Excellent Adventure – Page 4 – Jake & Eddie’s Excellent Adventure 😎🐶

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We fade from south to west on the second half of the drive.

Leaving on Day 6 from Sonora we drove through the remaining part of the Hill Country into Big Bend Country. The scenery changed pretty radially and it became flatter and dryer. At one point the signs warned of an 80-mile stretch with no services.

His dog riding on the back with his goggles on! They were easily doing 80!

We saw a guy riding a big road bike with his dog strapped to the rear seat. he was wearing a pair of goggles and seemed to be thoroughly enjoying the ride. We passed them several times during the day (which is common – you get to know different rigs, etc). Finally, I was able to get a photo of him as he sped out of a rest area and overtook us at 80 mph!

We arrived in Van Horn and stayed at the Wild West RV Park! Not much to write home about but everything worked and we had a quiet evening there.

Van Horn is home to Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin launch operations. About 25 miles up the road Jeff and his buddies fly into space on his giant flying dildo 🤣. I suspect many of the people staying in the campground worked there. I doubt very seriously that William Shatner was one of them! I passed on the opportunity to visit. Maybe next time 😎.

We woke to a clear, cold (49 F) morning and headed out on Day 7 for the westernmost end of Texas. We were within range of the Mexican border for most of the drive which took us through El Paso and the New Mexico border. El Paso was not a pretty sight from the roadway – it looked like an endless sprawl in a hot, dry desert.

We stopped for the day at our first KOA Kampground of the trip. We will be staying in them for most of the remainder of the trip. I like the consistency and convenience of going through a single booking process for hundreds of campgrounds. This one was perched on a hill overlooking Las Cruces and Mesilla toward the Guadalupe Mountian range.

We are staying next to the town of Mesilla just north of Las Cruces. The place has an interesting history. It was settled in the mid-1800s. During the Civil War, it was occupied by Confederate soldiers and was named the capital of the Confederate Republic of Arizona for a brief period. Billy the Kid was tried and sentenced to be executed in 1881 here before he escaped (only to be mysteriously shot several months later).

On our way there we stopped by the Rio Grande river at a park near Las Cruces. The riverbed was dry, affording an interesting view of the river, indeed! Jake had a blast running on the sand 🐶.

We started Day 8 out visiting Las Cruces and Mesilla before heading west to Arizona and our next stop outside of Tucson. This called for listening to Linda Ronstadt as we drove through the arid landscape! We came across several stretches of areas with bad dust storms. I am not sure I was encouraged by the roadside instructions!

…and pray there is not some idiot from Texas behind you 🤠

We ended the day in the middle of Tucson’s suburban sprawl in a huge KOA Resort. Resorts are KOA’s mini-theme park with lots of stuff for families and especially kids to do. This one had several hundred spaces and one section was covered (with a solar panel) to protect the spots below from the scorching Arizona sun ☀️. I like them because they generally have a hot tub. Unfortunately, the one here was lukewarm at best. Our spot was excellent though – Jake even had a little spot of grass he could lie in. It was hot but the low humidity and breeze made it feel a lot cooler.

Day 9 and our last overnight before our visit stop at Desert Springs and Joshua Tree National Monument in California. We drove from Tucson northwest and then made a detour to Gila Bend Arizona.

North of Tucson we went through Saguaro National Park and a stunning drive through Saguaro Cactii forests. I was stunned at how green it appeared in some spots like Pacaco Mountain.

Gila Bend Arizona

45 years ago this Summer I was traveling cross country after graduating from college. My finance Margaret and I made a round trip around the US. The last leg of our trip took us the same route I am going now except we were headed to San Diego. We were trying to get back to San Jose to get married and were making time.

Camping outside of Houston I was bitten by a bunch of ants. I had a reaction, took a bunch of Benadryl, and slept for a day. We stopped at Carlsbad Caverns. The next day we went by Alamagordo (without stopping), and made it all the way to Gila Bend. It was the beginning of August and the heat (in our non-air-conditioned Toyota) was almost too much.

