A FIVE-PART BLOG

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our E-mail Digest or RSS Feed. We will then send you the stories that are posted each day in an e-mail digest. We use a service called Feedburner for delivery of these emails. You will receive an e-mail from Feedburner after you subscribe and you must click on that email to activate your subscription. Thanks for visiting and enjoy all the information! RV.Net Blog AdminBy Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers YORK AND THE HOGS — As today’s title suggests, there are five parts to today’s blog, beginning with our discovering an interesting area to visit when you’re traveling in the Northeast.  The place is York County, Pennsylvania, between Harrisburg and Baltimore.  It proudly calls itself Another "Hog" owner arrives at the factory. No photos are allowed in the production plant. “The Factory Tour Capital of the World.” Before going further about all that’s available in that area, I’ll start out by saying that the only tour we took was the Harley-Davidson motorcycle factory.   Realize that technology is not high in Monique’s sphere of interests and I’ve never longed to straddle a “Hog,” but whattaplace! The robots that paint and form parts are magnificent.  The workforce’s devotion to producing a precision product is inspirational.  Everything on every motorcycle that goes through the stations is checked and rechecked all along the assembly lines. Most of the... Read more

EXTRA, EXTRA, READ ALL ABOUT IT!

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers I was a newspaper editor and reporter back in the days when newspapers were the primary source of news.  Decades later, ink still flows through my veins.  In other words, even today I gravitate toward the news.  I All the Pulitzer Prize winning photos on display -- a time for reflection mention this because I put the new Newseum in Washington, D.C. at the top of my list of museums in our Capital City. The Newseum houses an incredible collection of things that matter to us all.  It’s about things so many of us have personally experienced (depending on age) so it’s filled with information we can identify with, and then gives us a different perspective on what we read or saw on television. In the FBI Section -- The shoes of the Shoebomber Matter of fact, it explains how television vaulted into first place as a reliable source of news when President John Kennedy was assassinated, as shown in an incredible series of temporary dynamic exhibitions.  It explains the importance of Edward R. Murrow.  The relationship between the media and the FBI sustained my attention. The most emotional experience was looking at the Pulitzer Prize winning photos through the years.  Almost every one of the more than 80 pictures made me think, reflect, evaluate, understand. Woven throughout the five stories of galleries are movies and other active visuals that take the viewer through the history of journalism from before the writing... Read more

D.C.

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers Washington, D.C. – I would call it the “phoniest” town we’ve seen.  Walking on the streets and through museums, around monuments and restaurants and on the Metrorail subway system, seems like everyone has a cellphone up to his or her ear, although they may be listening to music on an I-pod.  What did you think when I called Washington, D.C., the “phoniest” town? In the Museum of African Art With one exception, I would describe what we’ve experienced a notable, memorable stop along our route.  It’s been years since we both visited the nation’s capital.  We carried our impressions back with us and supplemented that with new appreciation of the grandeur of it all. We feel like we did it right. The first trip into the city (except for following our GPS’s routing of us through the plate of spaghetti they call freeways and roads) had us boarding a Gray Lines Tours bus for “DC at Night.”  We knew we would have a chance to revisit the must-see sights in the daytime; so, seeing it at night gave us a whole different perspective. Best of all, the crowds, especially the hordes of hyperactive school kids (mostly on cellphones), were more manageable when climbing the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and the numerous other sights we took in that night.  Even the long line of tour buses after 9 p.m. was mind-bending. We read this week that the National Mall in Washington has more visitors than Yosemite,... Read more

