Another journey just about wrapped up . . . .

It's been almost six months since we were in California, and a lot of miles under us ...again, but we are already planning for some of our future travels.

We left the snow and cold (24F) behind in Van Horn and West Texas, and it has been sunny, partly cloudy and a mite warmer - thank goodness!

We made our overnight stop in Tucson and we continue to be amazed at the expanding growth that the Tucson area is experiencing, especially the northwest area of Tucson around Marana, where malls, subdivisions and new I-10 over-pass bridges are, and have been, constructed. And speaking of I-10 construction, we gave a big "whoop-e-e-e!" coming through Tucson where the I-10 freeway has been under major reconstruction for the last six years, has now been completed and it is so nice to have it finished and a very nice job they did do on it. It makes coming through Tucson so much easier and more pleasing now.

And of course the Casa Grande area is expanding by leaps and bounds with many, many new malls, strip malls, housing tracts and large subdivisions make it an area that hardly resembles the 'old' Casa Grande.

Economics will have a big say in things, but with the growth of the greater Phoenix area, and particular that of Tempe, Chandler, Mesa, and Sacaton I can envision the continued growth south and the Casa Grande growth east and north to a point were they will likely join into a large megalopolis area with virtually no real open space between the two areas, in the next twenty/twenty-five years. But, it remains a very scenic area in the south/south central Arizona desert area.

The Apache Junction Elks Lodge is one of our favorites in this area to visit. There are many good Elks, good food, good hydration, and of course some good stories. And with the awesome view out the front window of our home here that has the beautiful Superstition Mountains is hard to beat in this area.

Tomorrow we continue to head west into what is generally billed as the "largest RV gathering in the world", at Quartzsite, Arizona located about 18 miles east of the Colorado River boundary of California, along I-10. In the winter there generally is about 200,000 RVer's there at this time of year. There is also sports, vacation, gem and mineral shows all wrapped around the RVer with many large RV dealers there with hundreds of units of every description and size to be sold. There are the large (blocks and blocks equivalent) flea market/swap meet, and of course the "big tent" which is like a very large circus tent (I would guess about 100,000 square feet) with all kinds of RV, camping, and recreation items, gadgets and electronics for every conceivable need and use. Needless to say, a very unique and interesting place. I love to turn on the CB (Ch-19) and listen to the truckers when they are coming through there on the Interstate with all kind of wonderment and amazement expressed by them. There is nothing else like it that we have ever seen or heard about. The 'largest' RVing event in the world? It would be very difficult to argue against that statement.

After Quartzsite, we will spend a day in the Palm Springs area, seeing some friends and doing a little visiting, and we will continue our journey North to Central California.

Looking forward to seeing our dear family and friends again, and of course our grandkids who have probably grown another inch or two by now. It will be good to see the old homestead once again, although I don't necessarily look forward to the doctor appointments, and other chores that will surely come up once we drop anchor.

Yikes! It's snowing. . .

Well we had a very nice stay at the Houston Elks RV Park. We celebrated Marilyn's 39th birthday (hee-hee-hee) with a few nice presents for her that I had picked up, and of course we had an excellent dinner at Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen. We both enjoyed the day.

Marilyn and I loaded up on books from Half Price Books in the Houston/Sugar Land area. We just love those stores!

We continued through San Antonio and into Kerrville where we stayed at the local Elks Lodge RV Park and joined some of the local folks in a very good dinner.

The next night we stayed outside of Sheffield, TX; and tonight we were planning on being in El Paso, but-t-t-t the weather had other plans. It was raining 'cats and dogs' (or is it armadillos and and rattlesnakes here in West Texas?), and then when we got about 40 miles from Van Horn, the rain turned into that cold-white-stuff. So being the prudent travellers that we are, we

got off of the Interstate and went into Van Horn this afternoon to spend the night and wait out the snow storm. Or as Marilyn so aptly put it, we decided that we would console ourselves with a steak dinner (afterall, there just happens to be a nice steak house next door).

Our intentions were to visit the El Paso Elks Lodge (a nice lodge and RV Park that sits up on a hill over-looking the city), but with our 'snow-diversion' it would appear that we will probably hold up at the Las Cruces Elks instead, to be followed by our almost annual visit to the Tucson Elks the following night.

Just hope that we can get out of Van Horn tomorrow morning, and the way that it has been snowing and continuing at this time with about three inches accumulated on the ground, we may just find ourselves spending some additional time in beautiful downtown Van Horn, Texas!

It may be white and cold outside, but it is sure toasty here inside, thank goodness.

Moving westward. . . .