Summer 1978 on my way back to California

We were basically out of money. We wanted to stay at the Best Western (now the Space Age In!) but it was too much. We opted instead for the budget strip motel down the road. We paid our money and went to the room only to discover the A/C had not been turned on! It was hotter in the room than it was outside!

Fortunately, they had a pool that was almost too hot to swim in but gave us a bit of relief. We went to take showers and left the cold water running for what seemed to be 30 minutes. The water never got any colder! Fuck it we said, and pulled the mattress off the bed and threw it in front of the A/C.

While we were going to sleep we turned the TV on and saw the weather. The hottest place in the United States that day? Gila Bend, Arizona at 117 F!

We woke up at 3 AM with our teeth chattering. While we slept the room cooled down to the point that we were now freezing! As I letter learned, once the sun goes down the desert can get quite chilly!

The next day driving into San Diego we passed dozens of cars on the side of the road with radiators boiling over as we drove over a mountain pass into San Diego. The temperature seemed like it dropped 50 degrees as we drove down towards the cool Pacific Ocean!

We stopped for the day at Salome Arizona near the Arizona-California border. It was a bit off the Interstate which gave us the chance to see the desert up close! The campgrounds were huge and mostly vacant after the snowbirds headed back north. They had a pool and a hot tub which I thoroughly enjoyed!

Day 10 – last day of our journey west – next stop California!

Midway Journey West

We’ve made it halfway on our journey west as we stop in Sonora, Texas. We traveled some 1400 miles so far averaging about 250 miles a day after our longer trip on Day 1 to Panama City.

We had a relaxing visit with Dave and Lisa and enjoyed burgers on the back deck with their wonderful view of Lisa’s butterfly heaven and the bijou. Our journey on Day 2 took us through Mobil Alabama and the dreaded I-10 tunnel. Of course, someone honked their horn endlessly and revved their engine to make sure we noticed them 🤡.

Oaklawn RV Park near Biloxi Mississippi. Not much – but convenient and everything worked.

We stayed that evening at a convenient campground near Biloxi Mississippi. Nothing to write home about but it was easy in and out with good hookups. We got our first taste of local color here, as noted on one of the resident’s pickup truck 😆.

Day 3 took us to Louisiana. Between Mississippi and Louisiana, you would have thought you were in some southern version of Las Vegas. I figure if your city didn’t have a casino you were shit out of luck. Other than that driving through the bijou areas was particularly scenic. We stopped that night in a nicer campground again located conveniently near I-10. A step up from the last place!

Day 4 started with a harrowing journey across roads that looked like they had been bombed. They were in such disrepair. About 10 miles east of the Louisiana – Texas state line the road turned to shit as they worked to repair the damage. It kept up for another 40 miles or so in Texas before getting dumped into bad traffic in Houston.

It was raining just to make life interesting. We made it to our campground in Schulenburg, Texas. The nicest place so far, although it rained hard all night into the morning.

On Day 5, we headed into the Hill Country of Texas as we drove through more crap roadways around San Antonio. The rest of the drive, however, was pleasant as the rain stopped and we finally had some scenery again (after the oil refineries around Houston!). It finally started to feel like we were in the west with good-sized hills (or are they small mountains?) with equally small trees. The temperatures started rising, and it was 90 degrees by the time we got to our campground for the evening in Sonora, Texas.

The campgrounds looked basically abandoned except for two trailers. On closer look, I noticed all the utilities looked new. WTF? Turned out the place was built by pipeline workers in service to the people of Sonora. Their town flooded several years ago, and a new set of campsites were set up for temporary housing as the residents rebuilt. Shortly after that, during the pandemic, the oil industry in this area got clobbered economically. Everyone left, leaving a nice but deserted campground. As noted, the hookups were new. The person who runs the place works during the day but was super responsive to my text messages—worked for us!

Welcome to the Wild West! Yippie-Tie-Yiyay 🤠

Excellent Adventure 2023 Begins!

