We were parked at Convenient Campground in Red Bay last night. It’s just a gravel parking lot but we were off the road enough that we had a quiet night, slept well. We were back up at 6:00am to be ready for the Tiffin supervisor who always visits you at your RV sometime after 7:00 am your first morning. We were still sitting at the table finishing up breakfast when the phone rang and the person on the other end asked us to come to Bay 7 ASAP. What? No visit from the supervisor? Nope. Straight to the bay. Guess our problem description was adequate. Talk about going from a slow relaxed morning to top speed in less than a minute. We made it to Bay 7 in about 20 minutes. As usual we had two very nice young men assigned to our coach and they began work on our slide out immediately. Since you are not allowed to stay with your RV, we spent the next three – four hours roaming around Red Bay, visiting the grocery stores, the Tiffin Hospitality Center, the parts store and getting our walking in for the day. Shortly before lunch we received another call asking us to return to Bay 7. The work was complete and we were good to go! They found a wire from the slide controller to a motor had come disconnected inside the wall. Apparently a known issue because they had a retrofit on hand to apply to keep it from happening again. So relieved and the cost of the repair was much less than we expected. We grabbed some lunch and were on the way to Pine Mountain. We will get some estate work done here tomorrow morning then we plan to return to SC. It was a good day.
In our Red Bay Tour today we found this at the Big Star grocery. Of course we had to buy it. And no, we haven’t tried it yet.
So… Another month has slipped away. It’s been a busy month and a hard month in some ways. The estate sale at Aunt Helen’s house is now complete and the house is now empty. We are thankful that project is complete. We have spent time cleaning out and then cleaning up. We are praying that God will bring the family He wants to have the house, to make Pine Mountain their home and be good members of the community. Of course, we want that to happen NOW, but… we know that God’s timing is perfect timing and that’s what we want.
Good friends that Anne worked with invited us to Destin a few weeks ago. As we were preparing to make the trip south, we realized we couldn’t remember when we had last slept in a house that didn’t have wheels underneath. They have a beautiful new home there where they can walk out their door, onto their deck and into their boat. It was a great weekend of visiting and catching up. Of course, we also had some great seafood and fun time on the water. So blessed to still have friends from the years at Cullman Internal Medicine. We plan to stay in closer contact since we both have plans to have extended time on the Gulf Coast. BTW, we were able to sleep just fine in a house without wheels.
We enjoyed some time on the water with our friends in Destin.
We attended at wonderful worship service on the beach before we left Destin.
We decided to take a few days “off” to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary in Maggie Valley, NC. We are so blessed! We were able to meet up with Barry and Donna on Saturday for a hike and lunch. We share the same anniversary day but different year. After lunch, while walking around in Cherokee, a large herd of elk walked out of the woods and into the town. The huge buck stayed in the edge of the woods for a while then began bugling, and shortly, all the ladies and children rejoined the buck and wondered across the parking lot and back into the woods. Such a treat to watch! We also got to meet some NOMADS for dinner on Monday night. It was a great few days of celebrating our 40th.
In Maggie Valley we stayed at Stonebridge RV Park. This is the “brochure” style picture of our site.
This is the “reality” version. Our slideout was less than 6′ from our neighbor’s slideout.
However we did have this nice view out our windshield at our site
We had a delicious breakfast one morning at The Buttered Biscuit near Lake Junaluska.
We visited Soco Falls which is just a few minutes from Maggie Valley.
The trail to Soco Falls can be interesting. At least someone has left some ropes there to make it easier.
We visited Mingo Falls on our way to meet up in Cherokee.
We went to Mingus Mill to hike one of the trails after meeting up with Barry and Donna in Cherokee.
We chose the Mingus Cemetery Trail. Good choice.
The bull elk acted like he owned Cherokee and all its streets.
Some of the rest of the herd enjoying the river. A group of folks floating on tubes went by shortly before this.
We also took a ride on the Blue Ridge Parkway and stopped for a hike at one of the overlooks.
The Grassy Ridge MIne Trail
Some of the lush flora along the trail
It is another rocks and roots trail typical of the Smokey Mountains
The NOMADS friends we visited are workcamping at Lake Junaluska so we hiked around the lake there after visiting them.
A hedge on the Lake Junaluska Trail
When in the Maggie Valley-Waynesville area you have to visit Mast General Store.
As we were preparing to leave Maggie Valley, one of Fred’s slides wouldn’t retract. Max was able to bypass the motor and get some help to push the slide in so that we could drive Fred and meet Randy and Debra for a few days of fun at South Cove County RV park in Seneca, SC. There we had fun visiting, resting, kayaking and of course eating. We played mini golf for the first time in a very long time. Oasis Ranch mini golf was different than any we have played before. There were water hazards with large fish, sand traps and all sorts of curves, inclines, and dips. It was also nicely shaded and lots of fun.
The view from our campsite at South Cove County Park
Pocket stew cooking on the campfire
We really enjoyed kayaking with Randy and Debra.
Oasis Ranch has the nicest mini-golf course we have seen.
Sunset at South Cove County Park
We left South Carolina yesterday and are now back in Red Bay, Alabama at Tiffin Motor Homes factory service center hoping to get Fred repaired this week. We are fortunate that we can live with the one slide in but sure will be glad when we have that added space again. We usually enjoy our time at Red Bay and have already returned to our favorite pizza place and visited with the owner there again, and then back to our favorite ice cream shop. Now if we can just get good news in the morning about the timing of our repair. It’s really not fun to have both RV’s in the shop. We will keep you posted. Prayers appreciated.
