Albuquerque to Upstate NY 2024

[Tom&Shelly]

After a year hiatus, we again made the trip across country. Actually got here a few weeks ago. Mom is now in an independent living facility and we moved into her old house which has been unoccupied since we left in Fall 2022. It's not in too bad shape, but we immediately got to work cleaning out old stuff. After doing that for about two weeks, and donating much to a mission run thrift store in Owego, we took the afternoon off and visited an "antique store" to see that they were selling basically the same stuff we were giving away, or even throwing away. Oh well! If we planned to be here long enough, we could probably rent a booth and might make enough to break even, before shutting it down and donating the rest to the mission.

But that's not what I'm here to write about, I'm here to write about the trip, and maybe share some places other teardroppers would like to see.

First stop was Palo Duro State Park just South of Amarillo Texas




Great scenery and some great hiking! Lots of stuff to do around the park such as helicopter tours, Jeep tours, and so forth, but instead of doing any of those, we decided to make friends with some of the regional pets



Couldn't you just hug them! Well, maybe not. We had just bought some ice cream (Blue Bunny!) and were watching them in the field next to the parking lot when they started walking over to us. Obviously friendly and...say...does that fence look strong enough?

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

From Palo Duro Canyon, we drove to Kanopolis State Park in Kansas. Along the way we stopped for lunch in the Oklahoma panhandle, at the very same picnic bench Coronodo used!



We had tuna sandwiches. Alas, the monument remains silent about Coronodo's lunch that day.

I admit, I completely forgot to take pictures of our campsite at Kanopolis. However, our reason for stopping there was to see, the next day, the Eisenhower Presidential Library, Museum, and boyhood home



He and his wife are buried in the mausoleum. A very interesting museum whcih emphasizes not only his presidency, but also his time growing up, in the Army, and especially his time as allied commander in Europe.

By visiting something in the state while we used our teardrop, I finally get to color in Kansas! I actually lived there for several years, but I was too busy to see much in those days. I was there getting a graduate degree which was total BS--before Shelly. And before the teardrop. We don't count anyplace we didn't use the teardrop to get to, or at least near, in our map.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

From Kansas, we went to Watkins Woolen Mill State Park, in Missouri. We actually picked it to be close to Independence and Kansas City, but it turns out the Woolen Mill tour is well worth it on its own merits.



Watkins went to that part of Missouri hoping to start a cotton mill, but it turned out cotten doesn't grow too well that far north. Evidently, sheep do, hence the mill. Much of the original machinery is still in there. During the tour they emphasized how dangerous working in the mills was, though I'm not sure it's much worse than farming, or much of the factory work in those days.

The campsite was nice. We had shore power, and with the heat and humidity, it was nice to have air conditioning. I need to redo the AC setup though, as the water doesn't drain properly, and everything in our front storage area got soaked. Can't test that at home, it's too dry.

The next day we toured the Truman Library and Museum in the morning. It was also very interesting.



We saw the National Museum of Toys and Miniatures in Kansas City that afternoon. (Shelly has a business making doll house furniture.) We also spent the next day in KC, and toured the World War I museum and ate lunch in Union Station before returning to camp, doing some laundry, and baking a Reeses Peanut Butter cake in the dutch oven, which we ate for breakfast the next two days.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

Our next stop was Kankakee River State Park, in Illinois. Closest place we could find to Chicago, and a nice park at that



Plenty of foliage, to the point we couldn't even see our neighbors, which is alays a feature of the best campsites. Bit of rain on the trip at this point, but it wasn't as bad as predicted. We had originally planned our trip to stop at Springfield Illinois on the way, to see the Lincoln museum, but my aunt, who we planned to visit in Chicago, warned us of Lolopolooza coming up, so we drove a full six and a half hours to get to Kankakee River two days earlier, so we could leave as Lolopolooza started.

We spent three full days "commuting" to Chicago each day, parking at my aunt's condo. We visited the Art Institute of Chicago, the Field Museum, and especially the Museum of Science and Industry. That is the home of the captured German U-boat, the U-505, taken on the high seas in early June 1944. There are many other interesting things at that museum, as well.

Someone probably said they wanted a model railroad setup as big as a Boeing 727, and by golly, if they didn't put one overhead to prove the point!



The designers even included an interesting feature for the sharp eyed tear lover!

Previously, I had Illinois grey on our map, indicating we had driven the teardrop through the state, but hadn't stopped (or, as with a few other states, we had stopped at a campsite, but went on the next day without really seeing anything, or even hiking in the campground). So now it is colored.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

From Kankakee River, we drove to White Star County Park, Sandusky Ohio, near Bowling Green. I have a 2nd cousin there, and we were long overdue for a visit. On the way, we had plenty of time, and I really wanted to see something in Indiana, so I could change the state from grey to full color, so we stopped in Auburn and saw the Colt-Dusenberg auto museum.

The museum is full of Dusenberg's, produced in Auburn, which were high priced luxury cars. The old factory is now the museum. I even took a test drive in one. It was a doozy!



As you can tell from the sky in the background mural, rain was threatening. By the time we got to our campsite, it was raining full guns, and we didn't bother to un-hitch, but dove into the tear, and ate junk food for dinner that night. It was sunny the next morning, revealing a typical Ohio campground--a big grass field with no privacy between sites.



Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

We spent the next day with my relative, and then had a day to ourselves. Found we were only 15 minutes away from the Rutherford B Hayes presidential museum.



For those who don't remember, Hayes was president...um...after Lincoln and before Teddy Roosevelt. I know he won against Tilden, which is strange because I at least remember Samuel Tilden from high school history.

The most important thing that happened while Hayes was president was that Queen Victoria gave him the Resolute Desk, which most presidents have used since.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

After visiting cities and relatives, I figured we should have a brief vacation before tackling my Mom's house. Thought Northwestern Pennsylvania was the ideal place, and so we planned to spend two full days at Sinnemahoning State Park.

.

I intended to ask someone how to pronounce it, but in fact, we did not meet anyone while there. Probably it's pronounced just the way it's spelled. (Pennsylvanians don't like to pay for letters they don't use.) Pennsylvania place names are often very entertaining:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRy95dlaWvE

It rained pretty hard while we were there. Since there was no cell or internet service, what we didn't know was that Hurricane Debby decided, after her binge on the coast, to take a brief vacation in Northwestern Pennsylvania before dissipating. We did eat well ($5/each tenderloins, and our first corn on the cob of the season) once Shelly convinced me it's okay to build a fire under an eazy-up.



I took a hike in the rain the first day, while Shelly sat under an eazy-up and did stick weaving. It was raining the second day, so we decided it was time to move along. Shelly and I moved into the house in Upstate NY and have been cleaning out 60 years of accumulated treasure since. Anyone happen to be looking for a six bedroom two bath colonial near Binghamton? Just asken'...

Tom