SV "Submit": it only took 3 weeks

It only took 3 weeks, but we have arrived at Submit.

Today we will climb on board and see how she faired, but first let us tell you about our last week on the road. We were anxious to get out of the freezing weather, even though we now had heat on board. 2019 greeted us with a temperature of 9 degrees and frozen water as well as blowing snow. The next two days were freezing rain and flooding. It rained hard enough that visibility was poor and that made it hard to miss the bumps in the rough road. Not the most fun driving conditions.

Day four finally smiled on us with sunshine. We smiled back until we discovered our own flooding. The carpet was wet under two different windows, but worse than that, one of the basement compartments had flooded. Many of our books were water logged and trashed. One is still drying us on the dash.

We have had some fun, of course. We spent a couple days in Pensacola visiting friends. Some let us borrow their van to pick up parts for Bev’s replacement (still looking for a name), others let us park in their covered RV spot. Good conversations and yummy food.

In Texas we had to stop at a Buckees again. Buckees truck stops are way more than a truck stop and are notorious for extra clean and fancy bathrooms. And dozens of fuel pumps. And all the treats in the world, such as fresh made on site fudge and barbecue sandwiches and honey glazed nuts and ….. We didn’t need anything, but a visit is always fun.

We enjoyed the Lafayette Science Museum. This is a well designed, hands on museum. Some of the displays were above Barbara’s head, but she enjoyed most of it and even learned some things. Reggie was amazed as he ‘swam’ in the virtual reality ocean

Unfortunately, Barbara had a Jonas experience and was stuck in the whale’s skeleton.

The other educational stop was the Infinity Science Center

near Stennis Space Center. We watched a 3D movie about our solar system and well as a movie projected on a globe. We were buckled in for a virtual rocket launch. We walked through a model of a space station experiment module. The last experience was a virtual trip in a submarine. We were suppose to use joy sticks to navigate and fix a leak in an oil well. We had no idea what we were doing and left a little disappointed with that event, but overall it was fun.

The other two fun stops were at Harvest Hosts. It is an organization of wineries, farms, golf courses, etc which provide spaces for RVs at no charge. Our first experience was Brushy Creek Winery. Once we were settled in we went for a wine tasting. This is a very casual winery where we just sat and chatted with the owner and some of the locals. All the wines are made from Texas grapes. We tasted some new varieties and left with yet another box of wine, except this box had six bottles it.

Hurricane damage was in evidence along I-10. Even though we were not on the coast, there were downed trees and signs everywhere. Residences destroyed by falling trees, roofs and outbuildings torn apart. Several sections of forest had nothing left but snapped off stumps of all heights. They resembled fields of stalagmites.

Our last stop was at another Harvest Host, the Tallahassee Antique Auto Museum

The gates close at 5 and we were not going to make it until 5:30, so we called to cancel. However, as luck would have it, they were staying open until 7, so we were able to get in to the grounds for our free overnight stay. In the morning we spent a couple hours touring the museum, looking at an amazing collection of dolls, Steinway pianos, knives, guns, jukeboxes, canoes, motorcycles, outboard motors and, of course cars. An no stop in the south is complete without Elvis