Amish

We camped for two days this week in Quabache State Park near Bluffton, Indiana, in Amish country. If I need to "regroup" for any reason, we head for Amish country. My family roots are intertwined with the Amish and I find the country to be serene, peaceful and therapeutic. If we were out west, I would head for the desert, which I find spiritual and inspirational, but in the midwest, it is Amish country.

Wednesday night at 6 p.m. storms rolled through the area and tornadoes were sighted. We were evacuated to the comfort stations which are considerably more safe than our RV's. When we visited our favorite bakery on Thursday morning, we discovered a tornado had passed between the Graber's home and shop. The end of the shop was peppered with leaves and debris and a door was torn off. The wooden bench out in front of the store was shattered and left in the field, but the rest of their property was largely unscathed. 

However, right next door a large Amish home and barn was ravaged by the tornado. Siding and roofs were blown away and one shed was blown to pieces. Another newer large shed was left completely intact and no lives (animal or human) were lost and no one was injured. I told Marie that we had seen that house when we drove in, but the lack of debris around led us to believe it was just a work in progress. She said, "No, it happened at 6 p.m. and was totally cleaned up last night. Then the repair work started this morning." The Amish do not buy insurance, but you have to think. Insurance is just money we put into a pool to be paid out when there is a loss. After adjusters, reports, etc., are all filed, materials ordered, contractors hired, etc, etc, etc. The Amish have their own insurance. It's called helping one another. They all come together to help a friend in need. They bring their tools, their equipment, their supplies, their labor and food is prepared to feed the workers. One field was set aside for all the buggies and horses with someone attending them. Terry was amazed that at just 10 a.m. trailers full of lumber and supplies were already there and 50-60 men were swarming all over the barn and the house. It was a wonderful sight.

Never is one family ever left to fend for themselves. They all move in and help. Everyone had a job to do and they were working hard to get things back in order for this family. This is their religion and this is who they are.

Till next time. . . 

Dale

Not much direction. . .

It's been hard trying to get interested in doing anything in the way of travel since Daddy died. We just kind of waiver between where to go and what to do. We have spent several weekends down in Warsaw seeing Mom and trying to keep all our spirits up. She is fortunate to have a network of kids and grandkids and great-grandkids who visit and spend quality time with her. She is so loved and she tells me she certainly feels that.

She plans to go to Texas this winter. Her thoughts are that she will clean out the trailer there and sort through stuff to keep. The plan is to sell the place there in Texas. Then in the spring she will go back to her place in Claypool. Her traveling back and forth to Texas will come to an end, but she has a lovely place in Nita's woods, so she will have family near her at all times. She is thinking of flying to Houston and we will pick her up there on our way through and head on down to the valley.

I had to go to Indianapolis last week and get a shot in my back. The surgeon I went to didn't want to start with surgery; he thought I should try the shot first. I had an epidural 12 years ago and it really helped but I consider that a band-aid. I have a condition in my back known as spondylolisthesis. It's where the vertebrae shift enough that the bones in the back are no longer aligned. I knew about the spot at the base, which is the result of a Pars defect, but xrays show I actually have another spot as well. It would require fusing about 5 vertebrae.  So I went to get a shot to help ease my pain. I don't think I will have to have another one because it's been a week and so far I can't even tell I had one. This shot was done a lot differently than my first one and the first one helped a great deal. So not sure the next step. I have to wait two months between appointments with this doctor, so even though I started in May, the summer is shot and I can't have anything done now before we leave the state.

When we left Indy, we drove over to Saint Marys, Ohio, and camped at the Grand Lake State Park. We have a friend who workcamps here and he was anxious to see us. We met Dan and his wife Dee when we had our first big campout of fulltimers back in 2005. They were in the same camp, had just gone full time and joined out little group. They have been part of us every since and we have made lifelong friends. Unfortunately, Dan's wife Dee passed away two years ago and this was the first we had seen him since. He seems to be doing well and has quite the support group of workcampers and family in the area. Tab and Deanna were coming in the next day to camp with us for the weekend, so we had a great time seeing them. They visited with Dan as well, being part of the same fulltiming group.

We had quite a storm come through the camp on Saturday night. They were talking 70 mph winds and I believe it. I have never seen it like that, but it was straight line winds and our motorhome was sitting with the back pointing toward the wind direction, so offered the least resistance. We didn't rock and roll too much. So many stupid campers though. Our loop got hit the worse and almost every travel trailer had left their awning out. First hint of a storm, and our stuff all comes in. But most of the awnings were ripped up and the arms broken and thrown up and over the trailers. I'm not sure why they think those flimsy things are gonna withstand some heavy winds. Idiots. The park rangers and watercraft personnel were out immediately writing up accidents reports for insurance claims. They were certainly busy in our loop and it was nice that they were there to do that for the campers. There was only one large limb that came down and that fell right onto an empty campsite. Other than that, there were a lot of smaller limbs, but I don't think there was any damage from limbs coming down.

Tab and Deanna left on Sunday and we stayed over till Tuesday and then headed to the Berne, Indiana, Amish country. We enjoy shopping at the Amish businesses over there.

Till next time. . .

Dale

Playing catchup!

