The 2006 Travels of Richard n Shirley

Its late in the day but still the sun is up. DW's mom is doing ok. She was in the ER again friday and we packed and moved back to Benbrook Lake till we know more. She passed the cath lab and now its on to the family Dr for further decisions. More on this when it happens. DW will be spending most of her time there and we will stay here till she is well.

A few more pics of the campgrounds before we leave. The pic of the farm is a reminder of what you had and what you have to give up to get water.

We will be going back to Benbrook Lake instead of going south. DW's mom is having some tests today and next week and we will be there. Since we are east of Dallas at Lake Lavon, we will make the short trip back on either saturday or sunday. All this depends on the test results of tomorrow instead of today.

More of the birds, geese, from the other day. There were atleast a hundred when they all got together. The day was clear, warm and a perfect day to go flying. And off they went.

They are in a circle pattern as they all gather. They circled several times.



One more view of the camping area. The sites 1-10 and 12 are FUH but most are not to desirable. If you have a 5th or travel trailer, these will make do much better than a motorhome. The sites just slope down the hill too severly. Several MH had there front wheels off the ground on the uphill side. And the trailers were very low in front on the down hill side and high in front on the uphill side.
We managed to get one of the very few sites not to sloping.


This is today's skies. The front came thru yesterday and the temp went from 87 to 47 this morning. The wind is blowing at
10-15 with gusts to 27. What rain we had is gone east and we are left with low clouds and wind. Not a pleasent day so we are stayng in tll this evening.

DW has washed her hair and still in her robe. I'm in my flannel pj's. We have one of the electric heaters running so we are warm and cozy. The RV does leak air which means we are getting some of the outside air inside. The good side is we are getting an air change, the bad side is we are getting the cooler air in for the air change. But life is good.

Forecast for Sunday is windy. Not good as that is our travel day. Looks like we will move on Saturday instead to not be on the road in the wind. I'd sure hate to et this thing blown over. With our shopping for new insurance, a claim on the current provider would be a nightmare. A claim on the new provider would be an even worse nightmare. But, its all in risk. There betting we don't have a major claim and we are being as safe as possible so we don't have a claim. But with this 36 foot beast, my money is on a claim of some kind in the year ahead so I have insurance.

Our plans for this evening are to pickup pizza and be at the grandkids around 6 pm. My grandaughter called and asked us over last night but we said tomorrow would be better. It was to late to be there. We can have more time with them on a planned evening then a spur of the moment. Its also MUCH better on the mommy and daddy too! Beside the boys want another shot at grandpa on the air hocky table. It seems he beat them badly. And they want grandma, DW, there too.

We woke up to a warm 65* morning with a forecast high of 85*. It got to 87* before the front hit and down the temp went. The wind came up and turned to the north, the temp started its downward turn, and some clouds have made their presence known. At this time we have west clouds, winds blowing at 17 and gusty and rain in the forecast. The rain we can use.
The birds woke up and circled above then off they went. They were really geese heading south.

A pic of our RV from above on the hill. It is brown and dry. More rain is needed to break the dry spell and rain to keep it broken.

The little trees that have been planted appear to have died.

The lake is in the background.



A closeup of our space with the new toad and the ready to go RV. We will be leaving here on or by Sunday morning and headed south. We will stop along the way and see the COE and local sights.

We are also shopping for new insurance for the RV and Suv and Cavalier. Our current provider has doubled our current rate and the pretext that our "move" to the new zip code caused the rates to go up.

We had all that rain over the weekend and now the ground is soaked. With the air temp higher than the ground temp, we have fog. This view is up the hill toward the fuh hookups. They are about 100 yds away.

The ground is very muddy.



Then we have a pic of our space 24 here at Lake Lavon. Its very brown and dry. Look at the Lake Benbrook pics and see the differency 91 miles makes.

We are east of where we were and it should be greener as you travel east. IE, you get more Gulf moisture vs more Mexico dry and heat.



A view across the lake with the fog. The following pics are of different days or later in the day and the fog is gone.

It was pretty at dawn but not when the sun came up.





Seems like a little police activity on Monday morning. There was a car parked in the parking lot and the police were called. They drove up very cautiously. The car can be seen beyond the closer of the two police cars in a later pic.





This officer is working at getting the mud off his boot soles. He and his partner had to walk out to the guy fishing and this ment getting into the mud.

All went well. The guy must have stayed over and was here when they opened the gate. Since you can not drive in during off hours, 10 pm to 6 am, he was missed by the hosts.


The car in question is seen just over the top of the police car.,

All ended without shots being fired, dogs (not any) attacking, a chase, helicopter overhead, etc. Gosh, that ruined a good story.

More on our space and the area here on later posts. With no rain, we can get some pics. We plan on going to town(s) and see the sights while we are here visiting my son and three grandkids.

It is his 38th birthday today. We went out to eat last night to celebrate, his choice of place to go. He did well. Went to night school to get his degree, conmputer engineering, and found a good company to work for. They just bought a new HUGH house. I'm proud of him and his sister.

We moved Sunday morning and got to Lake Lavon about 10 am. We got a few showers on the way but nothing like the rain since then. It has finally stopped and we are getting partly cloudy skies. I don't have any rain totals yet but I will guess that we got 5-8 inches since Saturday night. We put up the Direcway dish this afternoon and now we are on line.
EDIT- we got 3.5" at Wylie as of tonights news on NBC5. Not bad.

We will be here till Sunday morning and then make our way south. We will stop at two locations prior to making it tp Canyon Lake. Tomorrow is my sons birthday and we are going out to eat tonight. Pictures of our area will be forth coming now that the rain has stopped. This is a large lake and is about 12 feet below normal pool level. We are northeast of Dallas near Rockwall and Lavon.

GPS: N33* 02.704', W96* 26.674'
Temp: 74*
Mileage: 91 from Benbrook Lake to Lavon Lake- via I20, I30, CR205 and US78 to the city of Lavon, TX.