Sunday February 23, 2014

Various observations on our 1st retirement trip.
We've been on the road for a month and haven't hurt each other yet!  ;-)  Quite an accomplishment, huh?
It's been a cold trip.  (Well, duh! - it's winter.)  Not cold like back home in Ohio.  No - it hasn't even reached single digits where we've been.  Back home it's been single (and double) MINUS digits.  Our third night on the road produced 25 degrees in Savannah, GA.  A full week in St Pete Beach, FL garnered us maybe 2 days of sun and temps conducive to walking the beach in shorts and t-shirt, but generally windy, gray, and chilly.  Amelia Island in FL wasn't much better.  ...and then there's the 2014 icestorm in Aiken, SC.  Probably the #1 choice for a retirement relocation, but come time to leave and the roads are closed and the city is pretty much shut down due to icy roads and fallen trees blocking anywhere you want to go.  A tree was even leaning on our car from the wieght of the ice on the limbs.  Fortunately, we were able to move the car before the city had to cut it down, and there was no damage.  We had to extend our "visit" in Aiken by and extra 3 days, and spent the last night without lights or heat.  Our "home" for the week, the Carriage House Inn, was kind enough to not charge us for that last nights stay.  The storm didn't stop in Aiken.  It then proceeded to dump enough snow to prohibit us from visiting our next destination - Asheville, NC.  We get the message - NC is not where we are suppose to relocate.
Let's go visit some relatives!  Fort Payne, AL.  The home of Rick and Kathy Kuhn.  Louises' sister and brother-in-law.  It's been quite some time since we've seen them and a visit is certainly in order.  This was supposed to be a week to recuperate from the past couple weeks travel and get ready for the really long trip out west, but the extra few days in S.C. were enough "off" time to re-charge the batteries.  That, however, didn't mean we couldn't laze around for a few days and make friends with the myriad of cows, dogs, mules, goats and whatever else was out there to greet us as we took our morning/afternoon walks while the two of them had to go off and earn a living.  It also was a time to save our reputation as the official delivery couple of bad weather.  While most of the week was pleasant, we were able to conjure up enough wind to bring a tornado to Ft Payne.  It was my first brush with a real tornado threat that I know I don't want to go through it again.  Sirens blaring, lightning, horizontal rain - all while we're dashing to the garage where the underground safehouse is located.  The sirens eventually ended, as did the wind and the rain, but sleep came slowly as the adrenaline level slowly subsided.