Time to Start a New Adventure

 I have not written in this blog since the end of June. We did have a busy summer and early Fall, but I have a hard time taking the time to write. We are now back at the boat in Demopolis, Alabama. We are in the process of getting SHIFT ready to leave Kingfisher Bay Marina and head down the Tombigbee River to the Gulf of Mexico. We are currently planning to leave around November 1. The big question that we will try to answer in the next few weeks is: Where will we go?

The rest of this entry will be a quick recap of our summer. We arrived at the Ranch in Missouri at the end of April and stayed there until October 7. My last update concluded with our trip to the Great Smokey Mountains NP. In July, we started with a celebration of July 4th that is not only the birthday of the US, but the birthday of our daughter, Shannon. We spent part of the day out on Shannon and Brian's new boat. That portion of the day ended with a very strong thunderstorm. We then were invited to a friends house overlooking the Kimberling City Bridge. They had a nice fireworks show that we enjoyed.  

Look at all of the boats on Table Rock Lake waiting for the fireworks.

It late July, we were getting a bit stir crazy and felt it was time to go see our parents and as much family as we could. We took off in the Mustang and drove over 3000 miles. Our first stop was in Alabama to check on the boat and do some work on SHIFT. That all went well. 

We then headed to the Dallas Ft. Worth area to see Kim's parents and two of my brothers. We had the added bonus of spending time with a number of our Nieces and Nephews. That was an unexpected pleasure. They have all grown up a bunch since we last saw them, and they have turned into very impressive young adults. 

Kim's parents, Phyllis and Richie along their grandson, Eric, wife Elizabeth and twins Walter and Caroline.

My Brother Brian and wife Julie's new house has an awesome backyard pool area with outdoor kitchen. To the right is Brian's son Matthew, who is now at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh working on his Masters in Bio-Medical engineering and Daughter Katherine who is at OU. 

We then went on to my Brother Alan and Wife Denise's house, where Alan and I worked on his new to him Airstream Trailer. From there it was on to Colorado. We ran into a pretty intense hail storm in Colorado Springs, but suffered no damage to the car.

That is hail on the windshield.

We stayed at my brother Bob and Wife Cheri's house while in Colorado. We had a great time catching up with their family. We got our usual concert from the kids. They are amazing musicians. 

Daniel at the piano and Mom and Dad in the background. 

Mom has made an outstanding recovery after spending 4 months in the hospital last year. Dad showed me that he can still outswim me and 89 years of age. He is amazing. I then rekindled my love of golf with a fun outing with Daniel and Bob. I played a bunch more when I returned to the ranch in August and September. We then made the long drive back to the ranch. It was a long trip, but we are so glad we did it. 

I made a return trip to the Colorado mountains less than two weeks later when two of my partners and another new friend made a trip to ride dirt bikes in the mountains. I loved my time in the beautiful mountains and really enjoyed the cool morning air. 

My KTM 450 on top on Tomichi Pass.

We then came back to the ranch and prepared for three events. We had a Girls Ride Weekend over the Labor Day weekend that was well attended by 35 women riders. We then had an Enduro and a Hare Scramble on back to back weekends. After that, Kim and I were toast. We would have liked to take a rest before we left, but Hurricane Delta had other plans. We decided to move up our schedule to get to the boat ahead of the storm to ensure she was safe. The storm took a turn to the West and then went north of us here in Demopolis. We did not get any strong wind and just some rain. 

So, now I am caught up to real time. I will try to write on a regular basis to document our travels. We would like to haul the boat out of the water this next week to check the bottom and fix a small chip below the waterline. It will be the first time that we have done that, so that should be interesting. Check back to see how things go.