18 Aug 2024 - It is Done! Arrived at Home + Final Stats

 

2024 travels are in the books.  We departed our campground in Missouri at 0800 hrs this morning and headed northbound on Hwy 61, which is a beautiful chunk of concrete.  There was hardly any traffic on it and that did not suck.  

This was our view a good part of the day.

Soon we were so near Iowa you could see our mountains.... of gravel and sand LOL.  

It was great to be back in our home State of Iowa, even though we were here a bit sooner than planned.  That is OK, though.  The name of the game is flexibility.  The moto of our great United States Marine Corps is "Semper Fidelis" - always faithful.  The moto of our United States Coast Guard is "Semper Paratus"  - always ready!  The moto I learned while serving over 42 years in the United States Air Force and Air National Guard is "Semper Gumby" - always flexible!  Stuff happens.  You have to be ready to "Improvise, adapt, and overcome". There is nothing more important than our health.  So it was an easy decision to terminate our trip and head north to Iowa.  Doreen will be connecting with her primary care physician early this week and coming up with a game plan.  

And yes, Facebook deleted our post that explained our change in plans,.  I am so very close to being totally done with this Communist platform.  Their bullshit algorithms delete perfectly innocent posts for no reason.  Social media or socialism media?  

So we arrived at Griff's Valleyview RV Park at 1241 hrs after traveling 245 miles.  We unhooked, leveled and then commenced with unloading.  We took a full load home and then came back with the car and the truck, and then loaded them both completely.  At home, we unloaded all that stuff and now we are D.U.N done.  Doreen and I are both shot.  But unfortunately there is no relief in sight.  We snuck into to a site at Griffs only because someone vacated it for a few day, duration unknown.  So tomorrow will be full speed ahead with the work I need to do on the coach before it goes into storage.

Thank you to everyone who we reconnected with during this trip.  Thank you to Alliance for building a solid coach and for the huge FamAlly we have joined!  And a huge thanks to our son Dan Schellhase who stops by our house weekly if not more often to make sure everything is OK on the home front. We could not do this without him!  

Thanks to all who followed along with us with the blog.  Writing a blog every night is a lot of work not to mention editing and cropping the pictures, and shrinking them so they will upload efficiently.  You are getting it uncut and unfiltered - what happens along the way you are reading about.  And now we are done, except for the final stats (below), and we "stick a fork in it"!  It's done!

Next year's travels are still being planned.  We have a couple grand children's high school graduations to schedule in there, so, again, SEMPER GUMBY!

 Final Stats:  This is campground #37 of 37 

# States Traveled Through So Far This Trip, in order: 35 (IA, MO, KS, OK, TX, AR, MO, IL, IN, OH, PA, NY, VT, NH, ME, MA, CT, NY, PA, MD, WV, VA, TN, NC, TN, GA, TN, GA, TN, AL, MS, TN, AR, MO, IA)  

# States left to visit on this trip: 0 ( )

Baseball Parks Visited So Far This Trip:  2 (Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark, Oklahoma City OK; Texas A&M Olsen Field at Blue Bell Park)

Lighthouses visited:  13 (Olcott Lighthouse, Thirty Mile Point Lighthouse, Old Orchard Lighthouse, Tibbetts Point Lighthouse, Rock Island Lighthouse, Whitlock Mill Lighthouse, Mulholland Lighthouse, Lubec Channel Light, West Quoddy Head Light, Portland Head Light, Ram Island Ledge Light, Cape Elizabeth Light East, Cape Elizabeth Light West

Lighthouses climbed:  1

Point to point travel miles:  7778 miles 

  - Avg point to point travel miles between campgrounds:  199 miles

Vicinity miles:  4434 miles 

  - Avg vicinity miles:  120 miles

Total miles driven:  12212 miles 

Total point to point driving time:  161 hrs 27 minutes

Total diesel fuel purchased: 1110.141 gals 

Total diesel fuel cost:  $4101.92 

Average diesel fuel cost/gal:  $3.709

Max diesel fuel cost:  $4.499 (Wilson NY) 

Min diesel fuel cost:  $3.059 (Tupelo MS) <New>

Avg MPG:  11.55 miles/gal

Cost/mi of operation:  $0.34

# Nights at end of this stay:  156 (Includes Griff's start)

Total lodging cost:  $7442.35  (includes Griff's start)

Average cost/night:  $47.71

17 Aug 2024 - Arrived at Meadow Campground & Coffee House in New London MO

 

This morning we departed Sikeston MO at 0839 hrs and headed up I-55 towards St Louis.  We took the bypass around the west side and then headed north on Hwy 61, stopping a couple times along the way. 

