Thursday, May 27, through Wednesday, June 16, 2010: At Williamsburg, Virginia:
The trip to the Williamsburg area (we’re nine miles north of the actual city) was short but not entirely sweet. There was an accident involving at least three trucks inside a tunnel on I-64 under part of the Cheseapeake Bay. (Boy, is that bay huge!) We were stopped for at least 45 minutes outside the tunnel while they cleared the wreckage from one of the two lanes. I sought advice from the locals as to how long we might expect to be there.


So much for what was supposed to be a two-hour trip. Not a big deal, frankly, since we arrived in early afternoon, anyway. We are staying at the Outdoor Resort-Williamsburg. It’s a nice facility, with a pickle ball court(!!!), and we were lucky enough to get one of the few spaces without an umbrella of trees over it. So our rooftop satellite dish works. It was over 90 degrees when we got here, so the beautiful swimming pool, glistening in the sun, looked very inviting. Naturally, it wasn't open, since we hadn't yet reached the Memorial Day weekend. (That starts tomorrow.) So we had to settle for the indoor pool and its accompanying hot tub. Very nice, anyway. Of course, it rained the night we arrived. That seems to be a pattern for us.

On Friday we explored the area a bit, with the girls focusing on shopping. Having spent so much time recently in remote areas, it is quite a change to stay where there is civilization. Within a couple of miles of our RV park we have a gazillion stores and restaurants. I get hungry just driving around and seeing all the choices. We settled on fine dining at Wendy’s. I don’t think that gustatory experience will make the highlight reel. Saturday the girls got into shopping big time, while Bill and I checked out the historic (colonial) area of Williamsburg (after Bill loaded up at Dunkin' Donuts; we hadn‘t seen a donut shop in weeks). Williamsburg was very nicely done. We will return with the girls and get the full flavor, but this taste was impressive. There are some beautiful homes in the surrounding residential area, and the adjacent campus of The College of William & Mary (founded in 1693, it’s the second oldest in the country---after Harvard, of course) is quite magnificent.

We have talked the park manager into having the combination basketball/pickle ball court available to us old folks at 9:00 am---i.e., before it gets real hot. It used to be set aside at 4:15 pm, a very hot time of day, and only on Sunday. The sale wasn’t too difficult since the manager loves to play pickle ball and we are the only players here. He makes up our fourth, so it works for everyone. On the third day of play, Tuesday, I violated the first rule of pickle ball: Don’t run backwards to chase a shot. I tripped and fell on my butt, back, and head, simultaneously. According to the medical staff at the local hospital, I will ache for a few days, but nothing worse than that happened (except to my ego, of course).

Tuesday also saw the arrival of Chuck Conway, a former boss of Becky's at Union Bank, who stayed in one of the park models here for two days.


We all went with Chuck on Wednesday to have an extended tour of Colonial Williamsburg. Among other attractions, they have maintained the local flavor by having oxen do some of the hauling. We were told by the ox handler that oxen are not a separate species of animal, but, instead, are really any animal that is used for hauling things. I'm not sure he's correct, but it sounds good. (My dictionery says oxen are castrated male bovines. That doesn't sound good for the oxen.)


One of the buildings in the historic area is the Governor's Mansion (from when Williamsburg was the capital of Virginia). A great-great-great grandfather of Becky's, David Campbell, lived there when he was Governor. (He was also an uncle of Becky's. For unknown reasons, he adopted his niece, Becky's great-great-aunt, thereby making him a relative on two counts.)


It is fascinating, and well-restored. We had a nice, but unexciting, lunch at a restored tavern. Dinner was terrific at a (non-historic) restaurant called Food For Thought.