Regretfully, I had not posted while we were gone. I was more engrossed in worry about the motorhome and not really wanting to write much. So I will be adding pictures once I am finished with the text and upload all my pictures.

When we left Jellystone in Sioux Falls, we had all the warnings bells and whistles doing their thing. The camp is right on I-80 and there are no frontage roads, so we had to get on the interstate. The lights would go out, then on, then out. We were now experiencing a derate in the engine which puts it in limp mode, so I am struggling along at 40 mph while traffic is whizzing past me at 80. The problems didn't last long. At about the two mile mark, the engine was up to 130 degrees, all the lights went out and we were soon rolling along at my 67 mph speed I seem to like. No problems the rest of the day. We stopped for lunch and continued on. The engine is still warm when we take these breaks, so we don't have anymore problems with it like when we start out with a cold engine.

At this point, I asked Terry how far it was to Goshen because I was to the point that I just wanted to get someplace familiar and safe and then find someone "ELSE" who could work on the motorhome. Can't trust Hill's in South Bend to do the work. They have left us with more problems than we started with. But it was way too far to drive in one day, so we stopped in Tama, Iowa, at an Indian casino for the night. This was a good stop. The lovely campground with 50 Amp electric was $20 a night. They had very nice restrooms and showers. So we took advantage of that. Nice and clean and big. They were actually three-piece bathrooms. There was a nice laundry area, but I was good there. We went into the casino and spent a little time and a little money, the emphasis on "little." Once again, we broke even, maybe a little to the good side.

When we left the next morning, our departure was delayed by storms. We had been watching storms all along the way and had been successful at skirting or avoiding them all together. We had a storm roll in just as we got everything ready to go, slides in, jacks up, awnings up, etc. Good thing, because we had some serious wind and HAIL! An RV'ers nightmare. It was about the size of mothballs, so we didn't have any damage. Whew! It was rather LOUD, though. We did have a safe place to go if need be, but we stayed in the motorhome and were fine.

We started out with the same problems as usual until we were up to that magic 130 degrees engine temperature, then we rolled. And roll we did for 450 miles till we pulled in to Elkhart Campground about 6:30 in the evening. It never looked so good. So we had traveled almost 3,000 miles with warnings lights and buzzers to make it back here safe and sound. Obviously, there isn't much wrong but it sure would be nice to find someone who KNOWS WHAT THEY'RE DOING and can fix it!

Till next time. . .

Dale

Pace-Stevens Reunion

We arrived at Piney Grove on Bay Springs Lake in Mississippi last Wednesday, June 4, and settled in for four days so we could attend the family reunion. Ma and Pa Pace were both married previously and had something like five children each, then were widowed. They found one another, married, and had five more children. Many of the children from the three marriages are no longer around, but there are some. Most of the people who come now are the next generation, i.e., Terry and his cousins. We always enjoy going to Mississippi and touching base with family. It would be great if more people would come, though. We had 31 people this year, up from 18 last year, but there are many more we would like to see.

Years ago, one of the relatives had a notebook with family genealogy in it, but I don't remember who it was and they haven't come for years. I've been trying to think of some way to encourage other family members to come. Perhaps some readers out there have some ideas about what works with their family reunions. If so, I would love to hear your comments.

We are changing the format of the reunion next year. Instead of having a carry-in, we are going to meet at Raymond's, a restaurant in Marietta, Mississippi. Everyone will order from the menu, so no one has to worry about fixing food and bringing a dish. We will let Raymond's do the cooking and all we need to do is visit with one another.

After we left the reunion, we headed out to the lake to the dogs and spent some time walking them and visiting with Gary and Jo. Later we all headed in to Paul and Shirley's, Terry's cousin and Gary's sister, and we had a fish fry. What fun! We had our leftovers from the reunion carry-in and fish Gary brought from one of his many fishing excursions and then an additional treat that Preston fixed. He made us steak kabobs with jalapeno, cream cheese and bacon. They were very good.

As it got later, it was obvious a storm was brewing. The dogs don't like storms, although they aren't terrified like some dogs. Still, we didn't want them to be alone in the motorhome in a storm. So we left Shirley's to rush back to the lake, about a 30 minute drive. The wind was really blowing and rain was horizontal, but we somehow plowed through it all. I was more concerned about a tree blowing down on us as we drove back. Once we got out on the highway, though, the wind seemed to die down and we just had a lot of rain and lightening. By the time we got to the camp, the worst was past. The girls were doing fine. We always leave the A/C and fans running as it masks a lot of noise. They were glad to see us, but they weren't overly anxious. They are such sweet girls. We waited till the rain stopped and took them out for their evening walk and then went to bed.

Gary and Jo did get a motorcycle ride in while they were there. I think that would be fun.

We also found these really large fungi the day after the bad storm. Have not found out what kind they are. Several suggestions have been made, but I don't believe we have identified them yet.

We left on Sunday morning to head to Indiana for the FMCA Glamarama Rally at the fairgrounds in Goshen. This is the second rally we have attended there in a month. They are always fun and it's great to be with other RV'ers. We drove all the way to Cave City the first night, then Indianapolis the second night, then on to the fairgrounds on Tuesday, the 10th.

Till next time. . .

Dale