There Is Always Something That Goes Wrong

— Posted inTravel — 2 min read

After another long drive we arrived back at our RV lot in the Rio Grand Valley of Texas. This trip was just over 8,000 miles and lasted nearly 5 months. (Statistics tomorrow, maybe, possibly, hopefully.

Back to the title of this post. First problem was the battery in the Cherokee was dead when we unhitched and I had stopped on the street directly in front of our driveway. Had to turn the RV around and jump the Cherokee to get it started. Problem one solved.

Problem number two. When we hooked up the water to the 5th wheel ( we always disconnect everything when we leave) there was only a trickle of water inside the RV at the water faucets. Turned out the end of the green hose that connects to the 5th wheel was clogged with a grayish hard water deposit. Some scraping with a screwdriver followd by a good flushing og the hose and all was well on the water front.

Problem number 3 was the sewer hose. I had planned on shortening the hose before we left but is often want to happen, it was only a plan and not something that happened. Applying a utility knife and and wire cutting pliers then taking the end off the one piece of hose and moving to the other resulted in a much improved connection. Of course these three things were in addition to the many, many other things that need be done when ever we return from an extended trip. Many of which will wait until tomorrow to be accomplished. Till then…

Not a Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Spider

— Posted inNature — 1 min read
silver garden orb-weaving spider

Not being an arachnologist and after searching the internet, I believe this is a silver garden orb-weaving spider also know as the silver argiope with the scientific name Argiope argentata.

She was on the electric pedestal at our current RV site. It’s a she because of her size. Glad I was very careful to avoid her her when I plugged in the the power cord. Turns out she eats the male just like the Black Widow does.

2023 LTV Rally

— Posted inOther — 1 min read

September 6, 2023

We have had our travel RV now for more than 2 1/2 years, but have little interaction with other owners of this make of RV, but that ends starting today. We have just arrived at the 2023 LTV Rally in Winkler, Manitoba which is where the LTV factory is located. Being among the early arrivals, plus being assigned parking away from the center of all the action, I plan to have another post later today better depicting what over 200 LTVs look like.

Our RV is the partially hidden one.

An attempt at a 360 degree view from the hill where the first photo was taken. Most of the parking spaces are actually in the trees near the center of this photo, so they will never show. Don’t worry, I won’t be taking any more phots like this one.

A Unique Experience

— Posted inOther — 3 min read

September 2, 2023

While visiting friends in Canada during harvest time we had the opportunity to experience something new to both of us.

One of their fields was being harvested by the farmer who rented it. We had seen combines in fields over and over during our travels this summer, but now we were going to get see one up close.

Make that, Very Up Close! Linda, being a farm girl when little was so exited to be able to ride along. Her dad owned a farm implement store at one time in the 1950’s and she said how much he would be amazed at the changes from then until now.

My turn in the jump seat. The amount of technology in these big machines is unreal. Gary, the farmer operating the combine would turn it around at the end of a pass, push a button and the autopilot would take over and he remarked how much better all this technology made his life.

Transferring the crop from the combine to the transport trailer was as simple as pushing another button. The GPS in the tractor pulling the trailer made sure it was lined up precisely with the combine to make the transfer.

This is the seed head of what they were harvesting, “canola”, a special cultivar of rapeseed developed in Winnipeg, Canada, not all that far from the our friend’s farm where we are staying. It is used as a vegetable oil and a source of protein meal. In the US we tend to think of it as something grown only in Canada, but actually rapeseed is the third largest source of vegetable oil and the second largest source of protein meal in the world, being grown in many other countries..

The seeds are tiny, about the size of poppy seeds. With each seed being approximately 40 % oil, it is hard to imagine the number of seeds it takes to make a quart canola oil, but by my admittedly very rough approximation it would be somewhere around 450,000 seeds on average. At least I hope my order of magnitude is correct.

So often we never think about what it takes to put the foods we consume onto the store shelves. Agriculture has been modernized in so many ways, and while people may differ on whether some some foods are better or not, the end result has a been a far better life in general of all of humanity.

Pompeys Pillar

— Posted inOther — 2 min read

August 18, 2023

Two things have had a major bearing on the direction of our travels this summer. One was seeing our first great grandchild, the second to follow Lewis and Clark’s return trip from the Pacific coast to St. Louis in 1806. Today we visited another significant Lewis and Clark site.

It wasn’t just just men that were involved in the multi-year trek up the Missouri River and down the Columbia River to the Pacific coast and back again. Pompeys Pillar is named after the youngest person that traversed a portion of the trip by what is known as the Corps of Discovery.

Circled is what is known as the Louisiana Purchase. Land that was purchased from France by President Thomas Jefferson in 1803 and which greatly increased the land area of the young Untied States.

Mannequins in the visitor center of Capt. Clark (right) and his slave York who Clark took along on the trip.

The “pillar” is a rock outcropping above the Yellowstone River east of Billings, Montana.

The reason for the stairs. Capt. Clark craved his name and the date when climbed up on the rock. He named it Pompeys Tower, but a later historian changed it to Pompeys Pillar as it sounded better.

View from the top. I wonder what Capt. Clark saw that day from up here. History isn’t just words in a book, it is far, far more.