Mt. Airy, North Carolina is not only home to one of the most well-known Old-Time and Bluegrass festivals in the country, it’s also the birthplace of that piece of classic American television The Andy Griffith Show. Andy Griffith, you see, was born in Mt. Airy (in which his boyhood home still stands and is now available as an overnight rental) and modeled the fictional town of Mayberry and many of its inhabitants after the very real town and some of…
Driving may be my least favorite part of RVing. Sitting in a seat for hours on end, constantly scanning your surroundings, navigating a large vehicle through unfamiliar territory – all the necessary aspects of taking your home on the road are certainly not the most enjoyable. That’s the main reason we try to limit the length of our travel days, with a four-hour drive as our general upper limit for a day on the road (and even that would be…
Our days here on Geiger Key continue to be packed to the gills with activities, which you already may have deduced from the distinct lack of blog posts lately. “How can a ‘retired’ couple with no kids stay so busy?” you might ask. Most days I wonder the same thing. But when we take a few minutes to slow down and reflect on the past couple of months, it’s easy to see what fills our typical days. In the previous…
As much as we both value our personal daily routines, neither of us are rigid taskmasters driven to achieve daunting to-do lists day after day simply for the sake of accomplishment. Although if you ask Ashley, I may act like that on occasion. Nevertheless – when the days with visitors in January outnumbered the days without, we practiced flexibility while still finding time to do those core activities important to each of our lives. Cecil had been stationary for over…
Life continues to roll on here in the Keys this winter, and we certainly can’t complain about the mild weather with all the reports of snow, ice, and frigid temperatures up north. We find our days to be busier in this pseudo-early retirement than when we lived a more traditional lifestyle complete with full-time jobs and a sticks and bricks house. January was the first month since we started this little blog in March 2017 that I didn’t post at…
After cruising through three wineries thanks to Harvest Hosts on our way to Florida, we had two more locations lined up as tentative stops through the Sunshine State before reaching the Keys. Central Florida experienced extended rainstorms shortly before we arrived, eliminating one of our potential stops since it was simply too muddy to park an RV in the grass. Our second choice was located back a long country dirt road, and as I wrote in the last post, we…
Nestled on the bank of the Tennessee River, the town of Florence in the northwest corner of Alabama plays host to music festivals, seasonal celebrations, a Renaissance faire, and the NCAA Division II Championship Football Game every year. Florence is also the birthplace of W.C. Handy – a composer and musician credited as the “Father of the Blues” – and the town holds a festival every year in his honor, drawing visitors and musicians in droves. A Frank Lloyd Wright…
The daily activities experienced during our train-driven visit continued in stark contrast to our recent months spent in New Mexico. Gone was the isolation felt in the wilderness surrounding tiny mountain towns, replaced by near-constant communion with family and abundant opportunities to venture into well-populated areas. Slow days that occasionally threatened a twinge of boredom morphed into a steady river of activities and generally full schedules. Ashley and I continued our separate visits with barely enough free time to miss…
The snow-tipped mountains of Ridgway gradually gave way to the reddish, jagged peaks outside of Grand Junction as we approached the western border of Colorado. The famed town of Moab waited just beyond the horizon in Utah, a destination often held in awe by RVers and outdoor enthusiasts in general. Moab has become a mecca for tourists because of its proximity to both Arches and Canyonlands National Parks, as well as the numerous trails in the area sought by adventure-seeking…
Neither the following words nor the accompanying photos will accurately convey the sheer beauty that is Colorado. Having spent the majority of my life in the northeastern United States surrounded by lush farmland and gentle hills, I’m not conditioned to expect the sheer scope and magnitude of the Rocky Mountains. Ashley and I both visited Colorado in the past, but brief vacations barely capture the grand landscape throughout the state. While portions of our travels last year were certainly scenic…