The Harvey family in Wisconsin

Posted on September 26, 2021 by admin

My Dad was born in Gleason, Wisconsin, so I have always had an interest in exploring that area. In addition, the description of Wisconsin that his sisters wrote about in the family book was of a green, rather lush land and that made a visit there even more appealing.

We recently had the opportunity to visit middle Wisconsin and the 2 counties where the Harvey family lived from 1921 until 1926, when they moved back to Montana.  Both counties have Historical Societies, which we visited and where we found some valuable information.

The family moved to Elcho in 1921, where Grandpa Harvey was a pastor in their Union Congregational Church.

I had Googled ‘Union Congregational Church in Elcho’ but could not find a reference. I did find a United Church of Christ on Dorr road, so I thought that was a good place to start my search. The Langlade County Historical Museum, in Antigo, had several booklets written about area churches and in one we found a picture of the church that was in the family book and it was indeed located on Dorr Road. The church was built on property donated by the Dorr family. In the family book it mentions that they lived for a time on the ‘Dohr’ farm, but I suspect the spelling was ‘Dorr’ since this is the name of the family who donated the land, the Dorrs owned a lot of property in the area and the church was built next to their land.

The museum had an old plat map of the area and I put a red star in the approximate location of the church, which had just been completed in 1921.

 

 

 

 

In one booklet, it states that the first church was turned into the parsonage when the ‘new’ church was built. The family book says that the family lived next door to the new church, so the old church was most likely their home. (The ‘new’ church is on the right.)

A note about the church’s architecture: The square tower with a cut-out edge must have been a fad in early Wisconsin.  We visited 2 counties and found 4 examples of this design in churches.

 

This booklet has a reference to Grandpa Harvey’s time as the pastor, but his time there differs from a booklet we found later.

 

 

 

 

In Elcho, we located the church and found the current pastor who lived in the parsonage, next to the church.  The original church was rebuilt in the 1970’s and it appears that the old church was removed after the new one was complete and a parking lot was added over the old site.

 

The church had just celebrated their 100th anniversary – 100 years since Grandpa Harvey preached in Elcho – hard to believe! The church had compiled a history booklet and it contained a record of Grandpa’s time there.

 

A sign that hung in the original church is mounted on the wall of the current church’s sanctuary and that kind of tied it all together for me.

 

One more note about the ‘new’ church: the current Pastor was very proud of the community center that the church built. It is used by the church and by the entire community for meals and gatherings, and it contains a bar. Grandma Harvey would not have approved of that At All!

What I found particularly interesting is that the family moved 3 times while living in the Elcho area, if the booklet is correct.  The Harvey family moved quite frequently and that cannot have been easy. We drive around the area marked on the plat map as the Dorr farm, but could not find any evidence of a farm.

 

In 1924, the Harvey family moved to the Deerbrook community and  the older kids attended the Liberty Bell School. This area is several miles south and west of Elcho.  We found the community of Deerbrook, but the site of the school is an overgrown field.  A picture of the school can be found online.

 

Deerbrook is a few miles east of Gleason and Dudley and in 1925 – 1926 the family moved to an area which must have been between Gleason and Dudley. The towns are quite close together:  Dad was born in Gleason, but the older kids went to school in Dudley.

 

Gleason is south of Dudley and is just a tiny area in the current town of Russell.

 

 

No buildings exist where Dudley was located, but the museum did have an early day photo of the town.

 

 

 

 

The Lincoln County Historical Museum in Merrill provided some of the most interesting items.  They have historical school census records,  some school photos and old plat maps of the area.

The Dudley School, like Dudley itself, no longer exists.  The area is very overgrown and if there is an old foundation, it is not visible from the road.

When the Harvey kids went to school here, State Road 17 would have most likely been just a dirt track. Dudley Road is still just gravel, no asphalt.

 

The museum had a photo of the Dudley School, taken in 1977. I don’t know if the school had been rebuilt in the 50 years since the Harvey kids attended, but it looks like a typical rural school.

 

The most exciting find of our museum visit was a school census and 2 photos from the 1926 Dudley School.

What a treat to look back almost 100 years and see those faces!

(I am pretty sure that they are identified this way:  Torrance left side of back row, Adelaide in front of him, to his right, Nellie middle of front row, Lucille right end of front row. Playground picture: Lucille on swing to the left side, Adelaide standing next to her, Nellie on middle swing.)

I tried to imagine what these areas were like 100 years ago, but it was kind of hard because so many things have changed.  A railroad used to run through the area and the farm related businesses, like a creamery, are no longer there. In fact we could not find many buildings that appeared to have been built during that time.

However, what I did come away with was a sense of why Lucille was so dismayed when she ended up in eastern Montana, in November, after leaving Wisconsin. Even in late September, the grass is green and there are  purple wildflowers growing in the ditches. Any grassy space of some size has grazing Canadian Geese.  The trees are just starting to turn fall colors of all shades of gold, orange and red.  Rivers, creeks, lakes and marshes dot the area. Wisconsin is very pretty and it must have been even more so in the 1920’s when the Harvey family lived here.

