Going To See America 2015

     It seems hard to believe, but the end to 2014 is closing in on us, and it's time to start the preparations for Going To See America 2015!  We had a wonderful summer up on Chateaugay Lake in upstate NY, but our 8 weeks of summer are over.  Temperatures are dropping along with the beautiful fall colors, and the Canada and Snow Geese are heading south.  That's right....there is no such thing as Canadian Geese.  They are Canada Geese.  If they were Canadian, Homeland Security would make them show passports when the crossed the border.
     It was a busy summer, and Debbie and I never seemed to get settled in at Windsong Lodge.  Lots of family happenings seemed to keep us away this spring/summer.  We started with our niece's wedding down in Lake George.  Ben and Joanne flew in from CA, so the family was together for the first time in quite a while.  Debbie tends to get dehydrated on these occasions, but the kids seem to be doing quite well out West.  We'll be seeing them again in April, and I'm sure they'll be sick of us by the time we leave.  We're really more interested in seeing the PGD Jamo, but don't tell the kids that!
     Next, MAE sprouted wings, after a tremendous job opportunity opened up for her at the U.S. Attorney's Office in Syracuse.  So we spent what seemed like days and days, packing up "some" of her belongings, and helped her set up housekeeping in a beautiful apartment complex out there.  She seemed to have settled in nicely, making several calls home to her mother from poolside at the complex.  We made a few trips out there over the summer, and even stumbled into an Irish Festival, which was quite enjoyable despite threatening weather.  MAE even got her wallet out after discovering that my beer glass was empty!  We are both extremely proud of all her accomplishments, but we'll miss "the noise" of her around the house.
     We had the opportunity to travel to NYC and see "The Captain" play his last day game at Yankee Stadium.  We splurged on some tickets and had some great seats three levels up behind home plate.  Nice padded seats too!  It's been enjoyable watching Derek play these last 20 years.  He always seems to be enjoying himself, and he brought a lot of class back to the game.  I really think these guys need to quit chasing those ridiculous salaries, and settle into 1 particular team.  There are some truly remarkable players out there, but they swap teams so often, they never get properly recognized.  Just my opinion.

As part of our Fall ritual, we were invited to attend a football game at West Point.  Jim and Colleen Monty invite us every year, and even though the weather was cool and WET, we were nice and dry in our seats.  We had an extra bonus of running into Ben's  in-laws at the game.  Mike and Jean Pearson were there along with several family members enjoying their yearly outing to West Point known as the "Hudson Huddle."  Mike's brother Frank generally does most of the cooking, although this year he passed those responsibilities down to the next generation.  We had a nice visit, and really should get together with them more often.  We were a little late making hotel reservations for West Point, so we fell back to Plan B and looked for a nice RV park in the area.  A search soon located Black Bear Campground in Florida, NY.  It's only about 20 minutes from West Point and it's a very nice campground.  There are tour buses that take campers to NYC for the day which seemed to be a great way to visit the city.  There's also tours for West Point which are available.  If you're passing through the area and want to spend a few days touring, I would recommend this campground.  You can also find information about the campground at RVillage, which I also recently discovered.   It's a great site for the RV community that is quite similar with Facebook.  There are numerous groups you can join which will link you with travelers with similar interests. You can "friend" travelers, track their locations around the country, message them, join as many groups as you want, or stay anonymous.  But it seems to be a great way to find fellow travelers or identify travelers camping in your RV park.  You just have to update your locations, and the program lets you know who's around you.  There seem to be around 11,000 members and it is growing daily.    
     We've also made some updates to our transportation.  As part of our "downsizing" we were able to trade my Jeep Wrangler "Ike" and my Cadillac for a 2014 Jeep Cherokee, "Yozo".   We made sure it had the Active Drive II transmission so we can flat-tow it behind our 2013 Allegro RED 33aa.

This will give us quite a bit more power and comfort. We've got a couple more weeks of preparation at this end, but we hope you'll join us as we start our Going To See America 2015 journey.  We think it's going to be a great trip!