Great Friends, great food!

The other day as I stepped out of the house, I heard a loud humming from up in the sky. I looked up and saw the BLIMP! I know, it's JUST a blimp, but I do get excited whenever I see one. This one was labeled DirectTV.

One of the most amazing things about fulltiming is that you meet and make friends from all over the country. Then when you happen to be traversing the country from point A to point B, you may run into people you know! Such was the case today.

We left Goshen at 8:30 this morning and started our journey to Sioux Falls. We sailed right through Indiana and Illinois and when it was time to stop at our predetermined spot, Terry said there were some Corp (of Engineer) parks about 60 miles up the road, so I obliged and continued driving. It wasn't a hard drive and we were here before we knew it. We are at Corelville Lake near Iowa City, Iowa. We got parked and fired up the computer and discovered our friends, Alicia and Roger, had left me a message and were not too far away. In fact, they were about 14 miles away from us. So they decided to come down here to the camp and took us out for dinner. We drove back into Iowa City and ate at Jimmy Jack's Rib Shack. Those were really good ribs and, as usual, too much for me to eat, so I brought half my meal home and will have it for lunch tomorrow.

On the way back to our site, we took a detour and drove to the dam on this large lake. In 2008, there was a great flood here in Iowa City and large portions of the town were flooded. The water was so high in the lake where we are camped, that it actually tumbled over the spillway. Once over the spillway, it churned and tore at the surrounding landscape. When the flooding subsided and the water was gone--washing away tons of dirt and debris with it--prehistoric fossil beds were revealed in the spillway area. How cool is that? They re-routed the road and they have a viewing area where you can see these fossil beds. It reminds me of the Falls of the Ohio fossil beds. These are smaller, but no less impressive.

It just happens that tomorrow Roger and Alicia and two other relatives are going to be here at the campground camping for a few days. In fact, when we got back to our campsite, one family was already here! And just across from us! We walked over and met Matt and Heather and their dogs, Mack and Rufus. We enjoyed meeting and visiting with them.

It was a great day of driving and a great day with friends. Tomorrow we continue our journey to Sioux Falls.

Till next time. . .

Dale