On the Road Again

• AWNING FIXED

• FINALLLLLY LEAVE FLORIDA

• LONGEST DRIVE IN ONE DAY

• NAVIGATING VET ISSUES ON THE ROAD

We celebrated our 30th anniversary on May 18th - almost with a new awning, but there was a part that was missing for installation. One more week exploring Tampa and MacDill AFB, and finally the installation was completed on May 25. Some highlights of our extended stay included:

• Bowling (see Trip's Deeper Dive #3 here)

• Playing pickle ball at the base gym basketball court (see Trip's Deeper Dive #4 here)

• 130 miles ridden on our electric bikes - off base restaurants, stores, groceries

• Fishing in the various ponds and rivers on base (didn't catch much - Trip caught on Sunfish with his fly rod - but it was fun!)

We found an abcess on Bosun's hind quarters and made a vet appointment near Pam's parent's home for Friday afternoon. We left MacDill AFB early Thursday morning, May 26, and headed towards coastal Alabama. It was an eventful day of driving.

• We hit bunches of traffic (most of it going the other direction) due to an accident on I-10. Four cars involved, 1 caught fire. We found out the next day there were 3 fatalities. Highway was shut down for hours, but not in our direction.

• Torrential rain on the panhandle of Florida. We took turns driving which was helpful. Slow and steady. Pam is gaining confidence.

• We saw 3 sets of trucks towing a truck towing a truck.

• We ran over a large aluminum ladder that had fallen out of a pickup truck on the highway (fortunately no damage to us thanks to our 10 ton vehicle, but we can't say the same for the ladder!)

• Shortly after the ladder fiasco we caught a 10 foot piece of plastic that was on the highway and wrapped around our front axel (again, no damage, but what a pain in the you-know-what)

• See Trip's Deeper Dive #5 here

The skies cleared and we decided to do the 500 mile trip in one day. We would arrive around dinnertime.

We had a great welcome by Pam's parents (see video here)

Staying at their house - RV tucks nicely into their driveway.

Bosun was able to be seen at the vet early Friday morning - on antibiotics for his hind quarters which was more superficial than we thought, so that's good. The Vet was concerned about Cushing's Disease so Bosun had a diagnostic workup done - results next week. He seems to be feeling better.

Behind Pam's parent's house is a very small pond with very big fish. Trip caught a bluegill with his fly rod. Pam caught a big large mouth bass - biggest fresh water fish she has caught! We didn't have a camera but she created a picture of a similar fish that she saw online. See below. You can't unsee it.