I-55 Bridge over the Mississippi River 

We stopped for fuel at a Casey's a couple miles from our campground and then at 1310 hrs and 240 miles later we landed at Meadow Campground and Coffee House.  

Check-in was painless in the coffee house thanks to Lydia behind the counter and we arrived at our site.  

This campground caters to kayakers apparently.  There is a nearby river and they shuttle you to or from with the kayak.  We are only here overnight, so none of that for us this trip.

Nothing else.  We are making our lists and checking them twice LOL.  Prepping for our arrival back home.  Got the car insurance turned back on yesterday  Doreen is planning what has to go one the first load to the house, etc.  It is a production to set it all in motion in the Spring, and it is as much work to "unscrew" it in the fall when we return.  We are just a month ahead of what we had planned. That's OK.  It will all come together.  First of the week we will get with Doreen's primary care physician and get the wheels in motion on whatever he determines is next as far as testing.

That's it here.  I'm not sure when I will be making the final post.  Tomorrow when we get back home there will likely not be any time.  In the mean time, thanks again to everyone that follows along and has given us a shout out here recently.  We are so fortunate to have great friends who care!

16 Aug 2024 - Arrived at Hinton RV Park in Sikeston MO

 

First, thank you to everyone who called, texted, messaged and posted on Facebook.  I apologize with my terse blog post last night.  I did not intend to start a bunch of drama with it.  It is not unusual that I am up late editing pictures and doing the blog.  Doreen and Liberty usually turn in while I am still plugging away.  I had not talked to her about what she wanted me to say, so I chose to just mention that we were changing plans.  With Doreen's permission, here is a bit more info:

Wednesday night into Thursday morning Doreen noticed some unusual tightness/pain in her chest. She has absolutely no history and there was nothing she could think to contribute it to, and after discussion we felt the best thing to do was to get it checked. She was not having any of the other classic "cardiac" symptoms such as shortness of breath, diaphoresis, etc and the pain was not radiating, but it was still an unknown chest pain.  A stop at an urgent care would be immediately referred to a hospital likely via ambulance, so we bypassed that and went straight to the Northern Mississippi Medical Center Emergency Department in Tupelo.  Over about six hours they ran all the normal tests to include an EKG, chest Xray, CT scan, bloodwork, etc and everything came back negative.  The ER doc recommended we get with her primary care physician back home,  and a cardiac workup with stress test would likely be in order.  I mentioned that we were about a month out from being home if nothing changed, and he did not think it should wait that long.  So we talked about it and both agreed to "pull the plug" on the remainder of the trip.  

So within a few hours I was able to cancel the remaining reservations and even receive refunds for the deposits, and I found available campgrounds spaced such to get us home.  Most importantly I was able to find us a "landing spot" at home, since we cannot take our coach to our sticks and bricks.  

While I was working this, our Alliance friends Ralph and Lindy from Georgia arrived in our campground with their Alliance fifth wheel on their way home from an Alaska journey.  I was hoping to "sit around the campfire" and hear all about their trip.  We will have to make that another time... 

 

So today at 0818 hrs we said goodbye to Ralph and Lindy leaving our Natchez Trace RV Park one day earlier than planned, and traveled from Tupelo to Sikeston MO.  That town may sound familiar as it is one of the homes of Lambert's Cafe, home of the "throwed rolls"!  More about that later.  Well that was convenient!  We visited Lambert's in Foley AL and had this on our Google Maps radar.

The trip up from Tupelo was uneventful, about 267 miles which is a comfortable day for us.  We had to drive through Memphis and the construction there, so that was painful, but once past Memphis it was a straight shot up to Missouri.  

We arrived here at 1304 hrs, set up quickly and cranked up the A/C.  Temps at Tupelo were 96 yesterday, and today we reached 92 here with high humidity.

Since we missed lunch we had an early dinner at Lambert's.  This place is fun and the home cooking-style food is great.  It was started by Earl and Agnes Lambert in 1942.  As mentioned before, their claim to fame is their "throwed rolls".  We were seated quickly but they were very busy.  

