Next Stop-Sharp RV Park and Trina's House

Today we arrived at Sharp RV Park. It was situated about halfway between St. Joseph and Marlon's sister Trina's house in Savannah, Missouri.

Here was our site. It was one of only a few pull-thru sites in the park.

We sat on the upper level of the park overlooking the motorhomes and fifth wheels on the lower level.

Here we ran into something we hadn't ever seen or at least noticed before---these creepy webworms.

Apparently webworms are common in high humidity areas and areas of extended heavy rain. These can be found in the northern USA and all the way down into Texas. They are pretty harmless to mature trees but can strip a sapling of all of its foliage.

The Cuckoo Bird is a common predator, opening the nest with its downward-curving bill and dining on the occupants.

Speaking of Cuckoos, that evening we went to Trina's house for hot dogs and swimming. This is Trina.

This is not a hot dog. This is Casey, Trina's owner.

Here's Mason, Trina's grandson, ready for the pool.

Mason's mom, Jennifer, thinks she may have a kidney stone.

Jennifer's husband, Shannon, decides it's time to cook the dogs.

Mmm...acid reflux here we come.

Marlon finds time to take a dip so he can soak Doug.

Nighttime comes and the water wars continued as Doug and Mason were pitted against Marlon and Dillon, Mason's older brother.

Trina takes comfort in knowing no one has the cojones to turn the Super Soaker on her.

The next day we came back to Trina's house for some more visiting.

Then Marlon and Trina attempted a deep knee bend.

They almost made it.

For more pictures of the pool party and Sharp RV Park, go to http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/swimming-and-dinner/ and http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/stayingatsharprvpar/ .

To be continued...

Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure-Salina, Kansas

Today we ventured 38 miles west (yes back toward where we had already come from) to visit Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure.

Rolling Hills opened in 1999 with a zoo and then added a wildlife museum in 2005.

This Chilean Flamingo was searching for a feast.

Here are a couple of black tailed prairie dogs braving the heat.

I (Doug) crawled through a tunnel in order to enter this glass cube to view the American Black Bear (we think). The bear can be seen way back behind the glass cube on the left. We waited for him to come closer but he was otherwise involved.

It was too hot for Marlon, so he paid $3 to ride the train through the zoo all day long.

Actually, it was a great way to get the feel of the layout of the zoo. It also saved us a lot of reading as the driver of the tram told us pretty much everything we would ever want to know about every animal in the park.

This little guy is a capybara. Capybaras are the largest rodents in the world.

The giraffe catching us peeking through the trees.

Just like humans do, this orangutan fell asleep while reading.

This log must have been filled with a tasty treat as the chimpanzee would insert this stick in a hole in the log and then lick the stick. Yum!

When we got on the train to go to the Museum at Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure the driver told us it was so hot that there was only 2 other people in the zoo (this was at 3:00pm). Doug appears to be ready for some AC.

This is a "Lion King"-like exhibit in the museum.

Marlon tries to get a signal to make a phone call.

Marlon visited Rolling Hills Zoo and all he got was this picture of himself beside a sign that says "I visited Rolling Hills Zoo, Salina KS."

Now that our visit to Rolling Hills was over, it was time to head back to the RV and get ready for the next morning's journey on to St. Joseph, Missouri to visit Marlon's family and friends.

To see the rest of the pictures taken at Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure go to http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/rolling-hills-wildl/ .

To be continued...

Wamego, Kansas-Population 4,246

While staying in Abilene, we decided to see a few of the sites nearby. On Saturday, we went to Wamego, Kansas to visit the Oz Museum.

While there we learned a lot about the history of the Frank Oz book and its sequels. We also watched a couple of videos on the making of the 1939 movie. We found out that Buddy Ebsen (aka Jed Clampett and Barnaby Jones) was originally cast as the Scarecrow. Ray Bolger had been cast as the Tin Man. Bolger persuaded Ebsen and the studio to switch the actors' roles. However, Ebsen had an allergic reaction to the aluminum dust used in the Tin Man's costume and was hospitalized for 2 weeks and replaced by Jack Haley.

The Deadly Poppy Fields proved tiring to Marlon...

Across the street from The Oz Museum we ate at The Friendly Cooker. This is the only restaurant we have eaten at so far that charges you 10 cents (!) when you ask for "everything" on your pork tenderloin sandwich. Apparently the price on the menu does not include "everything".

