OUR TRAVELS

Well, we left Kalen and Amber's in Alabama.  Had a great time.  It's always good to see family!  Stopped in Roanoke, Virginia on our way to Alexandria, Virginia.  Problems happen in threes..... The air conditioner went out for the second time (first time was a !@#@! rodent a few months ago). It got uncomfortably hot in the car as we drove......We also got a chip in the windshield (compliments of a semi).  Guess we will be spending a day in New York getting both fixed. Since it was two fairly long days of driving we spent some time on the interstate and some time on side roads. The Shenandoah National Forest was pretty and the road was very twisty.  We were glad we did not take the ridge road since the top was foggy.  Stopped in a quaint town for lunch - Warrenton, VA.  The scenery was beautiful (look at that dogwood tree) and the food was tasty - especially the garlic butter knots. The drive into Alexandria (suburb of Washington, DC) was hectic with road construction and crazy

Had a great time in Madison, AL with our son Kalen and daughter-in-law Amber!  We do miss yardwork, so we twisted their arms to let us help demo a bunch of gnarly vines that had taken over an electrical transformer while Kalen built raised vegetable planters! It wasn't all work..... donuts and ice cream were rewards for our hard work.  Harry and Hermione love donuts too! Who knew that it is cheaper to buy four pints of flavor of the day frozen custard at Culver's than four individual bowls?!? We took advantage of that several times.   No pictures of the ice cream, we ate it too fast! Crossed paths with Don's sister Debbie and her husband Jack while in Alabama.  It was great to see them even for such a short time. It was hard to leave Madison.  On to the next stop - Alexandria, VA to see our daughter Alexa.

We Left Texas and are on the way to our next stop - Son Kalen and Amber's house in  Madison Alabama.   Mistakes from the road: Don't go the McDonalds in Clinton Mississippi. They're out of Diet Coke.  We hadn't eaten at McDonalds in a few years, but after a day of driving for hours it was the simple option.  One of these days we need to figure out which fast food place has the best lower calorie salads.  Suggestions are welcome.  The menu at McDonalds is on one of those screens and occasionally it displays the special of the day.  The special of the day was 2-Big Macs, 2-10 piece chicken nuggets and two fries….. After doing the math quickly,  the price for the 6 items is almost the same as 4 items we wanted, 1-Big Mac 1-10 piece chicken nuggets and two fries. So we got the additional Big Mac and 10 piece chicken nugget…….. More food is not always better……  Especially too much McDonalds food…yuk!! We took some back roads to get here.  Notes from the road: Looking for wha

Our last week in Austin was filled with plenty of sports and hiking sandwiched between lots of eating.  Forgot to take photos of the many times we played badminton.... Don says it was more of a workout now than in his 20s.  Growing older is not for the feint of heart! Baseball with grandsons Isaac and Eli.  Donna fielded and took pictures. Hiking at Emma Long Park Cheesecake Factory with Eli and our friends Harry and Hermione Skateboarding and Jump roping

Well, we left Plano more than a week ago and are just now getting to this post.  It has been a busy and fun week catching up with our son, daughter-in-law and three grandsons. Leaving Plano was easy to do mentally (we checked out a long time ago).  However, we did find that we still had too much stuff to fit in the car.  Moving into the Plano hotel had taken two Subaru Forester trips with the idea of paring down further.  We found out the morning of our departure that we hadn't pared enough, so the housekeeper has a new roll-up piano, hangers, food, etc.  Along with Harry and Hermione (from the Harry Potter movies), we said goodbye to the hotel ponds where we had spent a lot of time over the last six months and started our journey to Austin, TX. Conor and family have been great.  Conor is an amazing chef and has cooked several tasty meals for us.  We helped with yardwork and played badminton and board games.  It's been wonderful catching up and actually hugging them for the fir