Kamp Kendall

Wow, has it really been 10 days since my last update?? Just goes to show how busy we've been. Not really. We've been settling in here just fine. Rod's spent two days taping his mom's whole house to get it ready to paint. Now he's painting all the edges so when ready he can just take a roller and go to town painting the rest.



We managed to plant a little garden. There is a raised bed in the backyard that Rich (Rod's brother-in-law) had prepped and fertilized for Rod's mom before she broke her hip. It was all covered up with a tarp. When we took the tarp off there was some lettuce already growing. LOL. We went to the store and bought some plants for it. We planted basil, thyme, dill, parsley, rosemary, zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes and jalapeno peppers. Hopefully we'll get some yummy veggies and herbs from this.

The garden


After a good watering


The tomatoes we planted and peas that Rod's mom had already planted


Yesterday we went to Bainbridge Island and took the ferry over to Seattle to Safeco Field to watch the Padre/Mariners game. The only time I get to see the Padres are when they're playing in Seattle and we happen to be here. They're not in the same league so it's fun when we get to see the interleague games. Someday I'll get to see the Padres at home in San Diego again. It would be nice to hear the cheers for MY team.

We were going to take the 11:30 ferry but we left Port Angeles at 10:00 (our usual departure time, LOL) and it takes an hour and a half to get to Bainbridge Island. We got there, parked and ran up the ramp to the ferry but it was already pulling away from the dock. The next ferry was departing at 12:20 so we just waited around for that one. By the time it was ready to leave there were LOTS of people also waiting. Most were dressed in Mariners attire so I guess this is a popular way for people on the peninsula to go to the game.

Missed the first ferry


Here comes the next one


The ride over to Seattle was only thirty minutes long but pretty cold. Once we got there we walked a few blocks to Safeco Field. We didn't have any tickets because when I looked up tickets online there were various charges besides the charge for the tickets themselves. We figured we would just buy them at the ticket window. The line was a little long and we'd heard some guy on the street hawking tickets. I thought that was illegal but he was doing it right in front of the police so apparently it's okay. He had several tickets and we chose two of them for $45 each. They were actually worth $65 each. We ended up 33 rows above the Mariners dugout and right on the aisle. GREAT seats!! In fact, we both agreed these were the best seats we've ever had at a game.

The Seattle skyline comes into view


The Space Needle


Our seats


My Boys


My boys warming up


I think Ichiro had something like a million hits yesterday. Uggghhhh


It was a fun day and we stayed and watched the whole game even though my Padres got trounced 9-3. They're not doing so good this year. They don't score many runs and their two best pitchers are out with injuries. It's like we say almost every year, "Just wait till next year!" LOL

The ride back was even colder than when we came. There are plenty of places inside to sit but it was way more crowded this time. We'll definitely do this again one day but only for a day game again. The night games end way too late to be taking the ferry and if we drove it would be about three hours one way.

The ride back


Coming into Bainbridge Island


Glad we weren't on THAT ferry



Today Rod is back to painting and then we're going over to check up on his mom tonight. She's doing really well in her apartment at the assisted living home and we're really happy about that. There's still a lot of things she can't do so we're glad to be here to help her.

I'm going to quickly publish this post now because it's the second time I had to write it. I was in the process of writing and was just about ready to publish it when it disappeared. I had been saving it all along while I was writing it so I'm not sure why it disappeared.

Back in Port Angeles

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can hear all of you now. "It's about time"!! LOL. The last time I wrote we were in southeastern Montana and now we're all the way up on the northwest peninsula of Washington state. The funny thing is that we have finally found some warmth and some sunshine! Who would have thought we'd find that here??

So we got to Gerryowen, MT (which is part of the Crow Indian Reservation) to another RV park that was pretty much empty. I guess people don't start camping in this part of the country until later in the summer. We got set up and went into town and found a Subway for lunch. We always split a $5 footlong and have never had a problem having the sandwich cut. This guy wouldn't cut the sandwich until all the toppings were put on because he said he'd have to charge me for two sandwiches. HUH??? What's the difference?? Whatever. We ate our sandwiches and headed out for fuel. We still had a couple of Shell Gas Station cards so we decided to use them. We had already used one somewhere else but it still had a few dollars left on it (Rod couldn't remember how much). The lady in the gas station said she didn't have a reader to tell how much was left on the card and said she'd give him $5 for it. HUH?? This place is just getting better and better. Grrrrrr We headed to a different gas station as Rod didn't want to give them ANY business.

We then headed to Little Bighorn Battlefield which is also know as Custer's last stand. On June 25, 1876 General George Armstrong Custer underestimated the size of the Indian tribes (the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho) who were ruled by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse and met his maker. Although Custer died here he's not actually buried here. He is buried at West Point Cemetary. This was not my idea but it was something Rod wanted to do. I think it must be a "guy thing" to want to go look at a big field where a battle took place YEARS ago. There were markers all over the place where either a soldier or an Indian was killed. I mean really, how many times can you look at another marker?? I've added a link if you click above if you're interested to read about it.




After we left the battlefield we decided to go get dinner. The only thing in the area was a KFC. Now, we don't ever eat at KFC but our choices were limited. Some people told us the new grilled chicken was pretty good so that's what we were going to have. We walked into one of the dirtiest places I've ever seen but as I said, our choices were limited. Not seeing grilled chicken on the menu I asked if they had any and was told, "NO, we only have what's there". Wow, okay then. Just asking. The attitude of the people in this town was just unbelievable. We were going to stay for two days but decided we really weren't comfortable here and left after only one day. Oh well...