SURPRISE, SURPRISE, SURPRISE – HAMPTON, VA

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers A continuing saga, which I call ‘Micro-Blogs” … From our campground at Hampton, Virginia, we walked the historic olde streets of Yorktown and visited battlegrounds.  We took in Williamsburg, recreated to show what life was like in the days before American Independence.  And we drove down to Jamestown, where it all began for Europeans arriving in the New World. That was two days of being injected with American history, and, honestly, it brought to life what I had learned so many years ago about the founding of this country. But, there’s more!  Before hitchin’ up and movin’ out of Hampton, we thought we should take a few minutes to see the Town of Hampton.  On our way over the scenic Hampton River Bridge next to downtown, we spied Scenes from Hampton's International Children's Festival something going on in town – looked like a festival.  No way to pass that up. That’s when we walked into a highlight of our trip – the International Children’s Festival.  Dozens of booths manned by locals native to or who have spent time in countries around the world.  The people dressed in the traditional attire of their countries were doling out information to children (and parents) about each of their countries. Each child had a passport to get stamped as they learned at least a smattering about each country, its geography, culture, products and more.  We saw native costumes and heard music from... Read more

GREENVILLE, SC –AN EXCEPTIONAL CITY

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers The Reedy River Falls are a center of beauty and relaxation for Greenville residents and visitors Ain’t no grass growing under our feet, but I’m happy to say there are flowers blossoming on the bushes and trees that line the highways and byways we have traversed over the past two weeks. The pace of our travels has limited my computer time, but now there’s time to catch up, which I’ll do with this series of “Micro-Blogs,” a few impressions on the past two weeks in the Eastern Time Zone, published in series form. The story of the Mouse on Main “Mice on Main” seems to fit in well with the character of dynamic Greenville, South Carolina.  Our journeys have taken us through so many towns that put heart, soul and dollars into re-invigorating their downtown areas, only to see their efforts sputter and die — Greenville is a glorious exception. In a grand effort that began about 40 years ago, the once decaying Main Street is booming, with beautiful and historic buildings shining in Shady Main Street contrasts with the historic and modern buildings along the boulevard the sunlight. People line up for lunch and dinner in more than 50 restaurants along the tree-shaded boulevard.  International corporations have move into town, bringing energy and sophistication to this once sleepy southern town. Gardens at the base of the falls outline the park under the suspension bridge The suspension bridge overlooking... Read more

THE PLIGHT OF A MILLION BATS

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers Another spontaneous detour on our 6-month journey across America took us to Russell Cave National Monument just over the state line from Chattanooga outside of Bridgeport, Alabama. The beginning of seven miles of Russell Cave The “why” to visit there: it’s “an archaeological site with one of the most complete records of prehistoric cultures in the Southeast. Thousands of years ago a portion of Russell Cave’s entrance collapsed, creating a shelter that, for more than 10,000 years, was home to prehistoric peoples. Today it provides clues to the daily lifeways of early North American inhabitants dating from 10,000 B.C. to 1650 A.D,” to quote the National Park service handout. The “caution” of visiting this remote park is the RV parking is very limited.  There are two spaces for RVs and buses, but I gave up maneuvering into them with our 50-foot truck and trailer length, parking instead across car spaces.  Luckily, since only two other visitors showed up while we were on site, there was plenty of room for us.  Smaller rigs, 5th wheels and motorhomes probably have less trouble than our 28-foot TT. And at this point, I’ll mention that when Ranger Antoine Fletcher was listing the numerous species of animals in the park, he said they have about everything but Bigfoot.  I corrected him immediately – our trailer is a Bigfoot.  We were also impressed to hear there are more than 700 varieties of... Read more

REFLECTIONS FROM THE ROAD

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers We’ve been traveling cross-country for two weeks now on our way to the Canadian Maritimes from California.  I’ll let you know more about the travels in Part 3 of this article. PART 1 – FREE OVERNIGHT PARKING – From my “I wish I could find the picture I took Department,” I send along this: In Mark Polk’s March edition of RV Consumer Magazine — http://issuu.com/rveducation101/docs/rv_consumer_magazine_march_2013/1?utm_source=RV+Consumer+emag+this+Month+March+2013+++&utm_campaign=RV+Consumer+magazine+RV+101&utm_medium=email — he has a brief item about Walmart parking, which probably applies to all one-night on-the-road no-charge parking places.   He mentions how putting down the jacks on hot asphalt to level the rig can damage the parking lot surface. We have seen several instances of what we feel is parking-lot abuse during our travels, but none so memorable as the Scamp mini-trailer on the edge of a parking lot with awning out, rug down, barbecue going and chairs and tables all arranged.  It looked like the owners had set up camp for the week. We try not to be judgmental, but put yourself in the role of store manager.  You can understand why he or she would think about putting the lot off-limits for overnight RV parking.  Most managers of businesses work hard to preserve an image of a clean property.  We hope you consider yourself their guests. PART 2 – TRUCKIN’ AND RVers Anyone... Read more

