"Today is a Good Day to Drive!" .....Van-Go

After a night's visit from Jack Frost the last few nights it was good to wake up to sunshine today. The sun shone through the brightly colored leaves bouncing colors back to our eyes and making us want to be among them. So we drove into the William Bamkhard National Forest in Alabama. We took route 101 south and crossed the mighty Tennessee River. We admired the TVA Wheeler Dam and watched the fishermen and herons catch fish. Then we continued turning off on scenic route 33 through the forest, but there were farms and houses. We turned off on another road and still another t we were driving down a small gravel path through the trees. We came to dead end where there was enough room for us to set up our camp and still leave room for others to turn around. The road didn't really end, but there is a gate across it. A wonderful road to hike tomorrow!! We set up camp: we put out the awning- giving us a front porch. Will hangs camo netting all around giving us both privacy and protec...

One of the adventures on our bucket list is to own a boat and sail the loop from Pittsburgh down the TenTom across Florida and up the inter-coastal waterway to Pictou, Nova Scotia and back through the Hudson River. A trip that would take us about two years. We found the perfect boat: Albion 43. Sat on it and spent the whole day discussing it. How grand to start a new adventure. The master bedroom reminded Kathy of the one in the movie Captain Ron because the queen size bed was so dominant with it's walnut posts. The grand salon was so big the Roadtrek would fit inside. The captain chair was like a thrown with a wheel in front. The second bedroom was like the bed in Maria and Cliff's front berth: a v shaped sitting area that makes into a bed. Two bathroom on board one with a small tubshower and one with a stand up shower. The kitchen was the negative down in a hole, with stove sink and small fridge and little counter space. The two gigantic red engines were down in the engine r...

Criss crossing around Natchez Trace we found a great little store with all kinds of fresh and homemade goods. Found some interesting grains. A keylime pie mix. Smoked Swiss cheese. Homemade nut butters. Steelcut oats. Yummy Flatrock Cheese & More. Manor Hill Hwy south of Pulaski,TN

Lazy morning inside: reading, listening to the raindrops patter on the roof, sipping coffee and chatting with Justin as he is on his way to work, guitar strumming, watching raindrops chase each other down the window....

"Today is a good day to eat!" The fridge is now all cleaned out and restocked with food.  Our mainstay veggies are bok choy, kale and spinach with treats like tomatoes, zucchini and cabbages and spicy things like garlic, onions and peppers. Kathy likes capers and Will likes olives for a touch of garnish. We like to have some sharp cheddar and some hard Romano cheeses along with a good string cheese for snacks and grated parmesan for pastas. A good sourdough bread is a must!. We recently discovered rice and almond milks, but Will still likes his good old cow milk.  The freezer is packed too with a bit of beef, a few cuts of pork, a cornish hen this time instead of our usual of chicken thighs, and a few filets of salmon and a ba g of shrimp.  Deserts this trip are little pies, chocolate pudding and oatmeal cookies...Oh and a pint of chocolate icecream.Fresh fruits and veggies fill the three tier basket: apples, bananas (Brett told us the sweetest ones have short...

A bright yellow and black wasp came buzzing through camp to say wake up; it is morning. He looked around for something sweet around our flowered tablecloth; finding nothing he flew off.  These guys are the good wasps as they attack the black widow spiders.  We found a mess of web and thought about the black widow as she spins a cobweb of no pattern and that is what we found; maybe the mud dauber was looking for her.   When we got back from our hike down to the creek we had a visitor sitting on one of the chairs: a walking stick.  They are mild insects (Insects have six legs and spiders have eight) and would make a good pet.  They were astrobugs; they went into space four different mission.  The first was back in 1972, the Apollo mission.  They flew with the Russians and Americans in 1975, the Apollo-Soyuz mission.  In 1985 they were on Skylab and they boarded the Space Shuttle Atlantis in 1992.  One would make a great pet:  They don'...

