Home Again

Hello all-
We are home again and almost all caught up, rested up.

Our travel weather was sunny and nice, except for the last day and nite, lovely fall colors entertained us most of the way.

We stopped for the evening at Steve and Kay's. Our grandsons and Ashlee were there to share some time and a delicious meal prepared by Kay.
We left veary early tuesday morning and unfortunately were unable to meet Roger for breakfast. When I called him, he had been sick most of the night and didn't want to come out. I am afraid his health is not the best and is deteriorating.
The next stop on our journey was in Marion, OH to see friends Tom and Minamarie Crane. Minamarie is about the same as she has always been. There is only one Minamarie! About 86, still fiesty and a non stop talker. Her memory may be better than mine. Unfortunately, Tom has not fared as well. He has had a variety of health problems for some years now, and it was necesary for him to go into a nursing home last spring. Very dificult for him to get around, to see, to hear. But the same spirit that helped him bail out of a burning bomber over Italy, hide in a cave in the mountains to avoid capture until found by partisans who led him through the mountains for 17 nights to return him to our lines, so he could climb into another bomber and continue the war will not let him leave this life on earth, and go to his well deserved rest in his heavenly home. We can only wish him God Speed.

We left Minamarie thursday morning and headed south to Atlanta. Our route took us through a great deal of Ohio. I do believe we saw more police cars out and about that day, in Ohio, than on all the rest of our trip. And they weren't just sitting in their cruisers, acting kind aloof like they do sometimes. My goodness no! Many times that day, we saw them out visiting with the people that were sitting in their cars parked along the road side. Some mighty friendly fellers. :-) Wisdom says it might go well with you to heed your speed if traveling through Ohio.

We arrived mid morning on friday at Jason's. I must say that Mapquest gives pretty good directions and I had a good navigator along with me, so we just drove right up to his door. We enjoyed our visit very much. Jason prepared a delightful dinner for us on friday, and saturday and sunday, he and Nabila were kind enough to show us around some of the interesting parts of Atlanta, as we had never actually been in the city before, except once, when we accidentally drove right through the middle of the city pulling our trailer, and we didn't do any stopping
or sightseeing that time, I can tell you. While we were there Jason helped me buy a GPS so I have a new piece of modern equipment that is pretty easy to operate. I am sure it will be a big help in future travels. They have a lovely home and it actually cooled off enough in the evenings so we could enjoy sitting by their fireplace, with a crackling wood fire.

All to soon monday morning came and both of them had to go back to work and we left for home. I had intended to make the trip in 2 days but somewhere along mid morning I got the idea of just heading for home and your mom was game to try it. It is 989 miles according to mapquest. Not a long days drive for Bob, perhaps, but further than I had ever driven non stop. Weather was good until we got to about Davenport, winds increasing quite strongly, raining off and on. Unseasonably warm, still 75 degrees at 10 p.m. I was starting to get pretty tired so we pulled into a truck stop south of Waterloo and I slept for about an hour, then struck out again, and arrived here at 2:45 a.m. tuesday morning, safe and sound, Thank God!

And so, another chapter in our book of travels has come to an end. I look at the pictures we have on the wall in my library, chronicling some of our earlier travels, and think how much we have gone and seen and done. Much of it before all the modern day technical marvels to aid and assist in traveling. I have been very fortunate to have a partner that is as curious to see what is over the next hill and around the bend, as I have been. But right now, our home is looking might good to us. I suppose that someday, that siren song of the open road might call out to me again, (well, ok, there is one place.....Jason, you know..) but for right now the road is silent

dad