I've been resting my injured body while Bill and Becky play pickle ball every day. It's very hot, so they start at 8:30 and quit by 11:00 each morning. On Friday, I went on a wild goose chase to replace my ailing bedroom DIRECTV ("DTV") receiver. It's ten years old and starting to die. I've was advised by DTV (via its internet site) to go to the nearest dealer (30 miles away) and buy a new one. When I finally found the store, I was told they do not stock the receivers and I needed to get one directly from DTV. I called DTV to verify that advice, and was told to just go to the nearest Best Buy to pick one up. (It turned out to be across the street from the first store.) The Best Buy man said that DTV no longer distributes receivers through any stores, as of three weeks earlier, and that its run-of-the-mill telephone people (and, apparently, its internet site manager) had not yet been informed of that fact. I called DTV for the umpteenth time and talked to a supervisor who proceeded to agree to FedEx me a new receiver---for free, surprisingly. (I will not bother to recount that there were three incorrect phone numbers to which I had been referred by various DTV people during this exercise.)

We've now toured Yorktown and Jamestown (thus completing the Historic Triangle of Williamsburg, Yorktown, and Jamestown). The museum at Yorktown is very well-done and interesting. (The Battle of Yorktown is considered the last big battle of the Revolutionary War, though it took two more years for the war to end.) Part of the City of Yorktown is privately-owned and operating as a normal place, and intermixed within the town are federal and locally-operated historic areas. It seems to work very well. The federal parts are administered by the National Park Service (NPS), our old friends from Zion and The Grand Canyon. There are two Jamestown areas to visit---the preserved historic one, operated by the NPS,


and the recreated one, operated by a group of local charities. Both are very nice and informative. The recreated one was finished in 2007 (the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown), the opening being attended by President Bush (43) and Queen Elizabeth II. At the recreated one, there are three full-size replicas of the ships that brought colonists to the area. It is hard to believe that these tiny vessels each carried 121 people across the ocean for more than two months without their going postal.


My body is now healed and I have joined the Pickle Ball gang daily---except when we have a touring day planned. It's fun to be playing again, even though Bill likes to poach.


As soon as we finish playing each day, Bill and I head off to the pool to cool off. It's quite hot and humid here, and the pool feels very good. Pat and Becky cooled off by kayaking on a lake at nearby Waller Mill Park.


One of our nice sightseeing adventures was a trip to the Berkeley Plantation, not far from Williamsburg. It's a well-maintained/restored home on a 1,000 acre plantation adjacent to the James River. Its historic significance is that it was the home for several generations of the Harrison family---which ultimately produced presidents William Henry Harrison and Benjamin Harrison---and a number of the founders (Washington, Madison, etc.) visited it during its early years. It is still privately owned, and its current owners stay there several times a year. The home and grounds are lovely. We saw our first Sarah Palin 2012 bumper sticker in the parking lot there.





The last Saturday of our visit to Williamsburg, eight of us decided to visit the local Outback Steakhouse for a wonderful meal. It turned out to be a total disaster. Half of the meal orders were either overcooked, undercooked, or just plain wrong. It took at least a half hour to replace the incorrect meals, so four of us were long-finished by the time the rest of us got to eat. Then it took another half hour to get the bills right. Every one of them had to be done twice. Along the way, we sought the assistance of the manager. He was as inept as the server.

Tomorrow, it's off to Colonial Beach, Virginia, for our next RV park. We returned to Food for Thought on Wednesday to honor our last night in Williamsburg. Being a creature of habit, I ordered the mussels again. So good! It will be hard for the next places we visit to beat Williamsburg. Besides being very historic, it’s a lovely area: the roads and signage are good; the landscaping of the highways is very calming; the residential areas are clean and neat; the houses are fine but understated; and the people are gracious and helpful. It’s all very civilized.


Monday, May 24, through Wednesday, May 26, 2010: At Shawboro, North Carolina:
We came to Shawboro for just three days in order to break up the trip from Lake Gaston to Williamsburg. By dumb luck, we are staying at the North River RV Resort, a beautiful place, magnificently maintained. It is not large, but it has RV spaces, cabins, park models, and standard motel rooms---and a large pond in the middle.


We are in an area that is mostly agricultural, and the nearest city of any consequence is Elizabeth City (“EC“), about 25 miles away. Shawboro, itself, consists of a post office and a school, and not much else. The day we arrived we went on a quick tour of EC. It seems to be a nice waterfront town, with some lovely homes.




