Our RV Adventures

Today started out slow but ended up being fairly busy.

My first job was to get outside and caulk the roof seam right over the window next to my computer desk. We’ve had a lot of rain since we got here at Galveston Bay RV Park right before Thanksgiving. And during the last several downfalls, I’ve started to get some water leaking in down the inside of the window.

So I got out my ladder and my trusty caulk gun and went at it. The seam I was trying to seal is where the roof rolls down and meets the vertical side. I had caulk part of this a couple of years ago, but as it turned out it was a length of the original caulk that had a lot of voids and holes in it. I caulked about 2 feet of the seam, and we’ll see how it does over the next several days.

The reason I wanted to get the problem fixed today is that we’re expecting 4 days of solid rain.

My next task was to call Westland Sales out in Clackamas, OR. I need a new door switch for our Splendide washer/dryer. Lately it has developed an intermittent problem of not wanting to open at the end of wash or dry cycle. Sometimes it will open immediately, sometimes it takes overnight.

So a new switch was needed. When I talked to Westland, the tech said it’s a known problem with this model and he was surprised it lasted this long. A new one will be about $80 and will go out First Class today. I always have gotten great service from Westland.

Luckily I will be able to replace the switch from the front and won’t have to pull the washer out of the cabinet.

About 3:30 Jan and I headed out for dinner and some errands. Our first stop was at a local feed store where we were finally able to find Jan some deer corn. Or at least we will find it there when we go back tomorrow afternoon after their shipment comes in. So hopefully that is taken care of.

Our next stop was at the TGI Friday’s across the Interstate from Baybrook Mall. We haven’t been there for several years and thought we’d try it again. Don’t know why we haven’t been back more. We’ve always enjoyed it and this time was no exception.

Then it was right down the road to the Home Depot for a return. When I bought caulk last week, I thought I was buying one tube of clear and one of white, but ended up with two of white. Guess they were mixed up in the bins

Our last stop was at Kroger’s. Jan’s going to make a big batch of veggie soup tomorrow and wanted to get a fresh onion and some garlic, along with a few other things.

Hot soup sounds great for these next few cold rainy days.

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Thought for the Day:

"It is virtually impossible to clean the pond as long as the pigs are still crapping in it"

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Here’s a repost of our visit to Thermopolis, WY in 2011, and our tour of a fantastic dinosaur museum.

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Dinosaurus . . .

Originally posted on July 23, 2011

After coffee and bagels we headed over to Al and Adrienne’s a little before 10 am to pick them up at their rig. Then it was off for the 85 mile trip south to Thermopolis, WY.

Arriving there, our first stop was lunch at Lil’ Wrangler Family Restaurant. Al and Adrienne had eaten here a while back and said it was really good. And they were right. Hamburgers made with 1/2 pound hand-formed patties of fresh ground beef.

Really good.

After lunch we headed over to the object of our trip, The Wyoming Dinosaur Center, the largest privately-funded dinosaur research center in the world. And the only one to have excavations in progress on their own property.

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This is a cast of an ocean bottom containing hundreds of echinoderms, relatives to today’s sea stars and sand dollars. This fossil is about 300 million years old.

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This is a pterosaur, one of the earliest flying dinosaurs. Although this one is about the size of crow, other species had wingspans as large as 30 feet.

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A Dimetrodon.

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Archaeopteryx is considered the first bird, since it had feathers. There are only ten specimens of this dinosaur in the world, and this is the only one in America.

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A cousin to the Stegosaurus.

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Two meat eaters in combat.

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A Protoceratops.

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A type of Ankylosaurus.

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Triceratops.

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Allosaurus, cousin of T’Rex.

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A nest of baby duckbills,

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And their mama.

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Albertaceratops.

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An Ichthyosaur, the ‘fish lizard’.

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This is Jimbo, so big I couldn’t get him all in one photo. A 106 foot long Supersaurus, he’s one of the largest fossils in existence.

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At 2 pm we all loaded in a tour bus and were taken about 5 miles out in the country to an active dig site. In the last 20 years 17 dinosaur skeletons have been excavated from here.

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These next two photos show the remains of an Allosaurus that they have been working on for 5 years, and it may take them another 15 years to remove it completely.

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In the wintertime, this large excavation pit is completely filled in with dirt to protect the dinosaur bones from freezing and cracking.

Next we were taken over to a large open excavation under the shed. The bones, mostly of plant-eaters, are lying around on the surface.

Because of the jumble of chewed-on bones, they think this was a kill-site where baby meat-eaters were fed.

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Outlined in red paint, this is the footprint of a large Allosaurus.

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And this is the footprint of a large plant-eating dinosaur. This is the only known location where both dinosaur footprints and fossils are found in the same area.

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We really enjoyed our time at the Dinosaur Center, and it’s well-recommended. The displays are all top-notch, and very well done.

Leaving the Center, we drove up into the country behind the Hot Springs State Park just admiring the many unique rock formations, and rich colors.

The many hot springs in the area have been a tourist attraction since the late 1800’s, and are considered the largest mineral hot springs in the world.

Just how mineralized the water is can be shown by these ‘travertine beehives’.

A 8 foot pipe is stuck in the ground over a hot spring. The mineral-laden water flows out the top of the pipe and down the side, leaving the mineral deposits behind on the pipe. It slowly builds up and expands, creating these rock-hard ‘domes’. As the dome grows, more pipe is installed on top as necessary.

