| We spent most of December camping on the lot of friends
Tom and Tinka Dooley at Escapees Rainbow Plantation near Summerdale, Alabama.
Fulltiming friends Dave and Sharyl Tholen were there all month and it was
nice spending time with them. I like to do my own maintenance on the motorhome
and two items we due for service. I replaced the oil and filter in the
generator and replaced the main filter in the transmission and topped it
up with fluid. By doing the work myself I saved over $200 and I know it
was done right. I had also been fighting with Spartan (made the motorhome
chassis) and Newmar (made the motorhome) about a rough ride on the front
tires. Spartan finally agreed to replace the front tires with a larger
size so we drove over to Pensacola one day to have new tires mounted and
balanced. If we had paid the bill it would have been about $1,180, but
Spartan picked up the tab. (Great company)
The weather in Summerdale was rather nice, warm and sunny
days and cool nights. One day we drove down to Gulf Shores, Alabama with
Dave and Sharyl and walked along the beach. Hurricane Ivan devastated Gulf
Shores a year and a half earlier and the town is being rebuilt. Sand from
the beach washed inland and it has been scooped up and returned to the
beach, but has to be sifted and the debris removed before it can be spread
back on the beach. Mounds of sand, up to 30 feet high, dot the beach with
large machines sifting and spreading the sand.
Linda and Sharyl taught craft classes at the campground
and sold some of their crafts during a craft show. Linda taught making
items from Wal*Mart plastic bags (rugs and wine carriers), a tee shirt
class and sewing designer-style purses while Sharyl taught making cards.
Linda also made pine needle baskets to give away for Christmas gifts.
Speaking of pine needle baskets, Dave and Sharyl jumped
on that craft big time. Dave prepared the needles and Sharyl made the baskets.
We left the motorhome in Alabama and drove the Honda CR-V 638 miles to Louisville, Kentucky to spend Christmas with family. We spent two days on the road and four days visiting family from morning until late at night as we have a lot of family in Kentucky. It felt good to return to Alabama and rest. Getting old and having health problems is the pits. I had been having trouble swallowing so I saw a gastro doctor and to make a long story short, he dilated my esophagus, had a barium swallow x-ray series done and dilated my esophagus again. After three outpatient days in the hospital and two doctor office appointments I was ready and eager to hit the road again. People who fulltime in RVs are not immune to medical problems and we have always found excellent doctors on the road. (Thanks Dr. Michael Berry of Foley, Alabama.) During our stay at Rainbow Plantation we enjoyed visiting with many friends including Tom and Tinka Dooley, Dave and Sharyl Tholen, Doug and Ann Craw, Bob and Nancy Colbert, Ken and Diane Dombroski and several others. The end of the month fulltiming friends Rich and Diane Emond joined us and we plan to travel together the next two months. The first half of January we will visit friends as we head west and the last half of the month will be spent in Quartzsite, Arizona and Puerto Penasco, Mexico. |
