Dave and Judy Moss

We left home yesterday and drove to the Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA) campground in Cincinnati, Ohio. The drive was very easy. The campground was very nice with full hookups. The member price was $15.00. We went to Mango Tree for for dinner. Wonderful Thai food and Sushi! Today, 8/25,

We drove to the Mercer/Grove City KOA in Pennsylvania. Very uneventful drive. When we stopped for diesel, the storm clouds we had been trying to catch up to all day caught us. Dave started pumping fuel and there was a torrential downpour that lasted about 10 minutes.

The check-in person at the campground recommended a burger restaurant called Black Out. It was absolutely wonderful.

We drove from Grove City, Pennsylvania to Andover, New Jersey. The drive was beautiful. We are at Panther Lake Campground. We stayed here eight years ago and it was a much smaller campground, but it is still beautiful.

We went to dinner at the Hampton Diner. The portions were huge! The food was excellent. We had matzah ball soup with our dinner. The specials came with cake. The cake was Peanut Butter Cheesecake.

Today, 8/27, we are taking the day off. We did our laundry. Our lunch was yummy. We both had large turkey sandwiches from my leftovers. Dave is making burritos for dinner tonight.

FMCA campground

Panther Lake

Bandelier is a newer national monument located outside Santa Fe, New Mexico. Ancestral Pueblo people inhabited the canyon from approximately 1150 CE and 1550 CE. There are cliff dwellings as well as ground built dwellings. The people farmed the land and consumed small animals such as rabbits and squirrels. They left the land due to drought and the land was not able to support the people. We walked a little over a mile to and handicap accessible trails to see most of the main dwellings.

Canyon where the people lived

Dwelling built into the volcanic walls

Giant Kiva used by the Pueblo people for religious and other gatherings

I did climb the ladder leading to a small room

We took a ride on the Verde Canyon Railroad. This is our second trip. The railroad was first opened in 1990 on old freight lines used for copper mining. Much of the railroad was hand built including several bridges and one 734 foot tunnel. We were able to see cliff dwellings built by the Sinagua. These were built approximately 1130 AD through 1300 AD. The only wildlife we saw today was a blue heron in the river adjacent to the tracks. The ride began in Clarkdale, Arizona, goes about 25 miles to Perkinsville, an abandoned town. The engines are then moved to the front of the train for the ride back. The engines were used by the Alaskan Railroad until the late 1980’s when the Verde Canyon Railroad took control of the engines.

EACH PAIR OF PASSENGER CARS HAS AN OUTSIDE VIEWING CAR

SLAG PILE AS A RESULT OF THE COPPER MINING

SINAGUA CLIFF DWELLING

BLUE HERON

OLD TELEGRAPH POLE

We left Las Vegas yesterday for the Distant Drums RV Resort in Camp Verde, Arizona. We left Vegas several weeks later then we anticipated since NIRVC had to replace our shower door under warranty. The new door finally arrived last Thursday, they installed it Monday, and we left for Camp Verde Wednesday.

Distant Drums is on the Yavzapai-Apache reservation and is one of the nicer RV parks we have been too. We plan to do some sight seeing, visit my cousin Jason, and take another scenic trip on the Verde Canyon Railroad.

Our last stop on our current trip was the Great Smokey Mountains which is located in Tennessee and parts of North Carolina and Virginia. We stayed for two weeks at a KOA in Cosby, Tennessee which was probably one of the nicest KOA’s we have stayed at. The Great Smokey Mountains was beautiful and the weather did cooperate for most of our stay. We did quite a few drives in the park and we were able to see bears, wild turkeys and elk. This is the first time we watched a bear in the trees going from tree-to-tree about 20 feet off the ground; I’m glad we had our telephoto lenses with us. We even saw a bear walk past the window we were sitting next too when we were having dinner at a steak restaurant.

Though some of their research and their bike shop was located in Dayton, OH. The Wright Brothers flew their experimental plane in Kill Devil Hills, NC. They made four flights the shortest being approximately 120 feet and the final test flight at approximately 820 feet. The actual runway and flight path are marked by small rock markers showing the four flights.

Monument on a hill overlooking the runway and work buildings of the Wright Brothers

The large stone marker on the left is where the engine was started and the flights began. To the right, you can see the markers for the first-three flights.

This marker indicates the fourth flight approximately 820 feet from the start.

We visited four lighthouses on the Outer Banks and Cape Hatteras on the shore of North Carolina. Dave was able to climb the Currituck Beach Lighthouse; 220 steps. We had to take an hour ferryboat ride to see the Ocracoke Lighthouse. The Cape Hatteras Lighthouse is currently undergoing renovations. It is the tallest lighthouse in North America.

Currituck Beach Lighthouse

We were lucky in our timing to see the Air Space Museum. It had been closed for renovations for the past four years and only half reopened September 2023, the other half is set to reopen next year. It was dark inside and no flash is allowed so it was difficult to get good pictures.

New London is a coastal city in Connecticut. We visited New London for a several hour water tour to see light houses and the old fort. We also passed General Dynamics Electric Boat Works where submarines are built. Unfortunately, we went to the U.S. Navel base to see the submarine museum but is was closed due to a power outage.

Mystic began as a seaport in Connecticut in 1784. Over 600 ships were built there. Today, there is an aquarium and the Seaport Museum which has been modeled after Colonial Williamsburg. Aside from a boat museum and an Indian history museum, shops have been setup to create, repair and manufacture supplies and parts for the C. W. Morgan whaling ship. The shops create everything by hand, including metal works, ropes, wooden parts and even an original printing press.