Didn't make it to Red Bay, AL (Tiffin) as we had planned, due to bad weather (heavy rain, thunderstorms, hail, and all that 'mid-west' kind of stuff that we prefer to stay away from (far from) if at all possible. The forecasts did not look promising so we stayed south and came on into Houston, where we will spend Marilyn's birthday (she says its her '39th, plus or minus, with emphasis on the plus side) tomorrow here, before continuing on westward over I-10 to the west coast.

We figure loosely that we will likely be back at our western home-base in Visalia, California in about 10 days or so. We are beginning to look forward to our return back to Visalia, even if we do have a rather busy schedule (well, busy for us anyhow) when we return, including some west coast trips and rallies that are coming up over the next few months. And then we are making our pilgrimage back to Rapid City, South Dakota in May, so we do have a few things on tap, if you will.

Marilyn and I look forward to a fun day tomorrow with some shopping, a planned trip and of course, a great dinner tomorrow evening to celebrate 'her day'. It should be fun. (...now, if I can just keep her out of the Half Price Book store. They have great deals on books and since we both are avid readers, how can we refuse. I know that they must love to see us coming!...)

We will keep you loosely posted as we move westward...

Our love and best wishes to all ya'll out there who follow us on here. We do think of you all often.

The full circle tour of Florida, and then some. . . .

Well, we have now come full circle with out Florida tour, having come in at Pensacola a month-and-a-half ago and went down the Gulf Coast/West Coast side of Florida, across the Everglades, down to Key West, and then back up the Atlantic Coast/East Coast of the state to Jacksonville in the northeast corner where we picked up I-10 and then pointed ourselves west, completing the grand loop here at Pensacola. The weather was cooler than we had anticipated (and wanted), but other than that we had some beautiful sunny days and some nice warm days mixed in also. It was good to visit the "old homestead" and associated areas in south Florida. We find it to still be a nice state to visit and to tour. Florida has many of the same problems that much of the nation experience, especially in the sunbelt areas, and that is ever increasing growth, more commercialism, and increased automobile traffic. But then too, the beautiful blue/turquoise of the waters, the inlets, the Intracoastal Waterway, and the beaches are still there and still have that certain charm and warmth for folks like us who truly enjoy the ocean and all that entails.

One other interesting side-note that I will mention here is that, we have now traveled every single mile of Interstate Highway 10 from it's initial start in Santa Monica, California at the beach and CA-Hwy 1 (SR-1) to the very end and it's conclusion in Jacksonville, Florida at the I-95 intersection, downtown. That is roughly 2,454 miles. Much of it, especially the western half of I-10, and particularly the California stretch, we have traveled many, many times. It has been interesting to us to note the different topography, the varying flora and fauna, the climates, as well as the local foods all along the I-10 route, much as it has been for us with all the various other routes and locales that we have traveled through and visited.

Since we pretty much covered the sights, history and attractions in and around Pensacola on our 'in-bound' visit, we will not be repeating any of those visits on this journey through Pensacola.

The little blogs will probably become somewhat more infrequent and stretched out over time, but periodically from time to time I will be making an update and a note of those items of interest that we may encounter from time to time.

From here at Pensacola, we depart tomorrow morning and at Mobile, AL we take I-65 North to Decatur, AL then west on US-72 to Red Bay, AL. I have an inkling of curiosity to make a visit to one of the few family-owned and successful motorhome/motorcoach manufacturers in the U.S., Tiffin Motorhomes Inc., where the patriarch Bob Tiffin has his slogan, "Roughing It Smoothly". Yes, I still love to see things made, constructed, manufactured, and this is one that I have wanted to see. I have been through Monaco Coach (3 times) in Coburg (Eugene), OR, Fleetwood RV in Decatur, IN, Winnebago in Forest City, IA, and Newmar in Nappanee (Elkhart), IN

We received some heavy rain this afternoon, and it is still raining lightly with a forecast for it to continue through the night with thunderstorms into tomorrow. It may be wet out, but at least it is warm (currently 68F) and with a prediction of 74F tomorrow. We are looking for improved traveling weather tomorrow, but we'll see. Of course, the weather is always of concern, especially at this time of year, and we will be following the forecasts closely.

Seems that family and friends in California are getting hit quite hard with very heavy rains and high winds back out on the west coast, with rain and snow in higher elevations over the entire state. We do wish them all well and hope that they can keep their feet dry.

The Capital City...in those rolling hills!

Jacksonville is city that has grown by leaps and bounds over the past ten-plus years. It has a downtown that is in the process of redevelopment, and from what they have done, they are on the right track. Jacksonville has a beautiful setting along the St. Johns River and with continued redevelopment in a positive and planned manner should make Jacksonville a real show-case in years to come.

