Jefferson, Ohio Thousand Trails and more friends

As promised in the last blog, here are some pictures of our camp site qt Kenisee Lake Thousand Trails RV Park. This park is very well kept. We talked to the grounds keeper today. He said he mows 85 acres. Now that is a lot of mowing. The area has received a lot of rain and there are a lot of wet areas that he has not been able to mow but the sites have been pretty well maintained. The park has 3 fishing lakes, pickle ball court (no fence around it), heated pool and a lot more. We are on a 50 amp site that is really large.

 Looking right

 Looking left

Our site

On Wednesday, we got on the bike and rode about 80 miles to have lunch with our rv friends Paul and Marsha. We met them at Luigi's in Akron for lunch. The food was good and the conversation was even better. We had not seen them for a year and had a lot to catch up on. We hope to get together in Texas in November.

 Paul and Marsha

After lunch, it was back on the bike for a 15 mile ride to Mike and Cindy's house in Mogadore, Ohio. Louise worked with Cindy when she worked for Ohio State Parks years ago. We had visited them 3 or 4 years ago here and since we were in the area we had to stop by. I had to pry Louise away so we could get on our way back to the rv. 

 Mike and Cindy

Louise and Cindy

On the way back we needed to make a Walmart stop and lo and behold look what was in front Wally World..... We had to stop in to the Harley shop for a look around. Honest, I didn't know it was there until we pulled up in front of it. Great luck on my part...lol. The bad thing was they didn't have any cool tee shirts. I am running out of room in my drawer and I have to be much more selective.

Today, we rode in to Cortland, about 30 miles, to meet up with Jason Brown and his family for a pizza dinner. I worked with Jason in Dayton and in Shreveport, LA. When Shreveport shut down he was able to transfer to Youngstown. It is a shame that he and his family has had to move so many times for his job, but at least he is still working. The pizza was pretty good and we had a great time chatting about old times and what the future may hold. He is hoping that this will be his last move but he isn't willing to bet on it. If GM keeps closing plants here in the states, his next move may have to be to China to get work.

After three weeks of  visiting friends and family, we have come to an end for the time being. We have had a wonderful time meeting up with everyone even though at times it was hectic trying to fit everybody in. We have a nephew in Virginia that we  hope to visit on our way to Georgia if we can work it out. The next few days here will be filled with sight seeing and geocaching.  There are a lot of covered bridges in the area and a lot of wineries to visit.

Till next time

Duane and Louise 

Grand-kids,soccer games and friends

The second phase of our Ohio visit has come to an end with our move to Jefferson, OH today.  We really enjoyed the past two weeks visiting friends and family in the Troy area.  We shared many nice chats and good dinners with them.  We spent the most time with our daughter Rachel, our son-in-law Benji, Madeliene (8), Simon (6), and Judah (4).  We parked in their backyard and the kids couldn't wait for the front door to open to signal that we were ready for them to visit.  

Long-time friends Gene and Barbara Lucas

My Uncle Paul and Aunt Rhonola.  Uncle is 96 and still crankin'.  My hero!

Always time for a visit to the local HD dealer.  This one is in Piqua.

From left to right:  Niece Theresa, her mom and my big sis Martha, Me (the baby) and middle sis Marycarol.   There were three generations here.  Not pictured is Theresa's son Shawn, who is taking the pic.  Thanks Shawn!   

Duane and friend Gene Emrick

Duane and oldest brother Dennis and sis-in-law Pat.

My good friend of many years, Carmel

My brother Paul and sis-in-law Bev,

their daughter, Julie and granddaughter Andrea (on left)

Paul and me

Rachel has always crafted with the kids.  Here we are making alligator key chains with pony beads from Aunt Rhonola

Maddy likes to make her own creations.

Maddy, Jude, and Si mugging for the camera.

Dinner at La Rosa's  (Maddy is wearing a circlet with a flower in the middle of her forhead--one of her creations.)