We were quickly greeted by several servers.  The first one took our drink order, and as we were waiting for our unsweeted ice tea another stopped with (free) fried okra appetizer.  At the same time the "throwed rolls" guy came around and offered up hot, delicious yeast rolls.  They will throw these from across the room to you, but he happened to be right near our table, so we took them there.  

Look at the okra and they huge yeast roll!!  That is ONE roll!

They also come around with molasses and apple butter for your throwed rolls.  

A "throwed roll" in flight, from clear across the room!!

Doreen ordered roasted chicken with cucumbers and onions in vinegar, and cole slaw.  I ordered something I don't normally get at home - beef liver and onions!!  My sides were turnip greens and potato salad.  

So the meal was delicious and fun.  If you are ever in the Sikeston MO area or the Foley AL area, you will not be disappointed at Lambert's!

Tonight we watched the Indiana Fever (WNBA) win their first game since the Olympic break.  Caitlin Clark had a great game, with another double-double!  So fun to watch her and Kate Martin, a couple University of Iowa greats!

Tomorrow we pull chocks and travel north past St Louis to the Meadow Campground and Coffee House near New London MO.  

15 Aug 2024 - Change of Plans

 No pictures today.  Due to circumstances beyond anyone's control we will be headed home tomorrow.  I was able to get all of our remaining reservations cancelled and refunds for all deposits.  Then I got new reservations in Sikeston MO for tomorrow night, New London MO for Saturday night, and home on Sunday.  

14 Aug 2024 - Toyota Factory Tour; Vietnam Veteran's Replica Wall; Elvis Presley's Birthplace

 

We started the morning bright and early at the Toyota Mississippi Experience Center in Blue Springs MS, which is the company that manages the contract for customer tours at the Toyota factory.  Many months ago I got ahold of them and reserved seats on a tour for today.  We've learned, sometimes the hard way. that you cannot necessarily walk up to these places and get a seat.  So was the case this morning as we waited for our tour.  A gentleman just showed up and was upset because he could not get in today.  

We arrived at about 30 minutes before our scheduled tour time, and after a short "in-processing" by very friendly staff, we walked around the "Experience Center" where there are various displays relating to the Toyota factory here, and the Toyota Corolla that they manufacture.  The rules here are very strict.  You can take pictures in the Experience Center, but one we launch out on the tour you cannot even take a cell phone or camera, or any sort of bag.  They offer lockers to store your items in.

Toyota announced on February 27, 2007, that it would build its fourteenth North American plant in Blue Springs, Mississippi.  They broke ground soon after, but the economy collapsed so it was put on hold until June 2010 and then it came online in October 2011 Which Toyota vehicle it was going to be producing changed a few times but it was finally decided it would be the Corolla, which is what is made here today. The plant is capable of producing 700 cars/day but in 2022 they produced 132,684.

Here are a few pictures from the Experience Center while we waited for our tour time to arrive:

1969 Toyota Corolla 2dr Sedan

1958 Toyopet Crown Deluxe

1976 Toyota Corolla

The 2016 50th anniversary edition (1966-2016) signed by everyone on the line.

Many of the displays here focused on the history of Toyota and what they are doing in their factories as far as automation, recycling and to protect the environment.  Soon our tour departed by shuttle bus and we arrived at the factory.  

<Note:  Any pictures from here on were taken in the Experience Center>  Since we could not take pictures inside the factory, the following are random thoughts of mine which are in no special order.  This places was freaking unbelievable!  I had never seen a car factory before, and have never seen an operation that is so automated.  So I was overwhelmed!

We got off the shuttle and proceeded into the factory where we boarded a tram.  There were seven total on our tram.  We each wore safety glasses and a headset that received audio from our tour guide.  The factory was noisy so this really helped.  Our tram took off and we then stayed in a specific lane in the aisleways that was shared with self-propelled robots called Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV).  These vehicles ferry parts to members on the production line.  They have lights on them to indicate what they are doing, and they even play songs if they detect an issue.  There is a huge parts staging area where they maintain two days parts there only.  So the parts are "just in time" numbers only.  The sheet metal panels (fenders, quarter panels, hoods, deck lids, inner fender wells, floor pans, etc etc are stamped here.  

All the panel assembly and many other operations is by COBOT, which is a collaboration + robot.  

