Head West not so young Man

[ultrarunner]

Looks like no San Francisco and surrounds in the plans?

 

[daugen]

not this time Ultrarunner, it just made the trip too long.
But I do want to see California before it slides into the sea
so I'll get there. Besides, my sister is constantly talking of retiring to SF, she loves the place.

I'd love to tour the vineyards, but think I'll fly out and rent a fun car to do that. Some day.

 

[ultrarunner]

Just had visitors from Switzerland.

They had never been to the United States and with the winter storm airport problems they were diverted to SF for a 30 hour layover going home from Hawaii.

They loved seeing SF and insisted on a quick trip to the redwoods. I'm sure they will be back.

 

[daugen]

One of the things I want to do as i come home through the Heartland and into Ohio and Indiana is to find several Quaker Meetings "out there" and visit with them
on Sunday mornings. It will be quite new for me since those Mid Atlantic Quakers who are members of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, sort of the birthplace of US Quakers, William Penn, etc, worship in mostly silence and individuals speak if they are so moved to. There is no organized clergy, no pulpit and it's fairly quiet. My late wife likened it to watching paint dry...ok, it's definitely an acquired taste. But out West, meaning further out than PA, the Meetings are mostly different, having a leader/clergy, singing and whatever else I'm going to find out. Kind of curious how "lively" the experience will be. Some of the Meetings are almost evangelical Christian types and those I try to avoid. But this is my time to experience "the other way" and bring those experiences home to share with local friends/Friends.

So I'm on a "church" hunt of sorts. I'd like to visit different religions too. Too bad Dearborn Michigan is so far North and out of my route to come home. That would be interesting. Certainly not going to get into any Mormon churches.

So...US cathedrals? They would be neat to see also. I've done the European castle and church tour once, but not in the US. I don't care if you have faith or not, stand inside a huge cathedral and most folk get goosebumps.

 

[ronjhall]

Too bad Dearborn Michigan is so far North and out of my route to come home. That would be interesting. Certainly not going to get into any Mormon churches.

65 miles north of I-80,90 is too far out of the way. It's RVing. Enjoy the side trips. :thumbsup:

 

[dmccarty]

big change in plans. Well not so big. My good friend who lives in Memphis seems to have moved to St. Augustine Florida, so.....
On the heading West part, I will now head South first, probably down to Charleston from Wilmington NC, then headed down to St. Augustine, then
West to Altha Florida where I'm going to mooch for several months... and then along the Gulf to New Orleans. This way I get to see more ocean and beaches, which is fine by me. No desire to go to Disneyland, again...too many people. No desire to wrestle an alligator, much less eat one. I really need to leave Florida for a separate trip, as I want to spend time down near Sanibel. Maybe next winter, there's a plan...

So I know on the way home I'm coming through St. Louis now but I need to redraw my lines again and start investigating rv places along the Gulf of Mexico. And a different route coming home. all fun to do. That I will start working on this afternoon.

We keep planning, but never quite make it to Charleston, SC. We want to visit the city but I especially want to see Patriots Point which has an air craft carrier and some other ships I would love to see. One of the ships the Laffey, was in WWII and was hit by four bombs and six Kamikazi's yet somehow managed to stay afloat. There are photos of her after the battle were her main deck was just barely above water. Somehow the ship survived the battle and return the US where she was repaired, which is surprising given the damage, and she returned to service. The Laffey served until the mid 70s. I think most people visiting Patriots Point want to see the carrier, I know I do, but I really want to see the Laffeey.

Also Wilmington, NC has the USS North Carolina which is a great ship to tour. I can spend all day on her but never get but 3-4 hours at best. You should be able to easily park at the USS North Carolina. Avoid a Friday as it seems that day they get a school field trips and their can be lots of kids running around.

Disneyland is in CA. Disney World is in FLA. :laughing::laughing::laughing: In case you did not know it, Disney World has a campground called Fort Wilderness. You can tent camp or park a huge RV. It is one of the cheapest ways to stay at Disney World. The camp ground is a hidden gem and very nice. Depending on when you go to FLA, there are slow times, mainly in the fall, winter or spring, where there are not that many people at WDW.

I have seen Apollo moon missions and space shuttle launches from various places over FLA but I have never been to Cape Canaveral. :shocked: We though we might in 12/2012 but we did not make it. Seems like I remember seeing that they had RV parking.

