there and Natalie sang us a couple of songs!

Our weather was kind of dreary today with snow in the morning that was gone by one o'clock. It was nice for a few hours and then started raining again late in the afternoon. We hope it will be nice tomorrow so we can hook up the camper and start heading east. We plan on going to eastern Colorado or Western Kansas the first day. We don't want to get too far east just yet because they are calling for storms and bad weather for a couple of days. We are hoping to stay behind the front in order to avoid any severe storms or threat of tornadoes. Wish us luck!

Happy Easter to all!

Easter Saturday

We met with David today at Buena Vista and said goodbye. He is planning on spending the day in Vail tomorrow to ski and join in the festivities for the closing of the ski season. We met at Buena Vista in the snow and walked around town and then had a great Mexican lunch at the Coyote Cantina! The food was great and we had a good time with him and his (girl) friend Robin. The town is a historic old west town and is 8,000 feet above sea level. The area is well known for mountain biking, hiking, rafting and kayaking and fly fishing on the Arkansas River.

It was a beautiful drive up the mountain and we saw deer, antelope and we even saw four elk on the way back down. It was snowing pretty hard when we came off of the mountain and we are glad we don't have to go back into the snow country anymore. It was wonderful spending the past few weeks in Colorado and enjoying the spectacular scenery and gorgeous mountains. We are amazed at the beauty of this state each time we come here and we understand why David loves it so much. Now it's time for us to head back to Michigan and concentrate on getting our new home built.

We wish everyone a blessed Easter and hope everyone is doing well.

Here are some pictures from the day....

David showed us around Buena Vista and we enjoyed a great lunch and said our goodbyes.

The drive down started off pretty ugly, but the further we drove the drier it got.

We stopped and took a few pictures of a herd of pronghorn antelope along the highway. There were about twenty in this group.

Further down we stopped along a river by Eleven Mile Canyon and I didn't catch any trout again! Look how nice the weather got. It changes in the mountains all the time.

We came upon four elk grazing in a meadow west of Woodland Park.

The weather is holding up.

Friday was nice and warm again at 67 degrees here at Cheyenne Mountain State Park. We took a ride up into the mountains behind Pike's Peak to Lake George and visited Eleven Mile Lake and Park. The wind at the lake was howling at thirty to forty miles an hour with gusts even higher! The lake was all whitecaps but I found a sheltered cove and did some casting for the elusive Colorado trout. I managed to get one on for about two minutes, but the constant head shaking worked for him and he eventually shook free. Bummer! I tried and tried but couldn't get another taker.

The temperature fell to 43 degrees at the higher elevation, but when we got back down to our camp later in the day it was back up to 67. Ah, the mountains!

Looking eastward to Pike's Peak. It's snow capped peak blends in with the clouds.

Eleven Mile Lake. This is a very large lake fed by the Platte River and is rated as one of Colorado's premier fishing destinations.\

Nancy took this great picture of a group of deer on the way back to Lake George.

Back on the Front Range

We set up camp at Cheyenne Mountain State Park just west of Colorado Springs. We are on the side of the mountain and the views are spectacular especially at night when the whole world below us is lit up like a sea of stars!
The temperature hit 70 degrees today and we had bright sunny skies most of the day. This is a change for Nancy who was with David in Vail for the past two weeks. The are still getting snow there most nights and the snowfall this winter has gone over 500 inches!! Imagine, that's over forty feet of snow! We took a trip to Helen Hunt falls today which is a small falls in a city park not far from camp.
We also went in to Old Colorado City and walked the streets window shopping and going in to a couple of gift shops and a candy store. Mostly we enjoyed the beautiful day and relaxing together.

Our camp site overlooking the prarie to the east and Colorado Springs.

Entrance to the falls.

It's hard to see the water in this picture because it's so clear. The falls was pretty neat with a lot of hiking trails around it.

Old Colorado City. Lots of gift shops, novelty shops, art studios. restaurants and tee shirt shops. This was an old west town turned into a trendy tourist destination.

Critters of the day. This jay was seen at the falls.

When we got back to the campground we saw lots of prarie dogs scurrying about. They're fun to watch. 

The view from our camper at night. This was the view for 180 degrees across the horizon. The mountains are behind us.

Headed Back to Colorado

I have been in Leland for the past week and a half and construction of our new house is underway. The excavators showed up on Monday and worked on cutting in a driveway, clearing the homesite and burying stumps and roots. They made quite a bit of progress and were back at it today to start digging the basement and footings and starting to gravel the front of the drive.

I am flying back to Colorado on Wednesday. Nancy and I are planning to spend Easter with David then we will begin our journey back to Michigan. We plan to take a week to ten days and then spending a couple days visiting with the kids before we head back up north to get involved with our project.

Hope everyone is well.

Sunday in Leland

Mike brought me back to Leland on Friday and we spent the weekend touring and sightseeing in Leelanau County. On Saturday we took Hannah and Natalie to North Bar Lake, Empire, Frankfort, Point Betsie Lighthouse, and to Wheeler Road. The weather was sunny and in the high fifties.
Over night it rained and thunderstormed and this morning it was drizzly. Later in the morning, by ten o'clock the rain stopped and it began to clear. By one in the afternoon we are sunny and seventy degrees. I hope this lasts.