Our 2023 Excellent Aventure has begun! We left at the crack of sparrow fart and had a mostly uneventful drive northwest to Brother Dave’s.

We look forward to a leisurely drive west on I-10 to Los Angeles over the next 9 days!

Leaving Valhalla – Excellent Adventure 2023 Begins!

Excellent Adventure 2022 ~ The Movie

Highlights and video from the trip together with some fooling around in GarageBand for a soundtrack.

Excellent Adventure 2022 Final

Logging 5200 miles over 35 days, we wove our way along the Appalachian mountains north, west, and south again to visit destinations on my bucket list.

We headed north out of Florida with overnights in Georgia and North Carolina. The first stop was in Virginia and Shenandoah National Park and a drive on Skyline Drive. From there we drove through the badlands of Pennsylvania visiting my old nemesis Three Mile Island Along the way. This took us through the land of legends to coastal Maine.

We visited Acadia National Park and spent some time along the coast. We traveled inland to stay one rainy day at a stunningly beautiful pond in Maine on a lot belonging to my friend Bill. We then drove across the top of New England with stops at Mount Washington, New Hampshire, and the Adirondack Mountains near Lake Placid and Whiteface Mountian. Fall colors greeted us along the way!

Driving south now we visited Watkins Glen and the famous raceway and state park there. Our new two stops were to explore my roots with stops in Pennsylvania at my father’s ancestral home in Snow Shoe and my mother’s hometown of Connellsville. Continuing south we drove through West Virginia and saw the New Gorge National Park along the way.

We ended up in Tennessee, near Knoxville, at the home of my friend Bill. We visited the Smokey Mountains and toured the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. From there I spent a day with my friend Laura in Georgia and then headed south to Panama City.

We finished up there with a great visit with my brother Dave and his family including my 10-month-old grand-nephew Theo! Back home to access the damage from Ian – fortunately not too bad.

Next trip – Excellent Adventure 2023 – The West Coast!

Babies & Butterflies 👶🏼🦋

Last stop: Panama City Florida for a week with my brother Dave and his family. Dave’s son Carl, wife Kari, and baby Theo arrived towards the end of the week.

We enjoyed Lisa’s renowned cooking and spent time in the Butterfly haven she has created in the backyard of their stunning home on the bayou.

Lisa’s Butterfly Haven in Panama City

Another great set of family memories as the Tubridy family marches on!

Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Bill, Laura, and I visited some museums in Oak Ridge Tennessee. Oak Ridge is the home of the Clinton Engineer Works, now called Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Mockup of Little Boy atomic bomb at Oak Ridge National Laboratory K-25 museum.

The uranium used in the ‘Little Boy” bomb dropped on Hiroshima was made here. The effort was herculean. The world’s largest building (at that time) was built and manned to hold the hundreds of machines used to enrich the Uranium. It’s known as the K-25 site.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Called the “Top Secret” City. The K-25 site, now demolished, where uranium was enriched for the first atomic bomb in the 1940s.

There were other efforts using different enrichment techniques at other locations on the large laboratory site.

Today the Laboratory has very active programs. Especially for the production and use of neutrons for imaging and other high-tech application, as well as programs for our nuclear stockpile.

I stumbled upon a machine there which brought back some amazing experiences from my early professional work. My first job at Boeing was to test aircraft using a much more modern version of this hardware. Later I went to work for Hewlett-Packard which was making modern vibration test systems.

This is a machine to test vibration (my first job) using a Hewlett-Packard Oscillator – HP’s first product made in the early 1940s. I worked on its successors many, many years later during my time at HP in the 1980s.

In the middle with the big dial is a Hewlett-Packard Oscillator. This was a version of the original product Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard made in the garage in Palo Alto in the late 1930s. One of the first customers was Disney which used them to make the soundtrack for the movie ‘Fantasia’ during the same time period. I actually did marketing work on the successor models many years later and was directly involved in obsoleting the product line.

We also visited the American Museum of Science and Energy which had very good exhibits on some of the newer efforts of the lab as well as its history and general information on nuclear energy.