 

The final stop on our ‘Harvey Family in Wisconsin’ research was the first place that the family lived when they moved to Wisconsin:  Genoa Junction, now known as Genoa City. This small town is just miles from the Illinois border.

We had 2 photos from the family book to work with to try to identify the church where Grandpa was a pastor and the house where the family lived.

Thanks to Google Earth, Google Maps and Google (all the Googles) we were able to locate what we thought was the church and house.  We found the current pastor and church secretary at the church and they kindly found some old journals that mention Grandpa, so we knew we had the right church.  The Church is much the same on the outside –  a basement was added in the 1950s and an addition has been added to the back.

 

The sanctuary is small, but nice.

The house has been modified a bit but was still the same basic house. No one was at home in the house, but I was able to stand in the same spot where the early day photos were taken, so that was great.

 

These are some of the  documents of interest that I found in the church archives (including Grandma’s name, which I had not seen before in other documentation):

1918:                                                                           1919:

 

1920:

1921:

 

Grandpa had planted a row of trees that were referred to as the Harvey trees, even years later.   There were 2 large trees further down the block and I wonder if they are the trees he planted. I like to think so.

In the other areas of Wisconsin that we visited, there were no physical reminders of the Harvey clan, everything had been removed or rebuilt. But here, I could walk in the same footsteps as my grandparents and uncle and aunts (and even my great-grandmother) and that was  very nice.

 

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Desert Life

Posted on July 20, 2021 by admin

We have stayed in several kinds of environments while on the road, and deserts hold a special place in our hearts.  You wouldn’t think that a place which is bone dry, and mostly very warm or very cold and windy would be welcoming, but we have enjoyed our time in places just like that.

Each time we leave a desert area, we spend a few days sweeping up the sand and fine dirt which accumulates whenever we walk into our RV, or blows in when the wind kicks up. But walking, mostly easy walking, is one of the things we enjoy the most. Stepping out our door and taking a hike across the desert is one of our favorite things to do. In 2020 and 2021, we visited some old favorites and some new desert areas.

Deserts seem to be bland; all sand and rocks and not much color. But it does not take long to find the beauty all around, even in the color and shape of the many species of cactus.

Southern California has provided us some wonderful desert opportunities and Mojave is one of our favorites.  We have stayed at the Kelso Dunes twice now, and enjoyed both times. Camping there is boondocking –  no services, just pick a piece of the desert and make your camp.

The dunes are huge, and there is a trail to the top of the highest one – one which we did not take! We did walk all over the surrounding area, we just found it too difficult to walk far in the soft sand of the dunes.

 

The dunes change color as the day progresses and that is fun to watch. At night the skies can be dramatic and spectacular.

 

We found an area near the dunes where low brush and shrubs provided welcome cover to several species of interesting birds.

 

Trying to guess what kind of creatures leave all the footprints and trails in the sand is a fun thing for us to do as we walk around.

The Mojave Desert is large and has roads throughout it so that people can explore on their own and one of our favorite places to go is the lava tubes – leftovers from a long-ago volcanic eruption that shaped the area. The tubes are at the end of a sometimes teeth-rattling drive over a heavily-rutted dirt road, through scenic desert dotted with cinder cones and lava rocks. The drive also passes beside long abandoned corrals, remnants of past ranching in the area.

 

At the tubes, a ladder leads down into a narrow passage that opens up into a large open area containing vents to the surface above. Beams of sunlight coming through the vents provided the only light into the open area.

 

A new  desert stop for us in 2020 was Joshua Tree BLM, just outside of the town of Joshua Tree. This place was the largest piece of BLM land that we have visited; it was huge, and on the week-end it was busy.   It was much closer to civilization than the Mojave was, which probably accounted for part of its popularity. The spot where we picked to camp was close to a very large solar panel array which was located on the western boundary of the area.

We were able to walk across a big sand flat and up to some hills to get a good view of the surrounding area, and while we did not find much wildlife, there was the occasional tiny creature to watch.

 

We headed further south for a month-long stay in Borrego Springs, an area we drove through in 2018 and decided it would be a good place for a longer visit someday. The town is small and the snowbirds had not yet arrived, so it was laid back and quiet while we were there. We were parked in a full-service RV park (versus the previous boondocking areas) at the edge of town, under a big Eucalyptus tree which gave us some welcome shade. We could step outside our door and be in the desert and we took some great walks while we were there.

Our next-door neighbors had lived in their site for years and had created a backyard oasis, which we got to enjoy.  Hummingbirds and Verdin were regular visitors and we attached a window feeder to our motor home so that we could enjoy them up close.

 

Rabbits were everywhere -Cottontails lived in the park and Jack Rabbits lived in the desert. We saw and heard coyotes, who probably thrived on the rabbits.

Borrego Springs is home to acres of metal sculptures which are scattered around the surrounding desert. The artwork was commissioned by one man who owned a lot of the land, and his family has maintained the artwork for all to visit.