Creek walking behind the house

Gramps and me with the kids  Si and Jude are looking dapper in their Fedoras

Opening soccer games:  Maddy

Simon (blue)

Jude

We thank all of our relatives and friends for taking time out of their busy schedules to visit with us.  We apologize to friends Wayne and Denise Derrickson, Bob and Dottie Ries, Tom Cotterman, and Bob Kedler for forgetting the camera on their visits.
We arrived at Kenisee Lake Thousand Trails Campground about 2 PM today. We are on a 50 amp full hook-up site that is very large. This campground appears to be very well kept. We will get some pics tomorrow.

Next you will be introduced to more friends.  Bet you can't wait!

Louise and Duane

Wilmington, Ohio

We arrived at Wilmington Thousand Trails Campground  on Thursday. This will be the first chance we have had at staying at Thousand Trails since we joined a few months ago. This park has 124 camp sites, some with 30 amp hookups with water some 30 am, water and sewer. When we arrived here there were 3 sites with sewer available and we are on one of them. The most of the sites are nice and large. There are a lot of trees on most sites so rvs with roof satellite may have trouble finding a site they like. 

 Our site

 One of three fishing lakes. One of the lakes has canoes that anyone can use.

 Tennis/pickle ball court. The court needs a lot of work. It has cracks with grass growing up in it. We are still able to use it for practice at least.

 Hot tub

This is one of the nicest pools we have seen in are travels. It is an enclosed pool and is very large for a rv park. 

We have found this park to be a very nice park. The one thing we don't like is that most of the sites with sewer are taken by monthly or yearly renters. It will be a little hard for travelers like us to get a sewer site. This past weekend, there were a lot kids running around but seemed to be pretty well behaved and not to loud. Things are really quite here today. 

On Friday we took the bike out for a little ride to Roberts Arena. This is a large horse show complex that Jr. and I had shown horses at years ago. They were having a ranch horse competition going on. We watched a little bit of the show  but it  was running so slow we decided to head on.

We headed over to a truck show about 10 miles away. When we got there the show was closed for the day.

Another giant to add to our collection

Saturday we took off on the bike for Cincinnati to visit with daughter Stacy and her partner Ruth Ann. We went out to eat at Longhorn then went for a two 2 mile walk which ended at Graeters Ice Cream shop. We stayed at Stacy's house for the night because we had an appointment for a Segway tour of the Cincinnati river front at 8 am Sunday morning. Stacy and Ruth Ann paid for mine as an early birthday gift. Thank you 2 very much, I loved it.

There are a lot of murals on downtown buildings. I am not a city person but they are really doing a great job of cleaning up the downtown area. 

The first thing we had to do when we got to the Segway store was to get a lesson on how to ride them. Louise looks pretty good on there. TheSegway is very easy to master, 10 minutes of practice and off we went. No one wrecked so I guess they did a pretty good job with the lessons...lol

Stacy and Ruth Ann

There were seven of us including the guide.

Flying pig statue 

Our guide in the green shirt was very knowledgable about Cincinnati history

The ride took us down to the  river front where they have a very nice bike/running path.

Then we headed across the pedestrian bridge that goes over to Newport, Ky.

Stacy and Ruth Ann

The group
The ride was little over 2 hours. We had a great time and learned a little Cincy history.

After the tour we headed to a park. 

The flowers were in bloom 

The views were beautiful.  There were a lot of overlooks. From here we drove down to the area below.  This recreational area includes a dog park and two interconnecting walk/bike paths.  The outer is 5 miles.  We walked the inner 1.9 mile loop (pictured below) before we quit for the day.  Later the girls made a simple but delicious supper from fresh corn and tomatoes we got earlier from the farmers' market. 

 We left Cincy about 7 pm heading back to the campground. The ride back was great. Very little traffic and cool weather. We will see Stacy again tomorrow. Today was rest up day.

Till next time

Duane and Louise