Cherokee National Forrest

Located in the Smokey Mountian area outside of Knoxville. We drove up one afternoon to check out some waterfalls and the fall color. Lots of retired guys driving their motorcycles and Corvettes on a fine sunny day!

Rainy drive south

We headed south for three days driving in the remnants of Ian. Fortunately, it was mostly drizzling. It made for some almost surreal scenery driving through the mountain mists of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The mountains got ‘tighter’ in West Virginia and it seemed for a while we were always turning left, then right, then left,… Over and over again!

We stayed at a couple of interesting campgrounds. In Flatwood the campgrounds had a very nice amphitheater. I guess people come to camp and listen and watch the performances?

In Wytheville, the campground has a bowling alley! That was a first. It also offered some serious glamping opportunities in a covered wagon!

On the second day, we passed through New River Gorge National Park. This is an area famous for its white water rafting. We stopped at the visitor center to view the famous bridge covering the span in the mist. For a while after its construction the largest single-span arch bridge in the world.

The next stop is Tennesee for some time with my friends Bill & Laura. Great news it is supposed to be sunny (and colder) all week. I can finally dry out after a fairly wet trip! I plan to visit Oak Ridge while I am there. It is the home of Oak Ridge National Laboratories which had played a huge part in the development of nuclear energy (and weapons).

Connellsville

It was a very scenic drive leaving the State College area and heading for Connellsville just south of Pittsburg. Beautiful green, rolling hills with a touch of early Fall color.

We stayed at another large KOA getting ready to celebrate Halloween this weekend. It is on the Youghiogheny river in a hollow. A very scenic setting. The weather was cold but fair while we were there.

My Mom’s family, Mary & Michael Kovach, immigrated here in the early 1910s from Checklosovakia. My nephew Adam told me he thought they could be Rusyn Americans. According to a person I met, a lot of Slovakian immigrants came to this area as miners.

The immigrants were of an Eastern Orthodox religious background. A Byzantine Church was built in the late 1880s about 5 miles outside of Connellsville in Dunbar township. This is where the 1930 census has my mother living with her older brothers and sisters. The groundskeeper at the church told me it was the first Catholic church built out of stone in the United States. It was striking (and a bit out of place) with the onion dome towers.

St Stephen Byzantine Church in Dunbar Township Pennsylvania

Behind the church was a larger, well-tended cemetery with the graves of her mother, father, and several of her older brothers and sisters.

Mom came from a large family with 10 brothers and sisters. Her mother passed from complications of the birth of the last child, George. The father, for whatever reason, did not participate in their upbringing. This left the older children to take care of the younger ones. Most of the younger children were girls and married, and left the area like my Mom.

My grandfather Michael. He died at 82 in a car accident. My mother only met him once (after she was older) that I know about.

My grandmother Mary. She died following the birth of the youngest child. My mother was not even 2 years old.

Oldest brother Michael and his wife. He was born in Czechoslovakia and stayed behind for several years before moving to the United States. Mom told me he didn’t like it here but stayed anyway.
He had a large family. One of his daughters visited an area in the Ukraine where she thought they came from but was unable to find anything. It remains a bit of a controversy as to their actual origin but all of my geological research points to Checklosovkia.

Oldest Sisters Ann and Helen. They never married and raised their younger brothers and sisters along with the eldest son Michael. Ann worked at the church for her whole life.

Older brother James. He never married and I believe worked for the railroad.

Like in Snow Shoe, I tried to make a connection with these ancestors while there. Wondering what their lives were like in this beautiful mountain area.

Connellsville itself was a large town – almost a small city – with a lot of traffic. It sits right on the river which makes for some scenic views. I visited the waterfront and learned the Great Allegheny Passage, a 150-mile hiking and biking route, runs through Connellsville.

This ends the ‘roots’ part of the program! Tomorrow we make our way south (through the remnants of Ian 🙃) through the Appalachians over three days and a long stop at my friends Bill and Laura Zweigbaum in Tennessee.