Tag Archives: Travel

National Parks Passport

Kenn and I travel primarily to see parts of the country we haven’t seen before. While we’re seeing the sights, we also make it a point to visit any national parks, national monuments, etc. along our route. A few years ago I discovered the existence of National Parks Passports and gifted Kenn one. The “passport” is just a fun way to document the parks that you’ve visited. The book is broken out by area of the country and within each section each page gives spaces for the official cancellation and a regional stamp (decal) for the location.

Each park has “cancellation” stamps for the location. The stamp includes the date, name of the park, and the location (state, town). The stamps are usually located at the visitor’s center, but not always. At the Flight 93 memorial in Pennsylvania, the stamps were located at the memorial plaza instead of the visitor’s center. While the stamps are free, the decals (or regional stamps) are not. There are usually a variety of these decals to choose from and they are less than five dollars.

There are also a couple of handy accessories for the passport books. The first is stampable sticker sets. Each of the stampable stickers is round and just the right size for a cancellation stamp. These stickers come in handy if you forget your passport; you can just stamp the sticker, then place the sticker in your book later. As I’ve learned, they also come in handy when the cancellation stamp is incomplete or illegible as sometimes happens when there is too little (or too much) ink on the stamp. In those instances, I just stamp one of the stickers and place it over the original stamp. Problem solved.

The second helpful accessory is the expander pack which provides extra pages that can be added to the passport book. When we took our trip out west in 2023 we quickly filled up the section for that area, so it was nice to be able to add a couple of pages. Of course, the passport book is rather small so there are only so many pages that can be added. I’m not sure what we’ll do when we can no longer add pages. Maybe we’ll just pick up a second passport.

As one of the perks to turning 62 last year, Kenn gifted me with a Lifetime America the Beautiful pass. Now, rather than needing an annual pass to the national parks, we’re good for life! There are some national monuments, etc. that don’t accept any of the parks passes (I’m looking at you Mt. Rushmore), but they are few and far between. If you plan to visit several parks, monuments, etc. in the course of a year, an annual pass is your best bet. At only a few dollars more for a lifetime pass, it is definitely a steal once you hit the right age.

Now, we have an excuse to go back to the parks we visited before getting a passport to collect the stamps from those. I don’t consider that a hardship, LOL. Any other national park “collectors” out there?🙋‍♀️

Road Trip 20205: A Summary

I thought I’d do a quick summary of our trip before getting into detailed posts. After all, all I had to do was copy and paste most of the info from a FB post. What was I thinking? This is WordPress – it doesn’t do easy. Instead, it converted every individual line of the copied text into a separate paragraph. Ugh. It probably would have been simpler to re-type everything rather than fix the resulting mess, but I’m hard-headed so I did things the hard way. Anyhoo, here is the promised summary:

Trip Length: Twenty-five days and 4,505 miles

States Visited:

  • North Carolina
  • Tennessee
  • Virginia
  • West Virginia
  • Ohio
  • Indiana
  • Michigan
  • Wisconsin
  • Minnesota
  • Illinois
  • Kentucky
All of the states we have visited with our camper.

Places visited:

  • New River Gorge National Park
  • Babcock State Park (West Virginia)
  • Cuyahoga Valley National Park
  • The House from A Christmas Story
  • Indiana Dunes National Park
  • Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore
  • Castle Rock (St. Ignace, Michigan)
  • Mackinac Island
  • Tahquamenon Falls State Park (Upper Peninsula of Michigan)
  • Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore
  • Apostle Islands National Lakeshore
  • Atomic Antiques (Madison, Wisconsin)
  • The Bronze Fonz (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)
  • The Kaskaskia Dragon (Vandalia, Illinois)

Great Lakes:

  • Erie
  • Michigan
  • Huron
  • Superior

We’re only missing Lake Ontario!

I’ll break the future posts out by state, assuming I survive grooming (aka shaving) Kota, our long-haired cat. Wish me luck!

I’m still standing.

I don’t what happens, but every year, usually in the July time, frame I get behind on reading the posts by people I follow and my own posts become rather haphazard. I made it until August this year before this happened. (Go, me!😂) I’m actually just getting back into the swing of things so some of y’all are going to start seeing likes and comments on older posts.

August seemed to turn into a circular discussion on the following:

  • Are we going on a road trip this year?
  • If so, are we going to stick to the route we’ve already discussed or change it up?
  • If we stick to the route we’ve been discussing, do we want to add any additional stops to what we already have planned?