After another great day of exploring, we got back to Cody a little before 6, and after dropping off Al and Adrienne at their rig, we came back home, tired but having had a great time.

A little before 7 pm, we walked a few rows over to Lu and Larry Tillotson’s, readers of our blog who discovered we were in the same park and wanted to meet us.

We had a great time getting to know them and talking over some of our experiences in traveling fulltime. They’ve been on the road for 8 years now, still enjoying the RV life. Hopefully we’ll cross paths again soon.

And tomorrow . . . ?

Nothing, I hope. It’s time for a rest-up day.

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Thought for the day:

"The word bipartisan means some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out." – George Carlin

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In case you missed the premiere of the new season of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo tonight, it will be shown again later this week.

Jan and I decided on an early breakfast this morning so we headed up to the IHOP in Kemah. You have to pick your time going there on Sunday otherwise you can have a long wait, but we lucked out and got seated immediately.

Afterwards we make another futile attempt to buy deer corn at the Home Depot right next door.

Later in the afternoon I felt a nap coming on, so I was able to put those two hours to good use.

That was about it for today. We had the usual sun, clouds, rain, & wind types of weather today so it was nice to just stay home.

Since this is another short blog I thought I’d repost our visit to the DeYoung Family Zoo in Wallace, MI in 2011.

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Thought for the Day:

“I am only responsible for what I say. Not for what you understand”

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DeYoung Family Zoo . . .

Originally posted on August 7, 2011

When I went to bed last night I still didn’t know if we were going to make the trip this morning up to Wallace, MI about 100 miles away, to visit the DeYoung Family Zoo.

The weather was showing a 60% chance of thunderstorms last night, but it was supposed to be clear on Monday. So we could wait til then if necessary.

But when I checked it about 5 am, it was down to 50% chance, and by 8 it was 40%. So we decided to give it go since it looked like things were improving. And it turned out to be a beautiful day, lucky for us.

We headed out a little after 9, stopping in Shawano for Egg Muffins and coffee, and then gas. We got to the park about 11:30, and it was all we hoped it would be.

The DeYoung Family Zoo is owned by Bud and Carrie DeYoung, and has been featured for several years on the Nat Geo Wild channel as “My Life is a Zoo”.

Since we love small zoos and animal parks, it has been on our bucket list for a couple of years.

Just this year along we’ve visited places like Bearizona in Williams, AZ, Out of Africa in Camp Verde, AZ, Cat Tales Zoological Park north of Spokane, WA, and the Rooster Cogburn Ostrich Ranch between Tucson and Phoenix, AZ.

One of the first things we encountered was the petting zoo area where Jan tried her hand at feeding the goats.

They had a real mix of animals in this area, including alpacas,

and a zhorse, or zorse, a zebra/horse cross.

First off, you have no idea how hard I resisted saying something about “Lions, and Tigers, and Bears.”

Oh, wait. I just did. Sorry.

They have a little bit of everything here. I’m really just hitting some of the highlights.

One thing we both liked at this zoo was the fact that it wasn’t just all sterile concrete and moats. The animal’s habitats were large and natural-looking, like this grizzly cage.

They have over 400 animals here, and most of them are rescues of one sort or another, including these two beautiful cats.

A little while after we got there it was feeding time for the meat eaters. Here’s Bud flinging a chunk of cow over the fence to the waiting White Tiger below.

Although I could never get a picture of it, when the meat is thrown over the fence, the tigers leap up about 10 feet and catch it in mid-air.

Carrie said they go through three cows a DAY to feed the animals.

They have a new baby hippo who’s in a temporary facility,

until her new pool is ready. Very nice.

Here’s Carrie in the cage and talking about the different breeds of wolves they have.

These are Dingos, the Australian wild dogs, of “The Dingo Ate My Baby” fame, although these are like pets, and kids were hand-feeding them dog biscuits from the box.

This mother hyena is taking her cub back to the den after it got too close to the fence and the crowd of people around.

Besides the baby hippo, there were a lot of other, smaller babies that we could pet, hold, or feed.

This is a baby Wallaby, a type of kangaroo.

And here’s a very young monkey being feed by a little girl.

And here’s a Stripped Hyena, one of Carrie’s favorites, who really likes to be held and cuddled.

Bud came out with these two somewhat older baby monkeys that really entertained the crowd with their antics.

The last area we visited was the reptile exhibit with this Monitor Lizard just hanging out.

Bud and Carrie have really put a lot of work into this place and it shows.

As I said, I just skimmed the surface of what there is to see here. Check it out if you’re in the area.

We left the park about 2:30 and headed home, stopping for dinner at the Cottage Diner in Cecil, WI, about 25 miles from the rig.

We got back about 5:45 and settled in for the night. Tomorrow we’ll head south about 200 miles to Janesville, WI for one night, then Normal, IL for one night, before ending up in Vandalia, IL at Jan’s sister’s house on Wednesday for our family reunion. Brandi, Lowell, and Landon will be in on Thursday.

We can’t wait.

Unfortunately it looks like Chis, Linda, and Piper won’t be able to come. They will be missed.

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Thought for the Day:

Freedom is the freedom to discipline yourself so others don’t have to do it for you.

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