We stayed over at the Orange Park Elks and they were a great group of folks there.

We arrived at the Tallahassee Elks yesterday morning and we have had a chance to run around some and view the city. We have seen the Florida State Capitol Building, as well as the large and impressive campus of the Florida State University Seminoles, and the Florida A&M University here. I had forgot how hilly it is here. For Florida, these are nigh-on to being small mountains. Reminds me some of the Texas Hill Country. For a "flat-sand" state, the hills are rather impressive, but then with the highest point in Florida being just to the northwest of here up next to the Alabama/Georgia border, at 345 feet, it is obvious that these hills are just that - hills though.


We had dinner with the Elks last night and along with some great fish stories from "Big Rick" (a 'pro' tournament salt-water fisherman), along with Jean behind the bar and a group of local Elks members recommending what we should do, see and where to eat. Always good to hear the local folks speak on their own 'homeland', which as with all the other many Elks that we have visited, they love their communities, and their state.

An interesting point here is that this lodge (Tallahassee Lodge #937) has the original lodge and office furnishings from Elks Lodge #1 in New York City (established February, 1868). As I understand it, Lodge #1 was going to do a major remodel and refurbishment back around 1915, and were going to get rid of much of the old 'stuff'; the Tallahassee Lodge Exalted Ruler purchased it and had it shipped to the new Lodge #937, where it has been in use (and maintained very well) since. I may add that it is beautiful furniture that is obviously hand-made craftsman quality. Something that this lodge is quite proud of, and rightfully so.

Today we will move westward to Pensacola (yes, the Pensacola Elks) and we look forward to meeting those lodge members tomorrow night over dinner.

Looking for (make that 'needing') that 'Fountain of Youth' - St. Augustine . . .

(Note: this is dated 01/16/10; actually it was started on that date, but finished and posted this morning on 01/18/10 at 8:45 a.m. EDT)

We had to do a drive-by at the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach. Larger than I recall from before; more NASCAR related attractions in the immediate area around the Speedway. But yes, it is a large venue for sure. And another interesting tidbit that I noticed, is that the Daytona Beach International Airport is right next to the Speedway (...well, not 'right next', but quite close, in any event), which means for those flying in to see a NASCAR event or the like at the Speedway, do not have far to travel. And I would guess that for those NASCAR drivers who fly their own planes into venues, this has to be one of the better locations for them.

We are here at the St. Augustine Elks RV Park, and we have always loved St. Augustine, with the rich history from the European founding in the New World by Juan Ponce de Leon in 1513; the Spanish rule; the British rule; and the American rule.

The Castillo de San Marcos (the old, large Spanish fort) is interesting and a closer study of its construction (coquina, a crushed seashell like material that has been compressed naturally over the eons, and was quarried, cut and shaped as very large blocks (there is no natural rock as we know it, are available around here); the damage done in the 1950's/'60's as a 'preservative' (concrete, plaster, and synthetic grout) that was to prolong the life of the fort, but covered the "original-ness" of the original building materials and also caused unnatural deterioration of the coquina over the years. I spoke with one of the NPS structural engineers that was on-site doing restoration and preservative work on the fort, and found him to be very interesting.

The majority of the streets in the old historic district are very narrow, but quaint and scenic. It is always interesting to see the "oldness" of the area with its mix of old Spanish/Moorish - English - American architectural design and building influences throughout the downtown area of St. Augustine.

Since St. Augustine is the oldest, continuously inhabited city in the U.S. (although there is some argument to that claim by New Mexico, but then I guess that it another story for another time), we saw the "oldest house" in the U.S. as well as the "oldest school-house" in the U.S.

The City/State is in a six-year ongoing process of a complete refurbishment of the old "Bridge of the Lions". In order to do the refurb, they built a new concrete bridge with a large temporary lift-bridge center segment (for large vessels going through). The old bridge refurb is scheduled to be completed late 2010, at which time they will dismantle and tear down the substitute bridge that has run along side of the old Bridge of the Lions over the past five-plus years.

The County/State Amphitheatre (next to the Elks property here) is on the site of the old Spanish quarry site where the coquina was quarried for the construction of the old fort. A very neat use of a property that would generally have a rather limited future life. It sits in a beautiful park setting close by the water.

And one of the items that we always enjoy seeing, are the various lighthouses in North America, and here in St. Augustine is the St. Augustine Lighthouse, located just to the north of the Amphitheatre (we are just to the south of it). It was originally a lookout post for the Spanish; later the British and in the 1800's the Americans built three lighthouses on the spot (one was lost to a hurricane, one to rot, age and fire, and the third one now stands in retirement).