Later,
Dan

 

[daugen]

Chevrolet Spark Only Subcompact To Pass IIHS Small-Overlap Test

not looking too good for the Honda Fit...

well my arm is in a cast; can't do much so going to work on this for a few days.
hope to post a new map soon.

 

[grsthegreat]

I am starting the process of planning my motorhome trip out West this coming Spring. I know it's lame to post pics of a pc screen; I sure am not smart enough to capture the Google image, and I haven't joined them as a member yet,(do I want even more tracking of my activities?...)so this is the best I can do.

Most of the places with push pins are relatives and friends. I also want to see the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. Along this general path, can some of you make suggestions on what to see/not miss? I'll be pulling a Golf TDI so I can go exploring pretty easily. I noticed immediately the path takes me right through Waterloo Iowa. Now we all know what's there...sure not going to miss the home of Big Green. My actual route will be determined by the locations of the campgrounds I will stay in, but in this general path shown on the pics, what should I see? Can't do the West Coast on this trip, too long.

I intend to take as many farm equipment pics as possible, and will post them here as the trip goes along. Probably leaving late March.

Not interested in sports attractions, sorry diehard fans, nor Nascar, one thousand sorries..., but love history and local culture.
Travels with Charley, 2014 style.

thats a heck of a trip. The wife and i rented a car and drove from Idaho to the world equestrian games in Kentucky a few years ago. was a 5,000 mi give or take trip. Made lots of stops and detours (custers battlefield, mt rushmore and crazy horse, deadwood, yellowstone, grand teton, some cave tours, etc). was both alot of fun...and very boring at times.

after 5,000 miles i was glad to be home. haven't planned anything like that again, as im not a fan of driving. However we do like to site see. I just plan on doing smaller trips in the future..not so much at one time.

Have fun on your trip. you'll probably end up with 5,000 digital pics too. I still haven't worked through all of ours.


Oh, and i did get to trust my GPS. it only failed me one time in Nashville....it kept directing me into the projects and wanted me to go the wrong way on a one way street.

 

[daugen]

Well, I've made good progress. First of all, i decided not to go to Florida because it would've done the same thing that going to California would do, made this trip impossibly long.

I know that it is seriously lame to post pictures of the screen but no I still can't figure out how to do a screen capture; granted I didn't try very hard. Several realities became very clear to me after trying to plot this trip by the actual highways taken and not just from point-to-point. I had to really stare at the screen and zoom in to find a road going from west to east across South Colorado. Wow what a curving road. But that didn't hold a candle to the road going into Yellowstone Park. By the time I had drawn that line which curved about 2000 times, I wasn't sure I really wanted to drive a motorhome through there. Maybe a Porsche But I'm sure an awful lot of people do; it's just that you seem to get on the only road heading west into the park and it goes here there and everywhere and anywhere but straight.

And then to get out of Yellowstone Park is a real treat. Apparently you either backtrack and come back the way I came or I head North through some seriously rugged country and then head east into Idaho. I think by the time I get to Colorado I will know whether I have the energy to make that drive.

There is another drive that I'm not at all sure about either. I thought it would be nice to go into Charleston West Virginia. But then how does one get out? Again, either back up like crazy or head north on this apparently small road that goes through an unending amount of forest and likely mountains and finally winds up near Pennsylvania. Boy I sure wouldn't take that road in the winter. And what was really strange is that there are almost no RV facilities along that entire stretch. I'm sure there are some Walmarts along the way so there's always some place to stop for the night, but maybe I should go back West a little and then head north to avoid driving up through the entire state of West Virginia. However it might be very pretty.

So if anyone knows or has driven on Route 79 in West Virginia, is it a nice road?

All of the pushpins shown here are RV resorts, which I would then take my car out from to explore. So basically anything within about an hour of this general line, or more I suppose if it's pretty neat, is fair game.

I have an awful lot more work to do here and I haven't incorporated any of the suggestions given to me: most of those will be on day trips in the car. There is a whole section in Iowa but I'm not sure of, other than I know I want to take the factory tour of the John Deere plant.

If I stay three days at each of my stops I'm up to about four months now, so needless to say, a few of these stops will be over nighters. Because I'm sure there will be a few places I'm going to want to stay a while.

Lastly, I haven't sorted out Texas but I'm sure I will get some advice on that.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

I79 in WV is OK, some hills.

screen capture:
hold ALT and press PRTSC (ALT captures current window, CTRL captures entire screen)
open photo program, like paint or Irfanview, and paste into it. save the file.

Rt 160 crosses southern colorado