When it comes to these types of discussions, we can absolutely beat the topic to death. Discussions seem to come to an end when I reach the point where I just really don’t care any more, LOL. So, what did we decide?

  • We did go on a trip.
  • We stuck to the route we had already discussed.
  • We only added one or two stops at kitschy roadside attractions and those were added on the fly.
Selfie on the shore of Lake Superior

We’ve now been home for a week and are starting to get back into the swing of things. We’ve caught up on sleep and laundry and consoling the cats, now I’m getting back into the routine tasks like vacuuming, dusting, etc. We got home just in time for the government shutdown so Kenn hasn’t been able to go back to his part-time job yet.

I’ll be posting more about our travels over the coming weeks. Now, it’s time to go scoop litterboxes. Whoo hoo! (I miss our cats dreadfully while we’re gone. I do not miss scooping poop.)

What’s new with you?

Cutting the (wireless) cord

I know, I know. Cell phones don’t have cords – hence the whole “wireless” descriptor. But, sometimes my brain settles on a title and there’s no changing it. Such is the case with this post.

I may have mentioned in previous posts that Kenn is not a fan of change. When decisions need to be made, I do my research, make my decision, and am ready to act. Kenn, on the other hand needs days/weeks/months to come to terms with the pending change. Admittedly, life doesn’t always allow a lot of time for decisions – some need to be made right. now. But, when a decision can be postponed without major consequences for us, they can drag out seemingly forever. Seriously. It took years for me to convince Kenn we no longer needed a landline.

Another potential change that has been dragging out for years is changing cell service providers.We have been with Verizon Wireless for twenty years and have been paying through the nose for that honor. We have discussed changing providers ad nauseum. One of the biggest hindrances to making a change was our concern about coverage when we travel. However, as the years have passed, the difference in coverage between the various providers has become minimal. And, no matter the coverage, this is a big country and there are still plenty of areas where there is no cell service.

During our trip to Saint Augustine, we had yet another discussion about changing providers. I finally put my foot down. I didn’t want to talk about this any more. We either needed to pick another provider and change or just admit that we were going to stay with Verizon regardless of the cost. Kenn then took it upon himself to do some research. (Yay!) I’m always glad when he does this. I can give him all of the information in the world, but doing some of the research himself helps him be more willing to move forward with the change.

I am pleased to announce that, after years (and years) of discussion, we are no longer with Verizon. We are now Mint Mobile customers. Kenn changed over about a month and a half before I did so we could compare his Mint coverage to my Verizon coverage in the areas we visit most often. We were both surprised that in some areas of South Carolina near our kids, he had a stronger signal than I did. I made the change approximately a month ago and have had no problems. The best part is that I can pre-pay for 3 months of Mint for both of us for roughly what I was paying for one month of service from Verizon; this makes both me and our bank account very happy.

Just to be nosy – what cell provider do you use? How long have you been with that provider?

Saint Augustine, Florida

We try to take short trips for our birthdays and Kenn chose Saint Augustine as the location for his birthday trip this year; specifically, Anastasia State Park. I can’t regale you with all of the fabulous things we did because there weren’t any, LOL. For us, mini vacations – especially beach vacations – are for relaxing and going with the flow. We discussed going kayaking or on an air boat expedition but did neither. Heck, we didn’t even play mini-golf.

Medici Lion

Beach access in the park was a short drive from the campground, so we went for a walk on the beach once or twice a day. Our walks included searching for shark’s teeth, but they were few and far between (unlike Fernandina Beach). If you like seashells, Saint Augustine is the place to be; the beach was littered with shells of all shapes, sizes, and colors. Second only to the number of shells was the number of seagulls. The gulls were not the least bit bothered by the people on their beach, nor did they mind posing for photos.

One of the beautiful beach sunsets

When traveling, we tend to only have two meals per day: breakfast and then a late lunch/early supper that we call “lupper”. Food probably played the biggest role in our trip. We ventured downtown to dine at a different restaurant each day. While the downtown area was busy, we were able to find parking relatively easily. Tip: if you’re planning to spend time in Saint Augustine, brush up on your parallel parking skills. I have to give Kenn props for how easily he parked our Toyota Tundra; he made it look easy.

The first day, we ate at Prohibition Kitchen Gastropub. I loved the vibe of the decor, and the food was good. I had the PK Poutine just so I could try pork belly. I think I would have liked the pork belly better if it had been crispy. I also had a Hibiscus Spritz (Elderflower, lemon, simple syrup, mint, hibiscus, sparkling wine) and Kenn and I split a bread pudding for dessert. I’ve never met a bread pudding that I haven’t liked; this one, while good, had a sugary crust that made it a bit too sweet for my taste, and that’s saying a lot.

