What a busy week for us! We move into Swan Lake NWR on Monday and then on Tuesday afternoon we drove back to Kansas City to meet our grandson at the airport. Bryce is the youngest son of our oldest son and he lives in Sequim, Washington. Bryce flew in to spend two weeks with us here at the refuge.

 We like to have one or two of our grandchildren fly to us each year, so that they and we get more true "quality time" together. Bryce is now 12 and this is his second time to fly to us, traveling by himself. 

 Bryce too has been a very busy young man as he spent the past week at Boy Scout Camp. His dad is the Scout Master and his two older brothers were also attending. His oldest brother is now a Life Scout, next older just became a Star Scout and Bryce will be a First Class Scout as soon as his paperwork goes through.

We expect to have a very busy two weeks, getting to know the refuge and visiting things with Bryce!

We are off of the road once again, this time residing at Swan Lake National Wildlife Refuge for the next two months.

We spent two days on the road in route and arrived here about 1pm today, with only one minor incident. The original route plan took us in via local highways but when were were about five miles short of our destination we came to a bridge that was under repair. We had to unhook the CR-V and back the motorhome to the highway we had just come from, but after returning to the town of Chillicothe, we parked at Wal-Mart and did a bit of planning, a quick visit to the internet and were soon on our way by an alternate route. Everyone here seems to be very friendly and tomorrow we meet the rest of the crew. Then tomorrow afternoon we make a trip back to Kansas City to go to the airport and pick up our 12 year old grandson who will be spending two weeks with us.

We left East Fork Park just before noon on Saturday, Aug. 1. We had been planning to leave earlier than that but woke up to thunder storms and heavy rain and so chose to wait it out before leaving. By 11am it had stopped raining and was looking better so we ate an early lunch and headed north. We drove to Muskogee, OK (you remember the song, "I'm an Okie from Muskogee?") the first day, arriving at about 4:30 pm. We spent the night at the Meadowbrook RV park which is a nice park with no amenities, not even a restroom, but a daily rate of $15.  It is a well cared for and clean park. This is the third time that we have stayed in it and we will again if we pass that way.

We left Muskogee about 9am today and drove all of the way to Kansas City, even though that does violate our usual daily mileage limits of 200 miles! It gets us close enough to Swan Lake NWR to be there early tomorrow, which was the reason for the rush. We need to have a couple of days as it looks as though we may have a grandson flying in to spend a week or so with us, later this week. 

We are now in Miller's Kampark in Liberty, MO(northern suburb of KC) where we are spending the night to rest up for our final leg into Swan Lake. It is good to be off to new places and new experiences once again! Miller's is one of those parks that I would have to say is fine for a night, but not much more. While it has a pool and a clubhouse that the previous park did not have, it is also rather run down and sleazy looking. At $31/night we think that this park has convenience as it's only plus. This is clearly a one night park. We got in here by 3pm so we have plenty of time to relax and play with our computers. One has to have that fix, you know!

We are now in our final day for this stay at East Fork Park, in Texas. We have our chores done and it is time to move on!

One of my projects completed was the replacement of both of our TV sets with new, flat screen, digital sets from Vizio. Pam's big project while here was the replacement of the window coverings in our bedroom. She removed the deerskin covered valances and side boards and made new drapes and installed them,  and we removed the old day/night shades that we hated and replaced them with blinds. We really like the new look and the fact that with blinds, we can have both privacy and fresh air! And just think, I am already working on projects that were planned to be completed in October! (Never mind that fact that we are talking of October, 2008)

 This will be the last entry from our present tour at Lavon Lake as we head up the highway to Swan Lake NWR tomorrow.