Tuesday, we went on a very long trip to Kitty Hawk and Cape Hatteras, and back. More than 300 miles, roundtrip. It was fascinating to see the Wright Brothers Monument, learn the details of what happened there, and see where the flights actually took place.


At the cape, we walked along the shore


and we visited what seems to be the world’s most famous lighthouse, Becky and Pat climbed to the top (the equivalent of climbing to the top of a 12 story building) while Bill and I went to a gas station to clean the windshield on the Wheelers‘ car. (We’re not into lighthouses.)


On Wednesday, we went back to see EC again and make a Wal-Mart run. There wasn’t much else to do.

Wednesday, May 12, through Sunday, May 23, 2010: At Littleton, North Carolina:
On Wednesday, we finally left Yemassee (actually, a day early) and headed for Littleton, North Carolina---a 350 mile trip---where we are scheduled to stay for about two weeks. The trip was not exciting---just long. Our RV park is on Lake Gaston, a huge reservoir built in the '60s as one of a series of lakes created by placing hydroelectric dams along the Roanoke River. Our site is right on the water. Very nice.


The only drawback is that we do not have a sewer drain at this site. We need to have the park people come periodically to empty our holding tanks. We’ve never had this situation before, and were not prepared for the consequences. On Saturday, we had to have an emergency “dump” since our gray tank was full from doing a lot of laundry on Friday.

The night we arrived, we all went to a local Italian restaurant for dinner. I had Chicken Cacciatore (very tasty), half of which I took home---and had for lunch on Thursday. After lunch, we all toured Littleton (not exciting---in fact quite depressed), Roanoke Rapids (20 miles away and the center of local activity due to its proximity to I-95), and Weldon (next to Roanoke Rapids and very depressed). It seems that Weldon and Littleton were once quite important, with cotton mills, railroads, etc., but that has all now gone, and there seems little chance of substantial recovery of the old sections.

On Friday, we toured part of the lake area and had lunch at a lovely and quite reasonable lakeside restaurant (“Watersview”).

On Saturday, we went back to Roanoke Rapids and went on the bike ride from Hell. It was supposed to be a relaxing 14-mile roundtrip along a local canal.
It was hot (91 degrees) and humid, and the terrain was difficult, and I gave up after only 6½ miles. I rested at a big, air conditioned (Thank you!) store (“Riverside Mill,” which used to be a cotton mill) while the gang rode back to the starting point to get the truck to pick up my bike and me. They returned an hour and a half later and rescued me. What a relief.

Sunday was devoted to relaxing and a quick shopping trip to Wal-Mart. I actually got a haircut there. Quite a change from the old days when I was picky about the salons I would patronize. I've now patronized both Supercuts and Wal-Mart salons. For what it’s worth, the haircuts have been just fine.

Monday through Thursday was mostly relaxing and listening to thunder and rain. Not very exciting, but OK. Wednesday was Becky's birthday. I'm not allowed to mention how old she now is. We also did some local sightseeing (including a visit to Halifax, another virtually dead historic town) and had a few campfires and board games with the Wheelers.


On Friday, Becky and I set out to bicycle to the local marina to see about renting a boat---to tour the lake. After six miles of going up and down hills, I gave up and sent Becky to get the truck and pick me up.

On Saturday, the four of us toured the lake in the boat for a few hours---until the rain started.


We saw some wonderful sights, a multitude of very nice homes and some spectacular ones.



We docked at our RV park and had lunch. Becky and I ventured back out in the afternoon and enjoyed fine weather and saw some great parts of the lake.

Saturday evening we were joined by the Wheelers and friends of their son Tony. Mark Kellogg and his wife, April, live in Raleigh. They are newlyweds and very nice to be around.


We all went to Watersview (again) and had a marvelous meal. What a place!

Sunday was another day of mostly rain and preparing to leave for an RV park in Shawboro (near Kitty Hawk) for our next adventure.