 

At the beginning of January, we moved east to the Arizona desert and one of our favorite boondocking spots near the tiny oasis of Why. Gunsight Wash is a large section of BLM  land that borders both sides of a  dry river bed and it was pretty busy in January. We wondered if that was due to people trying to stay isolated, like we were doing. We were able to find a rather quiet spot along the river bed and set up camp for a few weeks. A once-a-week trip to a nearby dump station to empty our tanks and fill up on water and then another trip for supplies to the town of Ajo was all we needed.

We could not find a source of water anywhere nearby and wondered how the birds that  we saw got their water. We decided it would be fun to provide some food and water, but first we wanted to make sure we were not going to harm the birds by getting them dependent on us, so that when we left they would be in trouble.  We researched feeding wild birds on the Internet and found that the birds would be very appreciative of the free goodies, but would quickly revert to their customary sources of food and water once we left.

With that knowledge, we decided to put out some seeds and water  and see what happened.  We got way more than we could have imagined and it was so much fun.

It only took about a day before the birds started to show up. The first one to find us was a Gila Woodpecker and he announced his find quite loudly and soon his mate showed up.

Gradually other birds started to find us and they, and we, fell into a daily routine. The finches were the first to show up each morning, sitting in nearby bushes to warm up and coming in for some water and food.

Around 9 AM the California Quail would appear out of the surrounding area, all running with their funny little waddle.  They quickly checked the ground for seeds and then headed for the water.

A Cardinal who lived in a nearby bush would come out once a day for food and water, as did a Mockingbird who lived in an even bigger bush.

Assorted Sparrows, the Woodpeckers and Goldfinches, showed up too, usually in the morning.  In the heat of the day the birds took a rest and then in the evening everyone came back for more goodies before dark.

All that drinking and eating meant we had to refill food and water up to 4 times a day. Because we were trying to make our own water tank last a week, we had to find alternate sources of water for the birds. We found a couple of places where we could fill up multiple 2 liter pop bottles mid-week. All that bird food that we put out had to be replenished as well, so we ended up buying bigger, and more, bags of food.

We also put up our window Hummingbird feeder and enjoyed daily visits from a couple different hummers.

A small ground squirrel decided to join the birds, and at first it was very timid, running in and out quickly. Over time, it got more bold and would just hang out with the birds. The Quail were very bossy and usually chased off other birds who were eating ‘their’ seeds, but they didn’t know what to make of the squirrel and just left him alone.

The Saguaro Cactus is such an iconic symbol of Arizona and we really enjoy seeing them everywhere we visit in Arizona. Their shapes and sizes are as varied as people. Cholla cactus trees are also pretty spectacular – you just have to be careful not to get too close to them and the spiny ‘fruits’ that they drop all around.

 

This year we saw more peccaries than we have seen in previous years and I had to include some pictures of them because they are kind of cute(?) and we enjoy spotting them.

After Arizona, we moved into Texas and then Louisiana and out of the desert areas for the rest of the winter.

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Happy Trails

Posted on December 21, 2020 by admin

We have always enjoyed walking on a good trail and if that trail also included lots of scenery and/or wildlife, all the better.  Even before the pandemic steered us towards more outdoor activities, we were trying out trails in Louisiana, where we spent must of the winter of 2019-2020.  The following is a list of some of the best  places we found  to hike.

The one thing you can almost be assured of finding on a swampy Louisiana trail is an alligator.  From tiny to huge, we saw a lot of them while walking in the back country.  The gators are in a hibernating state until mid-March, so they were lethargic and easy to spot when they crawled out on logs or banks to get some sun. We took a couple of boat rides into swamps where we could get fairly close to the big gators.

Baby alligators are quite docile, at least ones that have been handled, and we had the opportunity to hold a couple of them.

We were even brave enough to try eating alligator, on a stick, at the Louisiana State Fair. It was a very mild meat, kind of good as a matter of fact.

Lake Martin, in Breaux Bridge, was one of our favorite places to walk.

A well maintained, wide path around the lake was rarely used by anyone and we enjoyed spotting the many birds which lived there. Blue Herons and Egrets were permanent residents and fun to watch as they went about their daily lives.

 

And there was always one log where the young alligators could be found on a sunny day.

Jean Lafitte National Wildlife Refuge is south of New Orleans and we walked that area twice. The first time we visited we attended a ranger walk. The ranger walks are always interesting and full of details about the area and the creatures that live there; information that we would not normally know about if we walked it on our own.  Jean Lafitte is alive with mammals, birds and reptiles and is an easy walk on a well-maintained boardwalk.  We found snakes, owls, gators, nutria, lots of little green lizards…all kinds of  creatures. Spanish Moss hanging from the trees created such a nice backdrop on our walks.