A tiny sample of what a COBOT looks like

We saw COBOT operations everywhere.  COBOTS perform all the welding with precious to 1/10th of an inch.  The vehicles being built are a long ways down the production line before they are first touched by a human.  As the vehicles move along, COBOTS move them from the lower level to an upper level for different operations.  Even the spare tires are inserted in the trunk by a COBOT.   They did not tell us which operations are done by humans.  

This factory has 2 million square feet under the massive roof. They capture rain water to flush the toilets, for instance.  They recycle everything with a goal of zero waste.  Some of the workers are contract employees and the ones that work the line are Toyota employees. The whole tour operation is contracted by a company out of Corpus Christi TX.   Toyota treats their workers very well.  They have stores where they get their work clothing, even their safety shoes.  If they feel ill, they have medical treatment onsite and they even have a pharmacy they call Walmart.  They have support groups here of all sorts.  They have their own fire and emergency medical services because the nearest fire department is too far away.  

One of the first aisleways we went down we passed a room with glass windows where the President of the company was holding some sort of leadership meeting.  Everyone was standing as all their employees are on their feet all day.  That was impressive, and surely keeps the meetings shorter (standing)!!  Everywhere we went the workers smiles and waved at us when they were able.   

As we traveled up and down the aisles with our tram, we continually had to stop and yield to the AGV's delivering the parts as they have priority.  Some of the parts delivery vehicles were operated by humans.  All the operations were behind safety glass panels so we could see everything going on.  Some areas we could not visit, like painting, the panel stamping (due to noise levels), etc.  The factory was immaculate.  We did not see any trash of anything laying around.  

When the vehicles are done they are thoroughly tested and inspected, and there is a team of technicians in a separate area that fix anything that needs repaired.  The vehicles get about 5 gallons of fuel and then they are driven out of the factory by a human to a nearby staging area where they are either loaded onto rail car or semi trailer, depending on the distance of their destination.  ALL vehicles that depart the factory are already SOLD to dealerships.  They do not make any vehicles in advance that are not spoken for.  

A very small portion of the staging area for completed vehicles.

So the tour concluded.  We loaded back up on the shuttle and returned to the Experience Center where we departed.  This was a great tour and I would highly recommend it if you are going to be near Tupelo MS.  I do not know if they offer tours at any of their other 14 factories.

We returned to the campground, had lunch, tended to Liberty and then launched out for the afternoon operations.  First stop was the Vietnam Veteran's Replica Wall which is located in Tupelo's Veteran Park.  It is meticulously maintained and a fantastic tribute to Veterans of all branches and all wars.  They have an F105D Thunderchief "Thud" static display as you first enter.  It was one of the primary attack aircraft flown during the Vietnam War.  The Thud flew over 20,000 sorties there and 382 were lost.   

.  The most impressive part of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial at Veterans Park is a scaled replica of the Maya Lin-designed monument on the Mall in Washington. The Tupelo Wall is etched with the names of the 58,318  killed or still missing from the Vietnam War.

From here we drove just a few blocks south to Elvis Presley's Birthplace.  They have a museum with gift shop, the original two room house where Elvis was born in 1935, and the church he attended had been moved here.  I did not remember Tupelo as part of the Elvis equation, but this is obviously a significant part of his life.

The museum and gift shop

We started in the museum paying our admission but then were diverted to the chapel as they were about to start a program.  

The church had been moved to this location and restored, but this was Elvis's actual church he attended as a child.  No pictures or video were allowed during the program, but they had three screens projecting a recreated church service featuring the first time Elvis sang in church, which was the start of his music career.   

From there we passed the outhouse (!) and then visited the museum.  

Again, no photos or video were allowed in the Elvis museum, but they had many, many artifacts from his singing career and even a few from his Army days.  

Finally we visited the Presley two-room house, which is the original house in it's original location.  In 1934 Vernon Presley borrowed $180 to buy materials to build a two-room frame house.  On 8 Jan 1935 Elvis was born here.  They lived here about three years when the house was repossessed and they were forced to move.  They lived in various other locations in Tupelo until Elvis was 13 years old and they moved to Memphis TN.  After Elvis died in 1977 the City of Tupelo formed a memorial foundation to oversee the birthplace and facilities.  

Elvis's birthplace home

One of the two rooms, the bedroom where Elvis was born

The other room, the kitchen, dining, living area.  The stove is original

The rear of the house, again, in it's original location.

That wrapped up our touring today.  More to come tomorrow!