Once upon a time in a small section of stream flowing through a woods, little fishes lived. They huddled under a rock overhang in the shade and in its shadow venturing out to warm themselves in the afternoon sun. It was at such a time when two humans came along to look into the stream. Quickly the little fishes darted to the safety of their overhang. But time passed. Time for little fishes is not like human time. For these little creatures a few seconds passes for hours and so the little fishes soon ventured back out. First a few brave youngsters and slowly some older fatter ones. They moved with the current but were careful not to go over the lower rock ledge; they would be lost forever so they would fight the current back to the overhang. A large bee like bug flew low over the water and these little fishes, smaller than the big bee bug, jumped and tried to grab hold of it's legs! Perhaps some wanted to go for a ride. Or maybe it was to bring the bug into the water so all could ...

We are trying to learn Kendra's new song, Somewhere Where the Road Don't Move.  I remember the first time Will and I were somewhere where the road didnt move.  We were driving on the back roads of West Virginia ( I can almost hear the strains of Blue Stone Mountain playing in the background) and not quite sure where we were.  We past this place, I guess it was a house up in the hollers,  There was a man and his dog out by the road, so Will stopped and said, "Howdy.  Can you tell me if this road goes to Beckley?"  The man looked at Will and he looked at the road in both directions.  He looked back at Will and he said, "Sonny, I've lived here all my life and I never see'd that road go nowhere's." You can hear RedHead Express sing this song at their website:  www.redheadexpress.com

This is a story of people on the move. The Chickasaw and the Choctaw Indians walked paths following game.  The French and Spanish peoples ventured out into the world and walked this trail bringing their pack mules and making the path a trail. These people mapped the land.  Travelers used the map and tramped the crude trail making it a wilderness road. Farmers moved goods along the road making it wider.   Soon people built inns along the road.  Thieves aded a danger along with swamps, disease carrying insects. People wanted a safer way to travel and soon they found it with the steamboat travels and the bustling trace became a peaceful forest lane. Today parallel to that lane is a National Scenic Byway. We walked along this trace for several hours today.  We could feel the history in our feet.  We imagined the Indians hunting deer; the early explorers picking a route, the travelers coming to a new land, the farmers m...

The gray road filled with traffic and stop lights have given way to the gray road under our tires with no traffic lights or stop signs. A beautiful drive-Natchez Trace. It all began with the age old need to get from one point to another. The new Parkway parallels the old trace and gives travelers an unhurried way to get from Natchez to Nashville among important examples of our nation's natural and cultural heritage. There. A brown sign; Meriwether Lewis Monument and Gravesite: On October 11,1809, just ten days and two hundred years ago, Meriwether Lewis died here of what are believed to be self inflected gunshot wounds. He was on his way to Washington with is journals. The monument, designed with a broken shaft showing his life was cut short at age 35, marks his grave. It was getting along in the day when we drove through the campground to check it out and found a travelers surprise: a free 32 site campground. It is a first come first serve no reservation 14-day limited faci...

Apryll took us to the zoo today, Chorus: We're goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo How about you, you, you? You can come too, too, too We're goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo. See the elephant with the long trunk swingin' Great big ears and a long trunk swingin' Snuffin' up peanuts with a long trunk swingin' And we can stay all day!   (Chorus) See all the monkeys they're scritch-scritch scratchin' jumpin' around and scritch-scritch scratchin' Hangin' by the long-tail  (huff huff huff) And we can stay all day!   (Chorus) There's a big black bear he's a huff-puff-a-puffin' His coat's too heavy he's a huff-puff-a-puffin' Don't get too near the huff-puff-a-puffin' Or you won't stay all day!   (Chorus) Well the seals in the pool all honk-honk-honkin' Catchin' the fish and honk-honk-honkin' Little tiny seals all honk-honk-honkin' And we can stay all day!   (Chorus) Well we stayed all day and ...

We have spent the last few days with good friends enjoying each other's company and companionship and making our ties a little stronger.  We have made meals, baked goodies, learned new things like making peannut butter and shared new ways of doing old things like math, we ventured out and stayed in and all the while there is the great joy and comfort one feels around kindred spirits.  We tagged along when they went for their interview and heard them play live for the video. The music is wonderful and new and happy and makes you want to tap along; the words are catchy and make you think or just want to sing along.  You know who we are with now right?  The Walker family.  Check out there new demo songs at www.RedHead Express.com