Grand Isle State Park is a long drive south on winding roads to the Louisiana coast. We spent a week there, enjoying walks on the beach. A very friendly brown pelican was one of the highlights of our stay. We named him Harold and we met Harold when he walked right up to us on our way to the beach one day. He hung around for a day and then left again, hopefully on his way  to visit more pelicans.

 

A big rainstorm moved in one afternoon and left a huge area of water in the campground. A flock of White Ibis landed and spent quite a bit of time ‘fishing’ in the flooded area.

 

We found a very different kind of trail in NE Louisiana, at Poverty Point National Heritage site. This area boasts a huge earthen mound and surrounding smaller mound rows, all built  by ancient Native Americans.  A museum provides information about the history  of the land and people who lived there. Walking trails posted with sign boards dot the area. A good view of the very large site is available from the top of the largest mound.

 

Poverty Point was our last stop in Louisiana and we drove north into Arkansas on March 11, when  our lives were still not yet affected by COVID.

Our first trail in Arkansas was at the State Arboretum in El Dorado.  We spent quite a bit of time enjoying the spring blooming flowers, trees and bushes in this park right in the middle of civilization.

 

We decided to stay in Hot Springs, Arkansas, while the country was shutting down due to COVID. We first stayed in the Hot Springs National Park campground for 2 weeks and then moved to a private campground for 2 weeks. Each day that the weather allowed we walked the miles of trails in Hot Springs National Park.

We accessed the trails system from the park campground by crossing a small creek and then walking up a very steep path to connect with the trails.  This route only worked when it was not raining, rain would swell the creek and make the creek crossing inaccessible.

The other way to get to the trails was to drive to the town of Hot Springs and then into the park via a steep, curving road to the top of the hill. We ended up using this method every day once the National Park campground closed due to COVID.

We enjoyed watching spring arrive in the park during the month that we were there. At first the undergrowth was all brown, but by the end of our stay everything was green and the wildflowers were putting on a show.

The little creatures that inhabit the woods are always fun to spot.

 

The states started to open up again by the middle of April, so we began our journey northward. We found an interesting set of trails at Table Rocks State Park located just south of Branson, Missouri. There is an easy trail around a lake and steeper trails in the hills where we found lots of  waterfalls over very flat rock ledges. Dogwoods were in full bloom, and the birds, bees and butterflies were enjoying all of  the spring flowers.

 

We hope you have enjoyed viewing some of the great places we found to explore in the spring of 2020.

 

(View a larger image of each picture by clicking the picture. Use the back arrow to return.)

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Our summer in Montana

Posted on December 20, 2020 by admin

Our full time RVing has given us the opportunity to see many places in Montana that we have never seen before. We had done some camping around the state in prior years, but since we have been on the road we have found some really new and great places to camp.

The summer of 2020 was a bit different because of COVID.  Our style of camping has changed this year as we switched from looking for places of interest, like museums in more populated areas, to looking for more isolated areas that had lots of trails.

We had made reservations to be in Kalispell in July, so timed our drive north to be there at that time.   We decided to find new camping areas in Montana where we did not necessarily need to make reservations and we could be outside and walking easily.

We entered Montana on June 26, and headed for one of our favorite campgrounds: Downstream Campground at Fort Peck dam.

We could only stay 2 nights because the park was busy, but we took advantage of the nice nature trails around the campground.

From Glasgow, we headed for Billings where we had an appointment for the servicing of our motor home and we found a great campground along the Missouri: James Kipp.  James Kipp is a BLM, dry camping, no reservation campground.  It is located right next to the road which runs between Malta and Billings so it was a great overnight stop for us.

 

After Billings, we headed to Big Timber where the Grey Cliff prairie dog town is located. We found a small private campground outside of town to stay for a couple of nights. We enjoyed a fun  few hours watching the prairie dogs go about their busy lives. We also found Sandhill Cranes in the surrounding fields, which was great.

Then it was on to Fort Benton, a small town with so much history – it even has ties to Kalispell:  The Conrad brothers began their businesses there.

 

The county fairgrounds had a campground with a couple of full hook-up sites, which is always a bonus.

We found 2 good museums in town that required masks and were not crowded so we felt safe to once again enjoy museum visits. The  town maintains a river walk, which is dotted with displays, statues and information boards. We learned a lot about the town’s history as the last stop for boats coming up the river in the spring, before the railroads were built.

We also enjoyed the walking bridge over the Missouri.

From Fort Benton we headed north again, to south of Havre, and discovered Beaver Creek Park.  This park is dotted with campgrounds, most of them in wooded areas. We use solar panels, so we chose a large, wide-open boondocking spot beside a lake. We were on a hilltop, which we had all to ourselves for 5 days.

It was pretty warm and breezy most days, but we came to enjoy the breeze for cooling us and keeping the bugs down.  The area was huge and had lots of walking opportunities, including a river bottom that was full of birds, butterflies and flowers.

 

One day we took an auto trip through the park and found a hillside of beautiful wildflowers.

On our last afternoon in Beaver Creek Park, a truck pulled up to the boat ramp and released thousands of small fish into the lake. The seagulls spent the rest of the day ‘fishing’ the area.