Wow, it’s been a month since we posted a blog entry. That’s about as long as we have ever gone without a post. But we haven’t been working on mission projects so not much has been interesting enough to blog about.
When we last posted we were both sick with COVID. YUK! We both had relatively light cases with none of the serious symptoms of shortness of breath or the like. But, we certainly would not have wanted it to be any worse. It took Anne about two weeks to be back to normal with Max a much shorter time. After returning to health we had a visit with family in South Carolina. While making one of our return trips to Alabama to work on estate stuff we were rear-ended while stopped at a traffic light outside of Atlanta. We were driving the van and now we are waiting for parts to arrive for the repair. Almost $10,000 damage but could have been so much worse. Most importantly everyone is okay. Unfortunately, no van meant we had to cancel our planned New England trip and NOMADS project in Maine. Maybe next year.
Randy installing a new storage rack and box on the van. If you remember, we installed one on the other door a few months ago.
And three days later this is what one of the rear doors on the van looked like. We think it would have been much worse if the newly installed storage box had not absorbed most of the impact.
We were able to go camping with Randy and Debra as they were learning more about their new-to-them travel trailer. They are ready to go out on their own but we will gladly go with them anytime! Always great to spend time with them. We had a good time at Modoc Campground which is a Corp of Engineers campground in South Carolina about 45 minutes from their house. We enjoyed camping by the lake and watching all the critters. We saw eagles most days as well as great blue herons and ospreys. It was a relaxing few days, although too hot for much hiking except early morning.
Our site at Modoc Campground …
… and next to it Randy’s and Debra’s site.
We had some pretty sunsets at Modoc Campground …
… and a few afternoon thunderstorms. After all, is is summer in the south.
We really were not planning to stay in the hot south this summer, but…we make plans and God laughs. We stayed in South Carolina so we would be out of the way during the estate sale at Aunt Helen’s house. The sale was over last weekend and now they will be cleaning out what was left. Hopefully that won’t take too much longer and the house will sell quickly after that. We still have other estate work to do as well. Anne has also been busy with NOMADS work. We are staying busy but hope to be back to some fun travel soon. Hope everyone is staying healthy, safe and cool!
And to update you on this year’s Constructors for Christ project which finished up last week:
This is Bethlehem Baptist Church in Bremen during week 5 of the Constructors for Christ project. A lot of progress was made after we left.
The attendance stats for this years project
Click here to see a local TV news story about the project.
Since our fun night at Christian Way Farm and Mini Golf, we have been camping at Horseshoe Acres RV Park in Bremen, KY. After getting Fred situated on the site, we headed to the job site for our build. We were disappointed to find that the rough plumbing and slab were not completed. As we have seen previously, where there are disasters, the craftsmen have more work than they can handle and sometimes you just have to wait. Interesting, the sermon Sunday was on building on a firm foundation, on the rock and not the sand. The new church must be built on a firm foundation so, we had to be patient and wait. The plumbers competed their rough-in work on Monday, and the concrete was poured Wednesday. While waiting, other work was done. Debra and Anne clean out and reorganized one of the tool trailers. Headers and tees were also built so the walls will go faster for the team next week. Thursday and Friday most of the wall baseplates were installed while we waited for the concrete to cure. Of course, Constructors for Christ is so much more than just building a church. We renewed old friendships – this is our eighth year to build with Constructors. It was great to share meals and catch up. Unfortunately, some team members tested positive for COVID earlier in the week. We had hoped to visit with some NOMADS friends in the area this weekend but we both tested positive Saturday. For now we plan to isolate here at Horseshoe Acres and figure out what we do next when we are feeling better.
It was very disappointing to see this when we arrived on Wednesday. We then realized Week 1 was going to be different this year.
At least the lumber was here when we arrived.
The church had these items sitting on the old slab.
These items from the old church building are still sitting the the front yard.
Randy and Max usually help layout and install baseplates on Saturday before the rest of the team starts work on Monday. This year we erected tents and set up equipment with the help of Anne and Debra and a few other team members.
We actually had to resort to reading the instructions to assemble one of the tents.
The first tent finally finished and anchored.
The second tent was erected on the slab to provide some shade in the heat and protect the saws and wood from rain.
We also helped Ray build a hand washing station for the crew.
Bethlehem Baptist Church is now meeting at Bremen Elementary School. We joined them for worship last Sunday.
Of course, each morning starts with prayer at the work site.
We were able to stay busy and make progress even while waiting for the slab to be ready. We cut the studs for the 20 foot high walls …
… and built T and corner posts.
Rough plumbing finally in on Tuesday
Concrete finally going in early on Wednesday morning
One of the great things about Constructors for Christ is that young people are encouraged to work on the job. We think it is important to teach the importance of mission work at an early age. This year Abraham was always eager to help and learn.
While waiting for the slab to be ready Abraham built himself a house out of fire blocks …
… or sleeping in a wheelbarrow in front of a fan.
Baseplates finally started going down on Thursday.
One of three baseplate crews working Thursday and Friday
While we were installing baseplates other team members were cutting fire blocks.
Normally team members write scripture on the wall studs. Since no walls went up this week they wrote on baseplates…
… and on headers.
This year Anne and Debra worked on the build site some days. Most years they cook for the crew.
Sacramento Methodist Church opened their facility for our team to prepare and eat meals and to house some of the team members.
On Friday after work Randy and Debra drove us to Bells Run Baptist Church which was their first Constructors for Christ project the year before we started.
RVing With a Purpose 