WE GET LETTERS … & ‘A CAN OF WORMS’

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers “WE GET LETTERS” is a line from the 1950s era Perry Como Show, where a bevy of beauties would come out singing the lyrics to “Letters, we get letters, we get stacks and stacks of letters.”  Then Perry sang requested songs from the home audience.  Well, enough trivia for this evening.  Just consider yourself lucky that I won’t sing, but here’s some of the mail received in the past week at neverboredrvers@gmail.com [each letter begins in bold]: You asked for “wrong route” stories.  We’ve found that traveling in our 38-foot motorhome is always an adventure. As we were driving home to Jacksonville, Fla., from a cross-country to Yuma, Ariz., we needed to buy fuel. When I checked GasBuddy, I found that diesel was several cents cheaper at a Chevron station near the Louisiana border just before crossing into Mississippi. We saw the gas station’s sign and pulled off. Jim slowly pulled in front of the station to see if we could access the pumps. By the time he decided we could, it was too late to pull into the station. He said he would turn around up ahead.  We kept following it, until it turned into a Y and climbed a rise. The road narrowed, and we found ourselves on top of a levee, on a narrow one-lane dirt/gravel road, with no turnaround in site. “Garmina” (our GPS) actually knew about this road … sort of. She told us it went straight for a couple of miles, then turned back... Read more

Good Sam and Camping World Launch ‘Project Good Samaritan’ to Institute Employee Volunteerism Program

Nationwide Initiative to Ensure Employees Make a Difference in Their Communities October 9 (Chicago, IL) – Good Sam, the world’s largest RV owners organization and Camping World, the nation’s largest RV and outdoor retailer, today announced as part of their 2013 goal to foster corporate social responsibility, the launch of a new employee-related initiative called ‘Project Good Samaritan’ dedicated to its mission of making our community a better place both as corporate citizens and for individual employees through a dedicated focus on philanthropy. The new initiative, ‘Project Good Samaritan,’ provides for the staff to volunteer eight hours of their work time a quarter to causes that are meaningful to them, such as lending support to local soup kitchens and food pantries, community projects such as home building and meal distribution for needy families, recycling programs, homeless shelters, nursing homes, and other worthwhile causes within their communities while the employee receives paid time off from work to participate. Read more  Read More →

GETTING READY – UNDERNEATH – PART 4

By Barry Zander, Edited by Monique Zander, the Never-Bored RVers Fall is Creeping In -- A Virginia Creeper The breeze passing by us this morning had a hint of chill.  My appraisal:  “This is not the time ‘to chill’ on getting ready for the winter trip southward. I began my prep for getting under our RV by rounding up all the sprays and gook I might need.  I had wisely spread them out in various plastic bins and closets so I would slowly work my way up to the uncomfortable tasks: 1) get the cans, Assortment of 'Gook' etc.;   2) wash the undercarriage;  3) decide on the easiest jobs to do; 4) take a two-day break; 5) ATTACK! The easiest job turned out to be spraying white lithium grease on the bars under the slide and then applying the white grease from a tube to the ratcheted parts.  Then, I took the black grease and stuck it to the leaf springs. That’s when I noticed two repair jobs needing attention.  A factory-installed box below the electrical hook-up cord was loose.  When this same thing happened to us while camping in the wilds of British Columbia in 2010, it was an invitation for mice – 9 of them – to invade.  Eight nights of interrupted sleep, but excellent fodder for my Sept. 7, 2010, blog: “EEEEEEEEEEEEK!” Not wanting to rewrite that article, Monday I high-tailed it to the True Value store and bought a can of the filler spray material (I usually call it the “horrid filler spray” because I tend to get it on my clothes, no matter... Read more

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