We started heading west and drove to the west end of the Tiber Dam reservoir, which is another huge open area where we just picked out a spot along the water and made ourselves to home.

We enjoyed walking around various areas of the lake where sunflowers and grasses were in bloom.

A small gopher decided our car was his jungle gym and spent hours running, jumping and climbing on the tires and underside of the car.  We are lucky that it did not chew through anything!  We had a bunny take out our power steering once and another time something chewed a hole in the line for the windshield washer.

Once in Kalispell, we decided we needed some huckleberries, a summer treat for sure. Our first huckleberry expedition was to the North Fork on a sunny summer day. We did not find berries, but found so much scenery. After months of muddy rivers and streams in the southern areas of the U.S., the crystal-clear water of the North Fork was refreshing.

The next berry picking expedition was to Sylvia Lake, a spot where we used to camp in the summer.  We found enough berries to make a pie, which was our goal, and we got to spend the day in a gorgeous area.

Our longest hike in the Flathead was the Cliff Lake area, which has many trails crisscrossing it and covers many miles of hills, woods, meadows and lakes.

This year we discovered the FWP Sandhill Crane preserve, which is located just a few miles north of Kalispell. This is a new preserve created out of donated farmland which has historically  served as a resting spot for migrating Sandhill Cranes. The cranes can be spotted feeding in the fields and it is fun to take binoculars and watch them – they are rather majestic looking birds.

We had some spare time before we were ready to hit the road again and  so we decided to check out Lake Mary Ronan, a place that neither of us had visited before. It is a pretty lake with a state campground that has some reservable sites and some walk-in ones. We found a good spot to set up camp and then spent our mornings and evenings walking the nature trails all around the park, often seeing deer and lots of birds. It was quite hot, but we had a spot with electricity and shade trees so we were quite comfortable.

We returned to Kalispell after a pleasant stay and made plans for our upcoming year. We had originally planned to travel north and south with the seasons and keep moving eastward, but rethought that plan due to COVID. We decided instead to go back to the west coast where we could stay near the ocean and enjoy walks on the beaches.

Our last stop before leaving Montana was Dunn Creek Recreation Area, which is located a mile or so south of Libby Dam.  We chose a great spot to camp along the river and found a nearby closed-off road that was a great walking trail up to the dam.

During our stay at Dunn Creek, we drove to the swinging bridge and Kootenai Falls.  This area is gorgeous: the water is green and clear, the bridge offers a scenic walk across the river and the falls provided a wonderful backdrop where we sat on rocks and ate our picnic lunch.

On September 3rd, we drove into Idaho. As we left Montana, we realized that we had taken its gorgeous scenery for granted for so many years as we went about our lives before we retired.  Coming back into the state we have gained a new appreciation for all it has to offer.

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Life on the road during a global pandemic

Posted on July 12, 2020 by admin

We spent most of the winter of 2019/2020 crisscrossing Louisiana.  Lots of fun and interesting things to do and see in the state, so we had a great time.  Valentine’s Day on Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras was a once in a lifetime experience.

What we mean by that is, we are glad we did it but will probably never do that again.

 

 

 

 

The beginning of March saw us heading north to Arkansas for a visit to Hot Springs and then on to Little Rock  to see one of our favorite people, Cousin Marcy.  We were in Moro Bay, Arkansas, when we heard the news of the growing pandemic.  Like just about everyone else, we headed to the closest WalMart (about 20 miles away) for supplies.

  We found lots of empty shelves but were able to stock up on essentials (even some t. p.!).  Not a lot of storage space is available in our motorhome so hoarding is not an option for us.

On March 17th, we headed to Hot Springs National Park campground and found a great spot overlooking a small creek.  We stayed isolated in our coach except for daily hikes on the park trails.

 

 

 

We had been there for two weeks when the park closed due to the pandemic so we had to relocate to a private park just a few miles away.  The trails were still open so we continued to hike every day while isolating for another two weeks just outside of Hot Springs, AR.

We really wanted to visit with Marcy but, according to the experts, that would have been too risky. So, after a month in Hot Springs, we headed north again.

Like everyone else, Covid 19 changed our way of life. We took advantage of the ‘old people’s day’ at several WalMarts, shopping early on Tuesday mornings when most people were wearing masks.  Instead of looking for museums and other attractions to visit, our goal became finding out of the way places to hike and enjoy nature.  The only public places we went to were to a grocery store and to a laundromat every couple weeks.  We even purchased some new clothing items so we had enough clothes to last a couple weeks between washings. Gail pretty much disinfects an area of a laundromat before doing laundry.

For a while it was difficult to find open public parks, which usually have some kind of outdoor activity available, but they slowly opened up as summer approached.  By the time we got to the Dakotas, most parks were open. One of our favorite parks, Cross Ranch, allows us to park right along the Missouri River, near the area where the Lewis and Clark Expedition stopped twice.  The hiking trails are beautiful, the ticks plentiful, and an encounter with the resident bison is not unusual.