I talked to Nancy in Vail this morning and they got five inches of snow overnight and it was still snowing. I'm sure she will be glad when we get her off the mountain and back into some warm weather.

I meet with our builder in the morning (weather permitting), to set stakes for the house and to see where we can put the driveway in. The excavator is supposed to be out there too and I anticipate he will be getting started this week to do some clearing and start digging the basement. It looks like this project will be getting underway very soon.

I hope all is well with everyone.

Back in Michigan!

Nancy stayed in Vail while I flew back to Michigan for two weeks. I will be meeting with the builder to start the new project next week. Here is a picture from only yesterday..

David, Nancy and I took a gondola ride to the top of Vail Mountain yesterday.

Good Day in the Mountains

We had a nice day doing some hiking and exploring with David. Temps reached the fifties with lots of sunshine. We saw some elk this morning down towards Edwards. About a dozen were feeding and bedded down in a meadow along the creek there. We took a hike before lunch and went up the trail at the end of Big Horn Rd. in East Vail. The snow is a little thinner now then it was when we were here two weeks ago.

After lunch we took a free ride up the Gondola at Vail Village and went to the top of the mountain. The views at the top of the rockies are awesome.

Back in Vail

The morning broke with blue skies and sunshine. Temperature was about 20 degrees but the sun started warming things up fast. The snow that accumulated yesterday began melting by nine o'clock and by noon it was all gone.

Flat tires seem to be haunting me all of a sudden. When I got in the truck this morning I had a warning that one of my tires was very low (modern technology). I checked and it still had 28 pounds of pressure so I drove to a tire store and and asked them to pull the wheel and patch the tire. They found a screw embedded in the tread and plugged the tire for me. Hopefully the plug will hold and get us back to Michigan safely.

We parked the camper in Englewood and drove up to Vail again. We are staying with David for a couple of nights and then I am flying back to Michigan to meet with our builder and get construction started on our project.

All of Davids Vail family came over for a "family dinner" tonight. They all get together occasionally for a potluck and tonight we had pizza, spaghetti, focaccia bread, salad, and cookies. Great feast and great kids. We all had a good time and good eats!

Hope everyone is well.

Crazy Wind and Crazy Weather

It looks like I spoke too soon about the nice warm temperatures. Towards evening the wind began to blow. We had steady 40 mile an hour wind with gusts that had to be 50 to 55! This wind howled all evening and all night into this morning. At 3:30 am I went outside to check on David and we took his tent down and threw it into his trunk and he slept the rest of the night in the camper. Even the camper was moving and shaking all night!
This morning the wind raged on, but at least the temperature was still moderate. David had breakfast with us then headed back to Vail. We slowly packed up the camp and we moved back to Chatfield State Park. When we left Pueblo Lake it was 74. This was a two hour drive and as we rolled north the sky began to get cloudier and the temperature started to fall, first through the 50's, then the forties, then the rain and snow started and by the time we got to Littleton it was 34 degrees and snowing.
No pictures today, but I wanted to check in with everyone.

Sunny Saturday

Today was the warmest day we've had since the 97 degree blowout near Amarillo, Texas. It got close to eighty with sunny skies. We started the day with David going into Pueblo to play some Frisbee golf at the park and me going trout fishing in the Arkansas River. I hope David had better luck than me, but the river was great and I did manage to see a few trout, but not on the end of my line.

After lunch we went to downtown Pueblo and saw the sights.

I want to wish Hannah a happy birthday and happy birthday to Amy. Hope all the kids have fun at Tom's tomorrow to celebrate birthdays and to visit with Grandma and Grandpa Goodfallow as they pass through town on their way to Leland for the summer.

We saw this big cocoon in the grass outside of our camper this morning.

Later after the sun warmed the cocoon this creature emerged.

This is the Pueblo County Court House. Very impressive!

Nancy and David along the riverwalk downtown.

TGIF in Colorado

We took another day trip today. this time to Royal Gorge near Canon City, Colorado. This was a short trip, only about a half hour each way. Canon City is an old historic town near the Cripple Creek gold mining area which was one of the richest gold strikes in history. We drove up to the Royal Gorge Bridge and tool some pictures and walked around.  This is a huge tourist area, but nothing really is open until May 1 and it gets into full swing around Memorial Day. We still had fun looking around and then we had a picnic lunch on the mountain. Later we drove back into Canon City and visited the train station.

David called and came out to the campground today. He will be staying with us for two nights and we are having a good time visiting and exploring.

We got news from Michigan today and heard that Jenny got a brand new Dodge Caliber! Congratulations Jenny!

The old steam locomotive and train at Royal Gorge Park.

This is the suspension bridge over the gorge. The deck of the bridge is 955 feet above the Arkansas River!

This is the visitors area at the top of the gorge. For a mere $37.50 two people can walk across the bridge. (Oh, you can also get a tram ride which is included in the price). Notice the throngs of people clammoring to walk across!

We saw these classy looking cows grazing on the mountain.

Look at the smile on this girls face!! Congrats, Jenny!