Steven and Betty RV Adventures: November 2017

Today we drove away from the very nice RV park in Savannah and arrived at home a little after 2 pm. We were held up a long time due to a traffic accident on the Buckman Bridge. Welcome back to the Jacksonville area!

The weather was generally clear but quite warm. It actually was normal for this time of year, but we had become spoiled by the cool weather farther north. When we got home we looked around the yard at all the damage caused by Hurricane Irma. There were several felled trees in the back lot. The sun screen that I had mounted on one side of the motorhome port had been ripped down by the wind. I had gone to a lot of time and trouble to mount that. Thankfully the house was in fine shape. Walking around the yard I see a lot of projects that I need to schedule, assuming the weather gets cool enough this winter.

We started unloading the motorhome, a very taxing job. I see why so many become full-time motorhome residents: you no longer have to load and unload for long trips. We still are not ready for that. Some day soon we must wash the motorhome, which we could not do along the way since RV parks forbid using their water to wash any vehicle. We also need to clean its inside.

A lot of mail was sent to our house even though we had forwarded our mail to my sister in Jacksonville. A lot of magazines, fliers, calendars, catalogs, etc. And Xfinity mailed me a new cable box that they expect me to install. Our TV now will not work, so I guess I need to get started figuring out how to install the new box.

We slowly are adjusting to being back home. The motorhome became our home in a very real sense. We often talked about how we never felt away from home or wishing we were back home. We had our home with us. We did get tired of bad weather as it turned sour in mid-October in lower Michigan, then followed us through Tennessee. Then the RV parks were horrible in Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina. Our last stop in Savannah, thankfully, was very nice. Would not have minded staying there much longer.

By the end of this month, Betty will have hip replacement surgery. We soon begin all the preliminary doctor visits that lead up to that. With all the other things we must do to care for this property, this should translate into a very busy remainder of the year.

I wrote yesterday that I would try to capture what it was like driving into our driveway after being away so long. As you can see above, it is seeing things that need to be done and scheduling chores to do, and then doing them as time allows. That is what being home is like. When traveling across the country, one is not thinking about chores around the house. The vehicle is also the residence. When one goes places and sees things, taking many photos and updating a blog along the way, chores are not a part of it. Little things may be needed to be bought or fixed, but they are rather small unless the vehicle needs something major, and that would be an expense but someone else's chore. When one is traveling, he is not involved in church or community activities either. So coming home is a return to chores and outside activities. Nothing mysterious, just life as usual.

On Monday, Oct 30, we left the terrible Shadrack RV Park for Elmore RV Park in Charlotte, NC. Getting there was quite an experience, where my RV GPS said to go one way and Betty's phone GPS said to go another. We should have followed mine, since Betty's phone sent us into downtown Charlotte at rush hour. We were being told to turn right at intersections which had signs saying no right turns. One way streets everywhere (like downtown Jacksonville). This sort of thing went on quite a while. I finally picked a road that looked like it would take us out of the city and followed it. While I drove away from downtown, Betty called the RV park to ask for better directions. Following those directions we made it to the park, but it was not too great a park. It was behind a used car dealership, requiring a drive over curbs, around a large tree in the road, then backing into a short slot. I was promised 50 amps but only got 30 amps. The place was a wreck, but its reviews were the best in that part of Charlotte. It was, thankfully, close to the Billy Graham Library. We got set up for the night and made plans for visiting the library the next day.

Tuesday, Oct 31, we slept late and had a quiet breakfast together. After lunch we drove to the library. The GPS took us on another roundabout route to get there, but once there it was worth the trouble. Beautiful well landscaped grounds, with pretty, tasteful arrangements and architecture. Billy Graham's childhood home has been disassembled and reassembled on the grounds. It is no humble farmhouse, but rather a beautiful colonial design home. It must have been one of the best in the area where he grew up. After walking through the home, we went outside to the library, which has a front that looks like a barn, but once inside one is taken on a computer-assisted tour of a much larger building that extends back behind the barn front. The tour begins with an animated cow that speaks and sings about the tour you will be taking. Click this link to listen to part of the cow's talk: Talking cow The tour is entitled The Journey of Faith. They have recreated in several rooms -- all connected by tall doors that open automatically at the close of each presentation -- the key events in the life and ministry of Billy Graham. It is called The Billy Graham Library because it is patterned after the presidential libraries. After having seen the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum & Library in Grand Rapids, I can see the similarities. Outside and inside the library beautiful hymns are being played and sung over speakers tastefully hidden from view. It gives the whole place a worshipful ambiance that envelops the whole visit. One enters the library through a cross-shaped door and exits to the lobby through another cross-shaped door. The centrality of the cross was emphasized throughout, a welcome change from all the Mormon buildings out west that have no cross, since they associate it with death and sadness without understanding their need as sinners for a Savior; and that salvation comes only through the cross. The volunteers everywhere were very gracious and helpful, always asking if we needed anything. They were of every race, which would delight Graham who was a leader in healing racial injustice, always insisting that meetings be integrated everywhere, particularly in the south. It was an unusually talented team that God in His providence assembled in the 1940s, Graham, Barrows, and Shea. After the indoor tour one exits the building to the prayer garden, a beautifully landscaped area with walkways that eventually lead to the gravesites of Ruth Graham, George Beverly Shea, Cliff Barrows, and Billie Barrows (Cliff's first wife who died of cancer). Remembering how I as a teenager sat glued to the TV screen in the 1960s watching the many televised crusades, loving the old hymns being sung by huge choirs led by Cliff Barrows, enjoying the solos sung by Shea, and watching Billy Graham perform his enthusiastic exhortations; I was stunned to stand over the gravesites of these instrumental people who left such a lasting impact upon me. We had lunch inside at the small eatery they have provided. And, yes, we could not leave without visiting the gift shop and buying a few things. We left as they were closing at 5 pm. The volunteers were also leaving and had kind words for us, wishing us well, even asking if there was anything for which they could pray. There is a wonderful aura of saintly service about the whole place. It was a shame to drive away back into the mad traffic of Charlotte and our awful RV park.

Today, Wednesday, Nov 1, we carefully hitched up our Jeep to the motorhome and drove through the obsticle course of that park out onto a very busy highway that was not friendly to a motorhome pulling a Jeep behind it. We made it safely out and onto the interstate highways of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia until we arrived at the Savannah South KOA Park. The wind died down when we got to I-95, so I could drive near the speed limit and arrive here sooner than anticipated. It took a little over 6 hours of driving to get from Charlotte to just south of Savannah, GA. It was a relief to be in a decent RV park again. This place is tastefully laid out, clean, and neat. The sites are level and long enough to keep the Jeep connected overnight so that tomorrow will not require the extra chore of re-connecting the Jeep, which requires many careful steps to keep the Cherokee's electronics from getting scrambled.

It was a moment of reflection this morning as I turned the page on the calendar that has taken the trip attached to the front of the refrigerator. We left St Augustine on August 8, and now it was November. So much had happened in October alone and now it had passed into history. Tomorrow's trip will be relatively short, especially compared to today's trip. It will be a little over 2 hours for the ride down the short east coast of Georgia and into Northeast Florida. Betty and I have been asking ourselves what it will be like to drive into the driveway after having driven this motorhome over so many kinds of roads, some really bad, up and down mountains, over countless bridges, and through many states. I shall try to capture it for you tomorrow after it occurs.