 

As we entered the summer months, we began to find museums that required masks to be worn.  If the place is not crowded, and everyone has a mask on, we feel it is ok to go inside. When we are done, we use lots of hand sanitizer until we can wash our hands thoroughly.

The main reason for this page is to reassure all our friends and family that we are well and taking all necessary precautions to protect ourselves and those we encounter.  We wear gloves and masks when we need to go inside any building.    We avoid crowds and no longer go out to eat.  If we do visit with other people, we do so outside, we wear masks, and practice social distancing.   We don’t want to be part of the problem, so we are taking precautions very seriously.  We certainly don’t want to infect any of our friends and family.

 

 

 

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Home is where we park it

Posted on June 13, 2020 by admin

“Home is where we park it” is a term often used by folks who live full time in RV’s.  As full timers, we have a number of choices where we can park it: commercial or private RV Parks and resorts, public parks such as national parks, state, county, Army Corps Of Engineers parks, and even some city parks, and also boon-docking or dispersed camping on public land.

Private RV parks are popular since they are most often located close to highways and attractions.  They usually have full hookups (hookups: water, sewer, electric, sometimes cable TV and even possibly WiFi, though the WiFi is most often not very good).  Private RV parks run the gamut from simple gravel lots with hook ups to paved communities with lovely landscaping, community centers, fitness centers, laundry facilities, pool and hot tub and even well stocked stores.

Private RV parks can sometimes offer a community experience with pot luck dinners, club and sports activities, community centers with a band or Karaoke, and sometimes even dances.

 

 

Public parks often feel more like a camping experience than in the private parks.  Sites can range from “primitive” to sites with full hookups.  There is usually a dump station located in the park where holding tanks can be emptied and water tanks can be refilled, if those things are not available at each site.

While we have experienced city parks, county parks and even county fairgrounds within city limits, most public parks are usually located out in a country setting.  We really like that these parks are often in woodlands near lakes and rivers and have nice hiking trails.  This is where we have taken some of our best wildlife and landscape photographs.

 

 

Boondocks/ rough, remote, or isolated country.

There are those that refer to spending the night in a Walmart parking lot as boondocking.  Parking in a parking lot is known as “lot docking”.  Parking in the yard of friend or family is known as “mooch docking”.  Boondocking is really parking out in the wild, or boondocks, usually on public land such as BLM land.

Before we hit the road we installed solar panels and solar charging equipment on the coach so that we have sufficient electricity when off grid.  The coach has a large propane tank so we can run the furnace, stove/oven, fridge (with ice maker) and water heater for quite a while.  The biggest limiting factor to our boondocking is water.  We carry about 100 gallons so, if we are conservative, we can stay out in the wild for a couple weeks.

We found a fair amount of BLM land in the deserts of the south west and even found open beaches on the Gulf Coast.  There is something quite special about being isolated and able to step out our front door and enjoy a hike in wilderness or on the beach.  We developed a great appreciation for the desert, its flora, fauna and landscape.  And falling asleep and waking to the sound of waves crashing on the beach is something we will never forget.

 

Travel day in a motorhome is part of the adventure.  We sit as high above the road as the big rig drivers and the whole front of our coach is a windshield, so we have a great view of the world as we travel the back roads of America.  Sometimes we have been able to stop to enjoy an attraction such as a museum or visit the world’s largest ball of twine on travel day.

 

 

 

 

 

Even stopping for lunch can be a memorable experience.

 

 

 

Everywhere we’ve been, we have found things to appreciate and enjoy.  Hopefully we will be able to continue to explore the wonders of our country and share them with you for some time to come.

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Photography

Posted on December 19, 2019 by admin

We have a number of friends and family members that are interested in photography so we thought we might create a page to describe the evolution of our photography and the equipment we are using as we travel.

When first we hit the road, Gail was using her Samsung S7 phone to document our travels while Bruce was using the Sony Cybershot DSC-P200 compact camera that we had been using for almost 20 years.  The phone takes surprisingly good photos and the Sony does quite well too but they each have limitations.

As those of you that rely on your phone camera to take pictures already know, it can sometimes be quite difficult to see the screen, so composing the shot can be challenging.  With compact cameras such as the Cybershot, they tend to pump dirt and dust into their insides every time they are turned on and off. After a while, spots and smudges will start to appear in pictures as the sensor gets dirty.  As you can clearly see in this photo, this happened soon after we started our adventures.

The only fix is take the camera apart and clean the sensor, which is what Bruce did soon after this picture was taken.  We were using the camera a lot and quite often in dusty, dirty conditions, so it didn’t take long for new spots to appear on our pictures.  The decision was made to buy another inexpensive camera just before we went the see the Spruce Goose in Oregon.  Now we had two compact cameras that we could use in rotation and clean as necessary.  The hope was that we would always have a usable camera.