From there we headed to Bear Country Campground in Bozeman, MT. We were just driving until we found something. No reservations and no idea where we were headed. That's kinda fun to do sometimes. (Yeah, I can hear you, Terry G) This campground was not cheap and they didn't offer any discounts but it was comfortable. We watched the news that night and they were predicting snow for the next day! WHAT???!!! I thought June was supposed to be summerlike. It was freezing!!! We decided to wait till morning to decide if we were going to stay or not. I woke up the next morning and asked Rod if we were leaving since it wasn't snowing. He said we were. I got up to drink some coffee before getting ready to leave. Once he got up I started getting the bedroom ready. After I was done in there I pulled in the slide. Rod asked what I was doing. I said I was done in the bedroom so I pulled in the slide. He asked why. I said, "because I'm done in there". At that point he informed me that he was only kidding that we were leaving. UGGGHHHHH!!!! He thought I knew he was kidding. I didn't. He ended up putting the slide back out and getting out everything I had put away. Too funny!! We did end up getting a few inches of snow that afternoon so I'm glad we didn't go anywhere.



From there we headed to Missoula, MT to Jim & Mary's RV park. This was a small park but adequate for a one night stay.

From there we headed to Coeur D'Alene (pronounced like Core Duh Lane) in the state of Idaho. It's right outside the city of Spokane, WA. The drive was really nasty all day through the mountains. It poured down rain the whole way. By the time we got to Coeur D'Alene the rain was gone, the sun was shining, and it was warm for the first time since I can't remember when. We were going to be meeting up with one of my chatroom friends, Jenny and her friend, Richard. I was really looking forward to this as it's been almost a year since the last time we met up. We had dinner at a really yummy Mexican restaurant. It was SOOOOOO good to see you again, Jenny!! Glad to see you looking well!

Road construction combined with rain, our favorite. NOT!!!


Jenny and Richard


From there we went to Graham, WA and a visit with my brother and his family. On the way there we stopped and had lunch with another one of my chatroom friends, Phyllis and Bob. It was soooo good to see them again. We went to one of the best pizza places on the planet (in my opinion) called The Rock. This was the same place we went with them last year and we had been looking forward to it for a long time! Oh yeah, and we did want to see Phyllis & Bob too. LOL. We spent last year at my brother George's house too. We followed almost the exact same routine as last year. We also stopped in for a visit at my other brother's house. Donny had just had back surgery but seemed to be getting around pretty good already. Good job, Donny!!

So that brings us to now. We're back in Port Angeles for a little while. We're not sure how long we'll be here. Rod's mom Arlene is all settled into an Assisted Living Home thanks to all the hard work his sister Sue did after Arlene fell and broke her hip. She LOVES the home she's in and didn't object to having to give up her own home at all. She has a lot of friends there and has adjusted really well. We're going to be spending our time here getting the house painted and ready to sell. It's going to be a lot of work but we get free rent and free laundry! LOL. We had to do quite a bit of trimming of the trees on the side of the house in order to get our rig in. We don't have sewer hookups here but we do have electric and water. We've been using the "facilities" in the house but living in the rig. We have our own TV and internet so it's working out just fine to stay here.

It's quite a tight fit

On The Road Again

So, we reluctantly left South Dakota this morning. We had such a good time there and really did love it. I'm pretty sure we'll go back again.

We are headed for Washington eventually. Our plans have really changed this summer. First, we cancelled our trip to Alaska and now we've cancelled our trip to Canada also. Our friends in Canada are having some personal problems I won't get into but we just decided it was best not to head that way.

Soooooo, we're heading west through Montana (which takes almost as long as Texas to get through) and will end up in Port Angeles for a little while this summer. We have a few stops to make along the way. One of those stops took us to Alzada today. Rod was in the Army forty some years ago and remembered just one guy from his days in Basic Training in Ft Lewis, WA. A sheep rancher in the southeast corner of Montana. He was a little reluctant to look this guy up because a lot of the guys who were in the service at the same time he was were sent to Vietnam. He didn't want to know that this guy never made it home. We stopped at a Saloon which by the way if we didn't stop there we would have never known we had just passed through Alzada. We were the only ones there and the guy inside let Rod use the phone book where he found the guy he was looking for!! He called the number and the guy's son answered the phone. He was still a sheep farmer and still lived there. Unbelievable. He was busy with somebody so his son told us where to find him off the highway and we stopped to visit. The road was really, really muddy and we actually had to put the truck in four wheel drive to stop sliding all over the place.

The Saloon we stopped at

Interesting motorcycle out front


What a nice guy. He remembered way more than Rod did about their days together but they both had a good time getting reacquainted. He lives on a HUGE ranch and invited us to stay anytime we're in the area. I think we'll have to take him up on that some day. We didn't get to meet his wife, Madge, as she was off visiting their new grandson.

Tonight we're in a RV Park that is pretty much empty. We're just going to stay here for the night and tomorrow we'll head about 110 miles west to the town of Gerryowen. We plan on staying there for a few days to visit Custer's battlefield and from there we're not sure yet where we're headed. We still don't have phone service because it's still Verizon here and we found out they don't share their towers. Good thing for you to know, Dee. When you head out for fulltiming make sure you and Jim have two different cell phone companies so if one doesn't have service the other one just might.

Our site for the night


Pretty empty


The crud


Cleaning it off