Then we headed over to see The Old Dutch Mill pictured on The Friendly Cooker's menu. This mill was built 12 miles outside of town by a Dutch immigrant in 1879 and moved to town in 1925 stone by stone. Each stone was numbered and the Mill was reassembled exactly like it had been originally. The Mill currently sits on the grounds of the Wamego Museum which consists of several old buildings from the 1800's.

The Old Dutch Mill and Museum are located on one end of the Wamego City Park.

Overall, Wamego was a nice little town. If we had gotten around a little earlier, we might have found some other things to see...maybe next time.

By the way, did we mention it was kind of hot here?

For more pictures of the Oz Museum, The Old Dutch Mill and Wamego City Park go to: http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/oz-museum-and-wameg/ .

To be continued...

Denver, Colorado to Abilene, Kansas

At 7:00 pm we were ready to head down the road. Marlon leaned back and took hold of the wheel...

and we all prepared ourselves for the first 200 mile leg of our journey across mind-numbing Kansas. Sammy attempted to relax...

and about 3 hours later, we pulled into our first RV Resort. They called it Walmart and it was located in Goodland, Kansas.

There were no amenities offered at this resort.

The lack of amenities depressed Chatfield and he contemplated jumping!

Boy, were we glad he changed his mind at the last minute!

The next day we finished the next 200 mile or so leg of our journey and ended up at 4 Seasons RV Park in Abilene, Kansas where it was only 102 degrees with humidity of about 90%. Here was our RV site.

We would be staying here 3 nights and planned on visiting The Oz Museum in Wamego, Kansas and Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure in Salina, Kansas... For more pictures of this part of our travels, go to http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/leaving-denver-colo/ .

To be continued...

Colorado The Final Days

The day we checked out of Cherry Creek State Park, we took the RV to the RV dealer to have our backup camera adjusted. We could not see all of the tow car, let alone ANY of the cars in the lanes on either side of the tow car. We were there all day as the part that came from the manufacturer to make the adjustment to the camera was not painted, so we had to wait for the paint to dry. Now that the camera had a decent view of the road behind us, we could safely change lanes.

After leaving the dealership, we headed to a public scale to see whether or not we were overweight in the RV. We came in at 31,860 pounds with full diesel and full water tanks and with all occupants in the house. We were happy to find out we had 1,140 pounds of additional carrying capacity, but faced with a puzzle as the rear end of the motorhome was overweight by about 320 pounds while the front end had 1,460 pounds more it could carry. Time to do some rearranging...

Stick with me here...I left something out. On the way to the public scale, we were on the highway and got a nice big rock flung at us by a pickup truck which hit our windshield maybe 2 inches from the top and made a nice silver dollar sized rainbow shaped crack. This was our first such incident and luckily Safelite was able to fix it so that it is almost completely unnoticeable.

Although we had our house sold at this point, we had A LOT of stuff at our friend Carol's house to arrange for storage and a garage sale. She was already planning on participating in a neighborhood sale and offered to sell our stuff for us in her sale. Being clueless about having a garage sale, we were grateful for her offer. So we headed back to Chatfield for another 4 day stay using Marlon's name to get around the "2 week limit in 45 days" rule. We had this great back-in site.

Having come up against a Saturday night at Chatfield where absolutely NO campsites were available, it was time to move on. We moved up to the Jefferson County Fairgrounds at 6th and Indiana in Golden. Here we got to see how we would get by with 30-amp service (the RV normally uses 50-amp) which only runs 1 air conditioner on the RV at a time. Not such a problem except that it was at least 95 degrees at this point and the humidity was at a rare level for Colorado.

We learned a lot about energy management while here and managed to survive the heat and not cook the cats. While we were here, the carnival arrived for the County Fair which was to take place the next weekend.

We ended up staying here for 5 nights, 3 nights longer than originally planned. Besides finally getting all our stuff organized to sell and store, this is what we did...

Ate at Red Lobster with Carol.

Had dinner with our friends Kevin and Terry. They are raising their head high to conceal their double chins, not that they have any.

Ate as many free cookies as we could as free cookies are not going to be an everyday occurrence in retirement.

And had one final farewell dinner with Carol.

And then, on Thursday, August 9th, we found ourselves heading east, leaving the Centennial State of Colorado---our home for 13 years---and heading toward the Sunflower State of Kansas.

To look at more pictures, you can always go to http://public.fotki.com/Marlonfleenor/1/2007/august/ .

To be continued...