Compact cameras are really nice since they can easily slip into the pocket.  Given the dirt issue and the limitations of this type of camera, we started to consider upgrading to a DSLR.  So many times Bruce emphatically stated that he didn’t want to spent his day lugging around a big camera and lenses.

All that started to change as we got more interested in birding.  We needed a good camera and lenses to really enjoy that.  So we ordered a kit with the Nikon D5600 camera.  Included with this kit was a 18-55 mm, f/3.5-5.6 lens and a 70-300 mm, f/4-5.6 telephoto, among other incidental accessories.  This really got us going on birding and wildlife photography and all seemed well until the day we set up our gear to photograph a herd of elk in Yellowstone National Park and a lady set up next to us using a 150-600 mm telephoto lens.  Given the opportunity for a side by side comparison of our 300 mm lens to her 600 mm lens, we were suddenly in the market for a 600 mm lens.

So now we had added a Tamron 150-600 mm, f/5-6.3 lens to our camera bag.  Then came a 1.4 teleconverter that, when used with the 600 mm lens, creates an effective focal length of 850 mm.  Now we are able to get up close and personal with wildlife subjects.

The ability to use different lenses is what makes this type of camera so versatile.  But changing lenses can be a bit challenging out in the field so when our cousin Tom introduced us to his new Nikon 18 mm to 300 mm telephoto lens we knew this lens would be very useful for the birding, wildlife and landscape photography that we enjoy.  Thanks to Amazon, we had another new lens within a couple days.

There is one more piece of photographic equipment worth mentioning.  We have a DJI Phantom 4 drone with a 4 K camera.  This little guy has given us an aerial view of some incredible places.

On December 14 2019, Bruce attended a photography workshop at Magnolia Plantation near Natchitoches (pronounced Nack-a-dish) LA.  The workshop was sponsored by the National Park Service and hosted by art teacher and professional photographer Annabel Jones.  Bruce said that his main takeaway from the workshop is that he still has a great deal to learn about photography.

 

 

 

Three of the remaining slave quarters at Magnolia Plantation.

We are having having a really nice time discovering some of the amazing sights this country has to offer. We hope to share with you some of what we see through our photography.  Enjoy.

 

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Our winter in Texas, Part 6

Posted on May 27, 2019 by admin

We retraced our route and headed back to Corpus Christi and then further east to Goose Island, a state park which is situated directly across a bay from Port Aransas, the small town where we began our Gulf Coast adventures in January.

Goose Island is the winter home to Whooping Cranes, who summer near the Arctic Circle,  and the cranes are one of the reasons that people come to this area.  The park provided 3 docent-led bird walks, which we attended.  Fog was a pretty constant part of the day there, but we did manage to see all kinds of  birds.

 

Goose Island is  home to The Big Tree, a 1,000+ year old oak tree that has somehow survived natural and man-made disasters and is still in pretty good shape.

 

On our last bird walk we were privileged to witness what must have been a feeding frenzy of some kind.  A small body of water had one of the highest concentrations of bird species in one area that we have seen.  We watched in awe as we tried to pick out all the birds,  and then just as quickly as the birds gathered they all flew or swam away.  Whooping Cranes even joined in the group.  In the first picture a crane is in the back right corner and it gives you some perspective of the size of these birds.  Later we saw a family of cranes flying over us. A group of three cranes includes last year’s baby which has not been sent off on its own yet.

 

We signed up for a Whooping Crane boat expedition which took us to the edge of the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, a  crane wintering area. The day started out with the usual heavy fog, really heavy fog.

 

We drove around for about 3 hours and finally the fog lifted enough to for us to find Whoopers, and one pair gave us a rare treat.  The cranes mate in April after they have migrated north, but one couple decided to start practicing the mating dance a bit early and put on a nice show for us.  The 3 hours of foggy wandering was worth it!

Of course, there were other interesting birds to look at that day, like the Long-billed Curlew:

 

 

 

 

Back at Goose Island, the pelicans lined up for handouts at the fish cleaning station:

 

 

 

 

Oysters are a big business on Goose Island, and the empty shells are saved all year in huge piles around town. In the spring, the shells are bagged and placed in the water to create a good environment for new oysters to mature.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Turkey buzzards soaring overhead are quite a  common sight, and although it is not nice to pass judgement,  the turkey buzzard has to be one of the non-prettiest birds around! This one was wet from the fog, which did not improve its looks.

 

 

 

 

And then it was time to keep moving on, to Galveston.  Before we started traveling around Texas, we did not realize that Galveston was an island, and quite a popular island as it turned out.  We arrived before spring break, when the traffic was not too heavy and we could easily get around town.  We left a couple days after spring break started and it was quite a different place.

Our first stop on the island was the Elissa, a restored iron barque (3 mast)  ship built in 1878 in Aberdeen, Scotland and used as a merchant marine vessel for almost 100 years.  The ship stopped in Galveston twice during that time, and once brought bananas from South America into port. We watched the people doing maintenance on the ship’s masts with a bit of awe.

 

Next stop was a duck boat tour of Galveston where we were able to see some nice homes in town and on the water.

