Tag Archives: road data

Daily thoughts, travel days

The Road to Bowling Green, OH

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It’s Monday morning and after a hectic Sunday (the day before leaving). My goal was to be on the road by 6am. I wanted to get out early since Monday rush hour traffic can be brutal. I pulled out of Big Rock campground at 550 and headed to I-88. The traffic wasn’t too bad and even I-355 was moving well.

Then it happened, the dreaded beeping noise which generally means the leveling jacks are not up or low on fluid. I knew the jacks were up so that left low fluid in the pump. The beeping can drive you nuts, so I thought since I was just traveling on 80 for a short time then getting off and traveling east on route 30, I would wait and stop. I got over at route 30 and found a shopping center with plenty of room to maneuver. At 7 am, it was empty. I stopped, figuring it would be a quick fix: just put a little fluid in and off I would go. And then…ut oh! I couldn’t find any fluid. Crap.

So I pulled out of the shopping center thinking, “I can find a truck stop on the way that has the fluid I need.” I couldn’t just pull into an auto parts store with a 40ft coach and towing the Xterra — I’m about 56 feet long.

Route 30 going east in Indiana isn’t as popular as I imagine it use to be. I finally saw a sign that said Hank’s Truck Stop: Best Fried Chicken in Indiana, 2 miles. Bingo! That’s the place. I pulled in and turned around, finding a nice spot in the gravel drive. I went inside, purchased some fluid and filled the pump tank up. WHEW! that’s done. I started up the coach and no beeping sound, what a relief. By now it was about 9:30 am and I hadn’t eaten breakfast yet. So I started the generator and had me a breakfast sandwich, then walked Chloe.

Route 30 improves further east: not the rough road it was through IL and into Indiana. You can generally tell the repressed areas by their roads and buildings. They don’t have the money to fix the roads, so sometimes they are pretty rough.

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. In fact it was a pleasant drive. I had called the fair grounds to let them know what time I would be in. We pulled into the fair grounds about 3 or so. Right on cue one of the maintenance guys met me. I was getting ready to unhook the truck. He said we are going to park you over here behind the grandstands this year on the blacktop.

image of motorhome park at the fairgrounds
Where I parked at the fairgrounds

So I followed him to the spot they wanted me in and started to setup.

image looking out of the front of motorhome at the fairgrounds
Looking towards the front at the fairgrounds
image of motorhome parked at the fair grounds
Looking from the grandstands at the fairgrounds
image of the grandstands at the fairgrounds
Parked near the grandstands.

 

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travel days

Chattanooga Traffic Craziness

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Today we journeyed from London, Kentucky, to Fort Payne, Alabama. We were in four different states, and traveled our longest day yet of this particular route: six hours and 254 miles. It was not exactly a fun travel day, with happy sing-a-longs and road trip games (not that even our fun days produce such cringe worthy activities, but I think you get my drift, wink, wink, nudge, nudge).

Out the windshield view of Smoky Mountains
The view of the beginning of the Smoky Mountains in Kentucky on I-75 from my seat.
The views from my seat were very pretty, I must admit, and I think they would have been even more beautiful a week or so ago when the colors would have been at their peak. There weren’t too many serious grades: one downhill at 4% was as high as it went. I-75 skirts the Daniel Boone National Forest (DBNF) (FYI, Levi Jackson State Park is also in the DBNF) all the way down to the Tennessee border, and there were many attractions that caught my eye and have since been placed on the “places I’d like to see” list, hiking the Sheltowee Trace heading the list.

We went round the western side of Knoxville with a little more extra traffic than we experienced coming down I-75, but it was the kind of traffic we would expect in a metro area. There is a left hand exit from I-640 (Knoxville by-pass) to I-40/I-65, though. Things continued along, with the hills and grades gradually decreasing as we headed on to Chattanooga.

We hit the outskirts of Chattanooga about 2:00 pm, eastern. Traffic started to get very heavy around Cleveland, KY, with increasing amounts of semis and the dangerous behavior cars that are accustomed to a specific route exhibit when around them. The end of the route around Chattanooga on the south-east side terminates with a left hand exit, not a lot of fun in light traffic, but particularly difficult in heavy, semi-laden traffic.

View through windshield of Tennessee River just outside of Chattanooga
Don’t judge the traffic by this shot, Richard likes to give a lot of space in front of him. The Tennessee river is on the right hand side.
Then came the really fun part. In order to get to I-59 on the western side of Chattanooga, one must take I-24 for approximately 17 miles. There is a moment in this stretch where you break out ugliness and overlook the city nestled in it’s valley, followed by a beautiful curve bounded on one side by cut cliffs, and on the other by the Tennessee River. It is absolutely gorgeous. And absolutely not fun for the driver.