We can never pass up a big pretzel!
PK Poutine
My Hibiscus Spritz and my hubby

We love a good Irish pub, but the only two we visited with any regularity (one in Savannah, GA and the other in Fernandina Beach, FL) have both closed. So, of course, we had to eat at Meehan’s Irish Pub; I hope it survives our visit since the others have not. We started out with an order of Irish Chips (aka fries) and I had a yummy Shepard’s Pie made with beef and lamb. I would have loved to try their bread pudding, but since I had chowed down on the chips, I had no room left. But, rather than have no dessert, we stopped by Mayday and picked up pints of ice cream to take back to the camper for later. (Mint chocolate chip for Kenn and salted caramel for me.)

Shepard’s Pie. Yum.

Our last day we ate at Casa Reina Taqueria & Tequila. I had Carne y Papas tacos which is the first time I’ve had fries on a taco. Side note: whenever I see chihuahua cheese on a menu, I have a mental image of herds of chihuahuas hooked up to tiny milking machines. (I’m weird, I know.) I also loved the mural on the dining room wall.

Since the Castillo de San Marcos National Monument was right there, we thought we’d go and get another stamp for our National Parks Passport book. However, we didn’t want to pay the $15 per person entry fee. Kenn is much more of a history buff than I am, but we both felt like if you’ve seen one old fort, you’ve pretty much seen them all and since we’ve seen several, we noped out of this one.

My one photo of the fort.

We also had the opportunity to go into “mom and dad” mode for a while. When we stopped to check out the ancient quarry trail in the park, we met Patrick and Amelia, college students in Sarasota up for a day trip; their car was dead. We tried jumping them off – even using two different sets of jumper cables – but were unsuccessful. We then loaded them and their battery in our truck and drove them to the auto parts store where they were able to get a replacement battery under warranty. (Amelia and I had a chance to bond over being fair-skinned people at the beach.) We made sure that the new battery worked as it should and gave them our numbers in case they had more problems. It felt good to be in the right place to help these kids when they needed it.

My birthday is in November and we’ve already got reservations near Bryson City, NC. I love Bryson City and it has been years since we’ve been to Cades Cove and other locations in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Our beach selfie

How do you celebrate your birthday?

It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity

Rain or drought, heat or cold, the weather is always a popular topic of conversation. Feeling awkward in a social situation? Discuss the weather! Once summertime – or at least summer temperatures – roll around, the humidity becomes the primary topic of discussion among us native southerners. It’s hard to think of anything else when the humidity slaps you in the face before attempting to suffocate you every time you step out your door.

After the traveling we’ve done over the past few years, I’m here to tell y’all that it really is the humidity. Once of the first times this was really brought to our attention was when we visited Devil’s Tower National Monument, Wyoming in 2019. The park rangers were all very apologetic that the humidity was so high during our visit; it was 25%. I told one of the rangers that, while I appreciated her concern, I’m from Georgia and 25% humidity doesn’t even register with me. As a matter of fact, it felt wonderful. (Just as a point of reference, the current level of humidity is 68% and that’s not particularly high for July.)

Image courtesy of depositphotoscom

However, it took out trip out west last year to fully bring home the difference between heat with low humidity and heat with high humidity. All of the parks we visited had signs stating that visitors shouldn’t hike when the temperature is above 90℉ and recommending the amount of water that should be carried per person per hike. We were blown away by the whole idea of not hiking when the temp is over ninety. Around here, that would knock out hikes any time between April and October. It took a few days before it dawned on me that the lack of humidity is exactly the reason why it would be so much easier to get dehydrated. (Apparently I can be a little slow sometimes.) When the humidity is low, your sweat evaporates (as it should) without you ever realizing how much liquid you are actually losing. Around here, when you sweat, it literally runs down your skin and soaks into your clothes because it doesn’t evaporate. When your clothes are soaking wet, it’s easy to realize that you need to increase your liquid intake.

I’ve never dealt well with the summer heat and humidity and it seems to be getting worse as I age. I work two days a week and most of my tasks are outside. I’m going in a little earlier and looking for indoor tasks these days because I just can’t stay out in the heat after around 2:30pm. I’ve already had one day where I got too hot and don’t want to have a repeat performance anytime soon. Fortunately, September is coming. We only have to get through August first and August sucks.

Do you prefer hot weather or cold weather? Do you live in a high or low humidity area?