 

 

 

We also visited the Rain Forest pavilion, where birds and monkeys roamed free while the bats and other critters were more contained.

 

 

 

Galveston was our last chance to visit the beaches of the Texas Gulf Coast.  We stayed on the west end of the island, in an RV park which was across the street from the beach and where the colorful houses were built on stilts to stay above flood waters.  The nice beaches were less crowded and there were always birds to enjoy.

 

On March 11, after more than 2 months on or near the Gulf Coast, we made a hard left turn and headed for Houston.

 

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Our winter in Texas, Part 5

Posted on May 25, 2019 by admin

Harlingen, Texas, is the home of the original plaster model  used to create the Iwo Jima War Memorial which is on display at Arlington Cemetery. The plaster has been treated to withstand the weather and the dry Texas climate is ideal for it.  The model is in a small park that also houses an Iwo Jima museum. The statue is huge and the details are very impressive.

 

 

 

 

 

We visited two more birding centers during our stay in Los Fresnos and these are a few of our favorite birds:

Gail’s favorite, the Spoonbill and a Crested Caracara:

 

The flashy little Vermilion Flycatcher and the Anhinga:

 

 

Yellow-throated Warbler and Yellow-crowned Night Heron:

 

We visited the site of the last battle of the Civil War, Palmito Ranch.  It is now a quiet farm field with some story boards to explain the battle.  The battle was fought more than a month after the end of the Civil War, and there are several theories as to why the Union general chose to attack when he knew that Lee had surrendered. There were more than 100 unnecessary casualties and the Confederate army won the battle.

 

 

 

 

Our last day in Los Fresnos was February 25; it was time to start heading north again.  We wanted to cram in as much as we could so we visited a small beach close to the Mexican border that we had not been to before.  On the return drive, we went through an immigration checkpoint and one of the officials told us about a nearby sanctuary that was known for its birds.  We decided to check it out and we are so glad we did.  The bird watching was pretty minimal but the area was wonderful.

Sabal Palm Sanctuary is a former plantation on the banks of the Rio Grande.  The Queen Anne style home, built in 1892, is well preserved.  The grounds are nicely maintained and there are trails through the palm trees to the Rio Grande.  Hanging moss and thick undergrowth line the trails and it is like stepping back in time. Sabal Palms are the only palm trees which are native to Texas.

 

 

 

 

 

The last place we visited that day was Oliveira Park in Brownsville, which is a roosting spot for a flock of wild parrots.  The parrots come in at dusk and make such racket! The park is used by neighborhood kids for all kinds of activities and the sounds of kids playing  sports and parrots calling to each other filled the warm night air.

 

short parrots

Click the link to hear a short clip of the noisy parrots. It might take a bit to load the clip on your system.

 

 

The day was a perfect end to our stay in south Texas.

More to come as we head north.

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Our winter in Texas, Part 4

Posted on May 19, 2019 by admin

Los Fresnos became our most southward RV site and we stopped there because of its central location to many interesting areas to visit.  Two important battlefields are located nearby as well as South Padre Island and several major birding areas.

Palo Alto Battlefield National Historic Park is the site of a May 8, 1846 conflict between the United States and Mexico. This was the first major battle in the dispute that soon turned into the Mexican-American war, fought over where the border between the two countries should be drawn.  There is a museum and a paved path around the battleground.

 

 

 

 

 

But, of course, we found interesting birds to photograph while there.

 

We went to South Padre Island several times and found it to be nothing like the north end of the island. The south end is a populated town and a big tourist area, and we are so glad we got to experience the north end with its miles of uninhabited beach.

There are lots of birds to watch in the South Padre Island Birding Center, which has a boardwalk out to the edge of the ocean: (Black-necked Stilt below)

 

We have seen Coots all over, but did not know what their feet looked like until we saw them walking on land.  The Coots and Gallinule get our vote for ‘Most Interesting Bird Feet’:

Black-bellied Whistling Duck and Green Heron:

 

White Ibis and, Gail’s favorite, Roseate Spoonbill

Next door to the Birding Center is Sea Turtle Inc, an organization that rescues sea turtles in distress and returns them to the ocean, if possible.  Some turtles have injuries that do not allow them to be released, and those guys get big tanks to live in.  Some turtles have even been fitted with prosthetic flippers so that they can swim again.

 

South Padre Island also has a Sandcastle Trail.  The visitor center has  outdoor and indoor  sandcastles on display to start the trail and then various business around town have created their own sandcastles.

 

We did walk on the beach a couple of times ….can’t pass up a beach.  On our last beach walk on South Padre, we met a WWII pilot and his wife, in their 90’s, taking their daily stroll.  Pretty amazing to get to talk to them.  We also found several Portuguese man o’ war washed up on this beach.  They are beautiful,  but very toxic.

 

We visited Brownsville several times and enjoyed visiting the Historic Brownsville Museum, housed in a 1920’s Spanish-colonial train depot:

 

More to follow.

 

 

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