October 23, 2015. Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig.

October 23, 2015.  Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig.  We have been out of touch for the last three nights.  We watched the playoff series between Toronto and Kansas City on the laptop the first two nights.  Because we were watching the game, the laptop was unavailable to type the blog.  Last night, we had no electricity and the battery on the laptop was low, so we couldn't produce the blog.  Tonight, we are home and the trip is over.  So, this is a summary of the last three days and a wrap-up of the trip.

On October 20, I told you about our visit to the Kentucky Horse Park.  We left Kentucky and crossed the Ohio River into Indiana.  We also crossed into Illinois and spent the night in Mount Vernon.  That left us about 70 miles from Van City, where we had an appointment this morning. 

So, we drove to a Cracker Barrel Old Country Store yesterday - five miles from Van City - had a late lunch, then settled in.  We went to bed about 9:30 PM only to be awakened by a large moving van which parked next to us about 10:30 PM.  We were awakened again later by another large truck, and night noise.  It was a fitful night's sleep until we were finally awakened for good by the sound of small gasoline-powered lawn equipment about 6:00 this morning. The equipment sounded like weed-eaters at first.

It turned out that the equipment was chain saws.  A lawn company was felling all the trees in and about the parking lot, including two which were less than ten feet from T-Harvey.  I bounded out of Harvey and started the engine.  Tree limbs were in front of Harvey and one of the workmen saw me behind the steering wheel with the engine running.  He moved a sizeable limb in front of T-Harvey.  I pulled into another parking space away from the tree activity. 

I asked the foreman why they were cutting perfectly healthy trees.  He said that they were doing so because the trees hindered camera surveillance.  The bizarre series of happenings kept us awake most of the night followed by an abrupt awakening this morning.

We easily made our appointment at Van City at 9:00 AM this morning.  That was the only good news of the morning.  We had 4-5 items on our punch list, two of which were actually completed by the shop.  The others involved ordering parts which would not arrive for a week or two.  Moreover, only one of the items was covered under warranty.  We gnashed our teeth, then turned T-Harvey west on I-70 toward home.  We arrived home about 5:00 PM.

So, the fall-2015 trip has ended. We covered nearly 3500 miles, averaged over 15 MPG in fuel and spent about 70 hours behind the wheel.  We spent 23 nights away from home.  It was good to be away and it is good to be home, as usual.  Join us again in January, when we plan to be in Gulf Shores, Alabama, on the Gulf Coast.  For the first time, we plan to spend nearly the entire month in one campground, Gulf State Park in Gulf Shores, Alabama.  See you then.  Goodbye for now.