Thursday, April 22 through Tuesday, May 11, 2010: At Yemassee, South Carolina:
The trip to South Carolina was uneventful, the only irritant being the road (I-95) through 100+ miles of Georgia. There was construction for at least half of that leg, with concrete barriers on each side of the two northbound lanes, and no shoulder at all. Quite nerve-racking. Yemassee is about 45 miles from Savannah, a little less than halfway between Savannah and Charleston. Our RV park (“The Oaks at Point South”) is small (88 spaces), old (40 years), rural, heavily treed, and quite pleasant. There is nothing to do, though, so we will have to improvise. They have an internet hot spot in the office, but it’s not free. And our Verizon wireless internet goodie doesn’t work since we are in a bad reception area. Bill discovered that the nearby KOA has a free hot spot, though, so we go there every day to get our email fix.

A few days earlier, Becky had ordered a GPS thingy for our truck. It was waiting for us when we got to the RV park. I have always thought they were unnecessary toys. After all, what are maps for? But, it’s turned out to be an invaluable tool. This may be the only time I have ever been wrong.

Early on Friday evening, there was a barbeque dinner offered on the premises, catered by a local restaurateur (“Ray“).

We tried it; it was fine, but not memorable. There were only a few takers; not the usual early-diner senior citizen crowd.

On Saturday, we all went to the Soft Shell Crab Festival in Port Royal---about 50 miles northeast (right next to Beaufort). We got there early, it was raining, so we left early and went to Wal-Mart. How’s that for entertainment?

On Sunday, we walked to the nearby Low Country Visitor Center and Museum (2.5 miles roundtrip) to look at what we thought would be memorabilia from the Civil War (excuse me, here the polite folks call it the War Between the States and the impolite folks call it the War of Northern Aggression). The property had been the home of an important (read: wealthy) local merchant, but the home was burned in 1864 by General Sherman’s army, and rebuilt in 1868. There was virtually no memorabilia there, primarily just a gift shop. Beautiful southern architecture, though. There’s a lot of that around these parts.


On Monday, we went to Walterboro (25 miles) to the dentist for our regular cleaning. We had our records with us, sent by our dentist in Flagstaff, to give them whatever background information they might want. They wanted new x-rays, anyway, which---amazingly---were free. The dentist was very nice, and had a high-tech office and an efficient and friendly staff. (Everyone in the south is friendly.) He advised us to stop at the artisan center in Walterboro to see the arts and crafts offerings from all over South Carolina. We did, and it was interesting. We also wandered through the “historic” downtown area of Walterboro. It was very well preserved; mostly now consisting, though, of high-end jewelry and art stores.

On Tuesday, Becky and I went to Beaufort to take a look. Very nice, pretty town; with well-maintained historical areas. We had lunch at "historic" Blackstone’s Restaurant, on Scott Street just off Bay Street---a block from the shore.

On Thursday, Becky was to leave for Havasupai, flying from Savannah to Las Vegas via Dallas/Forth Worth. Since her first flight was scheduled for 7:00 am, we (including Daisy) spent Wednesday night at the Red Roof Inn in Savannah. There was a Japanese restaurant nearby, so we indulged our passion for sushi and sashimi. Yummy!!! At 5:45 am on Thursday, Becky hopped on the hotel shuttle to go to the airport. At 6:15she called to tell me that she had my keys to our truck in her purse. She left them at the American Eagle counter, and I (also taking the hotel shuttle) picked them up an hour later. Daisy and I then returned to Yemassee and spent the day at extreme leisure.

On Friday, The Wheelers and I went to Charleston and spent an interesting day seeing some of the city. We got involved in a local promotion for a vacation club ("We are NOT a timeshare!!!") for what was intended to be a simple way to score some free tickets for local tours. It was supposed to take about 45 minutes but was so interesting that we ended up spending almost three hours there. But, no sale. And, because it got so late, the tours of Charleston will have to wait until we go back with Becky.