Traffic is still very heavy, the lanes are narrow, and the curve around the bend in the river is accompanied by a more steep slope than one would expect from an interstate in an urban area. Follow that up with the fact that to get onto I-59 you need to get into the far left lane, and you have a recipe for some real Chattanooga Craziness.

Craziness aside, Richard got us safely to our destination in Fort Payne, Alabama, at the Wills Creek R.V. Park. This park is great for an overnight stop, with tons of pull-throughs. Bonus, it’s not at all far from I-59. But there are little trees on either side of each site, many with low hanging branches, as well as narrow, dirt roads and tight corners. All in all, Richard and I are glad to be relaxing here and no longer in the congestion and headache of Chattanooga (even if we don’t have TV because we we’re too tired to set up the dish for one night and there’s no antenna reception here).

Road Data for November 13th

  • Traveled 254 miles in 6.1 hours from London, KY to Fort Payne, AL
  • Used 31.3 gallons of diesel and average 8 mpg
  • Cost of one night at Wills Creek R.V. Park $28.82 (with tax)
campgrounds, travel days

A Day (or Two) at the Fair

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We left Indianapolis today after meeting with the gentleman from iRV2 who gave us the new Omega arms to fix our slide. We’re still living with a living room slide that doesn’t open, but hopefully we’ll fix it with a little help from our friend.

When we were looking at coaches over two years ago, we’d looked at our first Holiday Rambler, a 1999 Vacationer without slides. Without having looked at one with slides, we tried to tell ourselves that we could live without them. The price certainly was right. But then we saw some coaches with slides and we decided there was no way we could live without one (even though I still think every slide you add to a coach is another thing to go wrong).

At the Wood County Fairgrounds
Our site at the Wood County Fairgrounds
This experience of living without a slide has certainly proven that, though it may be fine for some, it’s no way for us to live! We can’t pass each other without someone getting squished. Poor Chloe is constantly underfoot. And we can’t eat at the kitchen table and both of us see the TV at the same time. Tough times, eh?

We left at a 11 AM, and got into Bowling Green, Ohio with plenty of daylight to set up and relax. We’re staying at the Wood County Fairgrounds for the next couple of days.

When we decided back in August to visit our good friend in Bowling Green, we wanted to stay at our favorite campground there, Fire Lake Camper Park. Although this park is mainly a seasonal place, they do have three pull-thru spots along their rectangular lake, and we’ve always been there in either autumn or spring. We’ve found it relaxing, and the views of the sunset over the lake are lovely.

This time, however, Fire Lake was already closed for the season when we’d get to BG. So, the only choices for camping in BG are Mary Jane Thurston State Park which is kind of far from Bowling Green, and the Wood County Fairgrounds. We’d never stayed at a fairground before, and I was not sure what to expect.

V=Beef Barns at the Wood County Fairgrounds
The Jr. Beef Barn next store to our site.
Long story short, we love it. Even though the grounds are shuttered up and kind of lonesome, it is still neat to be able to walk the grounds without a huge crowd of people. There is only one 50 AMP hookup: right between the Fine Art Barn and the Jr Beef Barn, right down the street from Gate C. The site is very large and although not quite level and grassy, we still managed to find a spot that, with the jacks, left us level enough.

Although shuttered-up, the grounds are far from empty. Workers are doing maintenance that they couldn’t do during high season, and people are dropping off boats, trailers, and RVs for winter storage.

There’s a guy training his horses for cart-racing in the track right across from our site this morning. First he runs the horse around the track to practice their trotting. He has this contraption on the back of a pick-up truck, and he hooks two horses at a time up to it. He drives around at trotting speed and the horses practice keeping their pace steady. Then he goes round the track with each of the horses several times, riding behind them in the cart. I liked watching him and imaging the chariot riders of ancient times, racing around a similar track to cheering, wild fans.

The fairgrounds manager is very friendly and made us feel welcome. He answered all our questions about the grounds and the Wood County Fair, which has been held in Wood County for the last 143 years. Last year they saw attendance grow to 103,000. For camping at the fair there are 600 campsites. They usually fill about 550 of them (!) and it costs $150 for the 8 days of the fair.

What I think is most exciting about the Wood County Fair, and what may bring us back to BG next August to attend, is the very unusual Combine Demolition Derby. When he told me about this, my jaw just hit the floor. I’ve only ever seen regular Demos on TV. I could only imagine how exciting it would be with COMBINES (*grunting sounds* More power!).

If you’ve been to a Combine Derby, please, let me know what it’s like in the comments.

Road Data for November 2nd, 2015

  • Traveled 213 miles in 4.5 hours from Mooresville, IN to Bowling Green, OH
  • Used 24.2 gallons of diesel and averaged 8.7 MPG
  • Cost of one night at Wood County Fairground is $20