Our Road Trips

4/28/2014

We had a nice time in Minnesota, even if the weather didn't cooperate like we would have liked. They finally turned on the water at the campground on Friday. We guess they must have decided it wasn't going to freeze again this Spring.
Sat. evening, we all went to the Canadian Honker restaurant in Rochester for dinner & to celebrate our 45th anniversary. The walleye was delicous. We had the whole family together for Easter at Sue & Brad's. Everyone misses Virgil & Marge...first time we all got together since they left us last summer.
Monday, the girls & I drove to Red Wing & went to the cemetary for a Spring clean-up. The VA had put a new marker for Virgil, noting his time in the Army during WW II, nice touch. I saw Whitey & Rick Taylor that afternoon, doing some catch up. The girls went to lunch and went shopping.
Tuesday, we went to Northfield (home of the final bank robbery by Jessie James & his gang ) to see my brother & Lynne. We spent the afternoon talking and discussing a porch project they are planning. Everyone is real sick of winter, it has been an extremely tough one. We had dinner in downtown Northfield next to the Cannon River...pretty spot. We spent the night there.
Thursday, we drove to Winona & spent the evening with Linda, Paul & Stacey. Friday, we got together at the Harbor in Red Wing with Rick Taylor, Greg Erickson (who both were in our wedding in 69), Whitey & Deb. Stephen McKenzie & Tom Hughes stopped by too, fun talking about old times & future plans. Rick is retiring from Meyers/Thomas & Betts after 42+ years next week. We worked together back in the early 70's at Meyers...seems like a lifetime ago...actually, it is.
Sat, we had Brad & Sue & the girls over to our camper for BBQ'd chicken & the fixings. It rained just as I was taking it off the grill (something new...lol ). We have been on the road for 3 weeks and we have yet to put down the awning, because of wind...
Sunday, we had 6 tickets to the Twins game against Detroit. We started for the Twin Cities and Paul called and said the game had been postponed by rain :(. I guess we aren't supposed to see any baseball...that is twice since Sept that we had tickets & didn't get to go...last Sept., we had Red Sox tickets for the day after Virgil died. So we all got together at Brad & Sue's for steak dinner and goodbyes. Brad even got hailed on while BBQing the steaks. The weather has really sucked!!
Monday, we woke to (guess what?) Rain! We waited a bit and packed up the inside of the camper. When the rain let up a bit, we unhooked utilities & hooked up the car & pulled out. As we drove west, it started raining again & the wind out of the SE got just plain brutal. When we turned south on I-35 at Owatona, the cross wind made driving quite a challenge. We were very happy to turn west at Albert Lea so the wind would be behind us. We had been planning to go NW on I-94 towards Fargo, but changed that plan when we checked the radar...the whole state was green, rain the whole way with 3 days of rain predicted. So we decided to go out into South Dakota and try to avoid some of the ugly weather. But as we went west, the wind got more brutal as we went. Near Alexandria, SD, while driving west at 60+, the wind from behind tried to pull the awning loose. I pulled over and the wind was so crazy, it was hard to even close the door on the camper. I drove real slow to the next exit and got off, turned north, and the wind pushed the awning back in place, incredible. I drove about a mile and came to a tiny town & turned so the MH was blocking the wind so I could secure the awning. I got out our ladder & secured bungee cords around the upright arms of the awning. They should be OK ...never have we encountered wind like that in 30+ years of driving motor homes...crazy!.
We did drive by and take pictures of the Corn Palace in Mitchell. It was raining & blowing, so the pictures suck, but we did try. We then drove west to Oacoma, SD where we are camped for a few days. We are west of the Missouri River, in a camground with one other camper...I guess most people know to stay home until summer arrives...lol. The owner said we were as far west as we could be without having snow to deal with :). We are going to sit here and see where the bad weather goes and act accordingly.

We are safe, we have heat (it is 38 & raining this morning), we have electricity, WIFI & satellite TV. We are on the western bank of the Missouri and the wind is still blowing at 20+, making it feel like 23...think we will stay inside most of the day :).

Steve & Barb