Saturday was another day of leisure. The highlight was my going to the local Piggly Wiggly for some food items. There's an interesting phenomenon in this area: Most stores, even the giants, are set back off the street or highway, hidden by stands of trees. It sometimes makes them hard to find, but it helps the beauty of the environment.

On Sunday, I mostly prepared for Becky’s return---washing dishes and clothes, vacuuming the house, and taking Daisy for long walks. Becky called from Kingman to say they had all successfully taken horses out of the canyon, but, unfortunately, Barbie’s horse had spooked and thrown her off only ten minutes into the return trip. She was injured enough that she was taken to Kingman by helicopter, poked and prodded and scanned, and released---with serious pain medication---to return to Las Vegas with Becky. A later report was to the effect that she was sore but otherwise OK.

On Monday, Becky returned from Las Vegas by plane. She was scheduled to arrive at the Hilton Head-Savannah International Airport at 5:30 pm, but---surprise!!!---her plane was late, due to weather in Dallas/Fort Worth, her interim stop. We kept in touch throughout the afternoon and evening, so I always knew what the flight status was. The flight finally arrived at 10:15. For no explained reason, when I arrived at the airport at 9:45, the Arrivals board showed her flight set to arrive at 9:15 and expected to be On Time. (????)

On Tuesday, Pat’s brother Dan and his wife, Kathie, arrived at our RV park to spend a few days.


They live in Anderson, South Carolina, about 3½ hours Northwest of where we were. Nice people. That night we had a weird dinner with them at the local Denny’s: All the food orders were slightly incorrect and arrived serially---no two at the same time. It was bizarre.

On Wednesday, we all went to Savannah, Georgia, and took the mandatory trolley tour of the historic section.



Becky and I had done that six years ago, and remembered absolutely nothing about Savannah---except that the park bench scene in “Forrest Gump” and “Midnight In The Garden Of Good and Evil” (with Kevin Spacey) were filmed there. The historic part of Savannah is perfectly charming.


We had a nice lunch at Wild Wings, and then headed home.

On Thursday, we all went to Beaufort and wandered around that charming town. There are beautiful (and beautifully maintained) old southern mansions there, and a lovely waterfront.


The girls went shopping while the boys had lunch. I had a wonderful bowl of French onion soup at Hemingways (no relation to THAT Hemingway) facing the water. We returned to Yemassee to a cookout by Pat. (Yummy hamburgers, hot dogs, and fruit salad).

On Friday, we did little of note, just relaxing Dan and Kathie left, to return home.

On Saturday, we all went back to Charleston. This time we took a carriage ride through the historic area


and a ferry ride to Fort Sumter


(paid for---except for Becky’s carriage ride---via chits we had received from the vacation club people). Charleston is a lovely place. Very charming and full of history---of both the Revolutionary War and the War Between the States. And Fort Sumter was very interesting. (The Civil War started with the shelling of the fort by the rebels, who were trying to force the Yankees out---Fort Sumter‘s being the only federal outpost in the area. The fort was shelled endlessly for many hours, with no casualties on either side, until the Yankees gave up---having run out of supplies.)

On Sunday, Bill and I basically rested while Becky and Pat went shopping in Beaufort (which was essentially closed).

On Monday, we all went to Hilton Head Island and went on a 22-mile bike ride. It‘s a lovely place, very upscale, with wonderful bike trails. The sand at the shoreline is packed so hard that we actually rode our bikes on the beach.



On Tuesday, we all went back to Charleston to have lunch with Sam Heitzman, an old co-worker of Becky’s from First Interstate and Union Bank days. We met him at 82 Queen Street, a restaurant located, not surprisingly, at 82 Queen Street, a historic site in central Charleston. It’s purported (by Sam) to be the best restaurant in Charleston. We certainly can’t disagree; it was delightful.


The popular dish was, surprisingly, barbecued shrimp and grits.


Best of all: Sam picked up the tab. Yea, Sam! On the way to lunch, we stopped at James Island County Park (part of the City of Charleston) where Becky and I had spent some time six years ago. It’s a lovely place, with a beautiful RV park. It was even nicer than I had remembered,