One last mention is of a super, super seafood that we had in Titusville a few of nights ago. It was local 'rock shrimp', and those guys are superb. They are only found in the area around Cape Canaveral; about the size of a man's large thumb; and they taste like lobster (really!). Get them boiled (in a butter/garlic sauce) and remove them from their shell (they even look like a real small lobster!), and dip in hot drawn butter and together with some conch fritters you have the making of an excellent meal. The story of the rock shrimp is quite interesting, but I will not bore you with the details just now. Maybe I will bore you later (hee-hee).

We will be moving on up to Jacksonville this morning. We are just kind of waiting out the rain and thunderstorm forecast for today. Our weather has been good here in St. Augustine. At least it has remained rather warm (74F), albeit humid due to the increasing rain coming in I would say.

All four of us, Marilyn and myself along with the two "kids" (Kalua and Bailey) are doing well and in good health (...knock on wood). More later....

Heading up the East Coast of Florida...ever so slowly...

It has been over a week, so I thought I would add a few words on what is going on with us and a little about what we have seen and done over that period of time.

We made our visits to Palm Beach, still beautiful ...and expensive; West Palm Beach, where we saw a few new buildings and developments; Okeechobee Blvd. is still a major commercial drive with little change, but some updates and a couple of our 'old favorites' out of business (like our first 'Roadhouse' experience with the peanuts on the floor, and the Texas Land & Cattle Co., both no more); the large regional mall, The Palm Beach Mall, appears to be closed down, but since it is a prime property in a prime location, I cannot imagine that it won't return, newly refurbished and better once the economy makes a positive turn for the better).

We made a visit to PGA National (the location of PGA of America headquarters, and one of our prior places of residence before our home in Jupiter). Of course we could not get into the area where we had lived since it is tightly controlled with gated security, but did have lunch at one of the great restaurants there at PGA National. The properties and golf courses look as nice as ever.

We drove over to Riviera Beach (part of West Palm Beach) to have dinner at one of our 'old favorites' (yes, we do have a good number of them), the old and rustic "Crab Pot" located on the water with their excellent crab and shrimp dishes. Well as luck would have it, there is no more 'Crab Pot'! Auwe! But there is a fairly new 14-15 story condo now located there. So I needed to know if the Crab Pot had relocated, so I stopped in at Premiere Liquor Store (actually an old time convenience store located about one-block away. In brief, the owner sold out about six years ago, took his million$ and retired all the way to the bank. The condos are are about four years old, and less than 15% sold (that real estate market is a jungle out there).

We had breakfast one morning at Loggerhead Park (as in the Loggerhead Turtles that frequent the local beaches; and speaking of beaches, one of our old favorites (...again) The "Lazy Loggerhead Cafe" is located in the park and overlooks the beach and the park.
We did a drive-by at Bert Reynolds Park (also close-by), where we used to make our boat launches.
The old, former "Bert Reynolds Theater" has been remodeled and is now the "Jupiter Mantz Theater", where live productions are performed.
And speaking of ol' Bert, we drove out to Jupiter Farms where the Reynolds home and Museum and Gift Shop (along with some acreage) is located, and you know what - yep, no more! I mean you cannot even tell where it used to be it is so over-grown. It appears that all structures are no longer there. It is all back to nature, if you will. (I guess those bankruptcy courts are hard on your real estate holdings). We did see a Bert Reynolds Museum located just to the east of the Intracoastal Waterway on Indiantown Road and U.S. 1 in Jupiter. Did not visit it though (not a real Bert fan I guess), and I would guess that it is a private endeavor outside of Bert personally.

We did a drive-by of the old workplace - NPPC/Sunsource Int'l Corp. located off of I-95 in the West Palm Beach Industrial Park behind Nicklaus Golf Equipment (still there by the way). Saw no name on the old workplace, but there were a number of cars there.
Went around the corner to Pete's Place, a local watering-hole and polynesian themed eating place that caters mainly to the Industrial Park lunch crowd, but we were a little too late. It was still in business, but closed at the time we were there.

We saw noticeable changes all along U.S. 1 and A1A from Jupiter/Tequesta north to Ft. Pierce. Many newer strip-malls, business buildings and home tracts. Noted also was the item mentioned before - more auto traffic up through Hobe Sound, Stuart, Jensen Beach, Port St. Lucie, and Port Salerno areas. But then again, isn't this just another by-product of growth within nice areas to live, anywhere.

We were in Cocoa Beach and went to see the "Worlds Largest Surf Store" (...or so they say anyhow...) "Ron Jon Surf Shop". Well, it is rather large. They have about a block and a half, of which the actual surf shop covers about 2/3 of a block itself (and next door is another fairly large establishment - the "Cocoa Beach Surf Complex".

We once again made a visit to the Kennedy Space Center, noted a good number of changes since our last visit there in the 90's. Very nice and well done (I will not fill pages here on the Space Center, just let it be said that it is a very nice visit on the Space Coast of Central Florida).

We have also visited Orlando area, where we drove out to Disney World. We did not go in as neither of us were really in the mood to do the 'Disney thing'. but I did want to see the complex. It has changed since our last visit in the 90's, but still "Disney" (...and 'yes Walt (Disney) you made an excellent and foresightful decision when you purchased all those thousands of acres of brush, trees and swamp south of Orlando 40+ years ago!)s
Coming back we went by Sea World Orlando and Universal Studios Orlando (there is a great Bubba Gump's Seafood House located there at the Universal City Walk; There are few of them, but they have a great one on the water in Long Beach, CA where we have also had a great seafood dinner).

And if one is in Orlando, then that means one is close to Windemere, where one Tiger Woods lives, so hey, curiosity made me make a visit to IsleWorth (but not through the gate of course, as it is controlled), and it is nice, but ya know, not really overly impressive. (of course, da Tiger does have a premium property located on Jupiter Island in Jupiter in South Florida. Now that in itself is impressive (living alongside Greg Norman, Chi Chi Rodriquez, Dan Marino, and a good number of other celeb's).

Downtown Orlando and the outlying areas especially to the south of Orlando have growth ex-potentially, and what I remember to be virgin land and swamp is now hotels, restaurants, clubs, and a lot of other growth throughout the area.

Tonight we are just north of Titusville in a very nice RV park in the very small 'burg of Mims, Florida. Tomorrow we continue north to Daytona Beach area for a day, and then on up to St. Augustine.

And oh yea, it has been warm again! Yesterday it was in the upper 60'sF and today was 76F with nice, mild nights. Now this is more like the old Florida that I remember.

Jupiter and the Palm Beaches area

Br-r-r-r-r-r-r, its cold here. Our low is 42F this morning, and yesterday only got up to 63F with a very chilly breeze. Now some might say that those temps are rather warm, but I guess when

you expect it to be warmer and it isn't then the chill hits you even more.

Actually though it is not bad, it is just much cooler than we expected in this area, and at least it is nice and sunny. I can never recall it being anywhere close to this cold in the previous years that we lived here, and even the years prior to that when I flew in on business. I think that this will likely be a record-breaker for the state of Florida and especially south Florida.

We left Hollywood, FL yesterday morning and stayed over in Jupiter (the "old haunts" - our prior residence in Florida about 12 years back), and today we are in Port St. Lucie, FL, about 20 miles north of Jupiter.

As Marilyn and I are quite familiar with this area, having lived here, we notice things that are the same, yet there has been a significant amount of change also. More growth and expansion; and very noticeable is the increased traffic; new housing tracts; some two-lane roads that have been widened to four-lanes; new shopping/strip malls; and the beat goes on. It remains though a very clean and well maintained area. And of course all the water is still here and as inviting as always (although it would be a mite more inviting if it were a little warmer).

Marilyn and I took a drive by the "old homestead" (our prior place of residence in Jupiter) yesterday and again very much the same, yet some significant changes have been made. The most notable was that the house has been repainted and with a different color scheme, and a few trees have been removed. But all in all, it was still very nice and appealing in our humble opinion. We enjoyed our time along the Loxahatchee River, and we have many great memories from our time in Jupiter and the Palm Beaches area.

Today we had lunch at one of our "old favorites" - 'Panama Hatties' on the water in Palm Beach Gardens. It is still a very good place to sit out along the water, break some bread and relax.

And we spent time looking and walking through different areas at a number of the places that we recall from the 'old days'. And that in itself was a lot of fun.

Tomorrow we are going into Palm Beach, West Palm Beach, and the PGA National, where we plan to visit with some old friends there.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

> ~~ > > ~~ > ~~~ ............ 2010 ! .......~~~ < ~~ <

To all of our dear family and friends -

Marilyn and I would like to wish each of you a very Happy,

Healthy, and Prosperous New Year 2010!

From sunny and warm South Florida, we wish you

all the very best for our New Year 2010,

-Jim and Marilyn

Hollywood, Florida

January 1st 2010