Hamilton, Missouri

Good morning, my friends. It rained a good part of the day for our drive to Hamilton. We backtracked a bit, passing by the Capitol rotunda in Jefferson City for the second time.

I've lost count how many times we crossed over the Missouri River this trip, but here we go again.

Up and over...

We didn't drive far enough north to pay Ozarkland a visit for more fudge, but it's probably just as well. Instead, we saw lots of barns.

We passed through Macon, Missouri.

It happens to be the birth place of Butch Patrick. Who remembers Butch Patrick? He played Eddie Munster on The Munsters. (Please tell me you're old enough to remember The Munsters.)

Historically, Macon citizenry had a very bad habit of lynching people without the benefit of a trial by jury.

Moving on, we drove past the exit for Callao, Missouri.

Wikipedia tells us that Callao was laid out in 1858, a year before the railroad was extended to that point. The town most likely took its name from the port city of Callao, Peru. Townsfolk did not know what to call the new town. They hung a map of the world on the wall, blindfolded a man like Pin the Tail on the Donkey, aimed him at the map and his finger landed on Callao, Peru. A post office called Callao has been in operation since 1859.

On down the road, we passed through Brookfield, which happens to be the birthplace of Dorothy C. Stratton,  the first woman to be commissioned an officer in U.S. Coast Guard.

We weren't finished with the barns, though. There were more.

As we neared our final destination, we drove through the town of Chillicothe, Missouri. Chillicothe fancies itself the "home of sliced bread."

On July 7, 1928, the Chillicothe Baking Company began selling pre-sliced bread "at quality grocers in the area," marking the first time sliced bread was available commercially in the world. They used the Rohwedder Bread Slicer, a machine created by Iowa inventor, Otto Frederick Rohwedder. There's even a mural across from the county courthouse depicting the community as being the home of sliced bread. The district around the courthouse is on the National Register of Historic Places.

(Image credit: "File:Chili-livingston.jpg" by Americasroof is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.)

And there were still more barns.

Eventually...be still, my beating heart. We're almost there!!

Yay! Here we are!

There was so much to see, just driving into town. I was snapping pictures right and left.

I've wanted to see the place for many years, but I honestly never thought I'd get here. I'm excited to go shopping this morning. The weather is a little iffy, so Mike is going to drop me in town, and then pick me up when I'm ready. The RV park is close enough I could walk, but then that would cut into my shopping time! Nobody wants that. So, nothing opens for a few more hours, but I will be there...so ready. I'll be like that Mervyn's ad where the woman is outside the door chanting "open, open, open." Yeah...no impulse control whatsoever. That's me. You'll be right there with me, right? We can be obnoxious together. I'll stop here, but you know I'll be back tomorrow to tell you all about it.

Another Slow Day

Good morning, my friends. It was a beautiful day weather-wise. There was no wind, and so it was very still and peaceful. We listened to the birdsong and sat outside. Even Smitty got outside to enjoy it.

Our neighbors to the north moved on and took their stupid woofie with them. Smitty could munch on his grass without having to look over his shoulder.

My morning was spent slow-stitching. I stitched enough of the kitten to decide to move my hoop.

Next, I was ready to finish off the leaves and the right side of the branch.

I was still in my pajamas at around 11:00 a.m. When I got dressed, I took another peek at the condition of my tick bite. Oooh. The red area was twice the size it had been the day before, and it appeared to be spreading upward. I've been consulting Mike about it. He took one look at it and said, "You need antibiotics." Sigh.

So, as much as I hated to head for an urgent care clinic for the second time this trip...off we went. Happily, there was no waiting there. The doctor took a look at it and reassured me that the risk of disease was low, but she was going to start me on a round of antibiotics just the same. I was glad we went. It was good to have someone with some expertise take a look. From there, we got some lunch, and then went to the nearby Walgreen's to pick up the medicine. Even though an hour had passed, they said it would still be 20 minutes before it would be ready.

Just down the hill was a Petco, and so we spent our 20 minutes shopping for cat toys. We found this little lamb for Sadie. She likes small soft toys that she can get in her mouth and then kick the daylights out of them. This lamb would do perfectly.

She's already killed it a couple of dozen times.

Resuming our slow day, I sat outside while I stitched up the leaves and the right side of the branch.

Now I'll start working on the tail end of the kitten.

When I moved my hoop aside, I noticed a big cicada had taken up residence on my knee. Ick.

When they come out of the ground, they shed their exoskeleton. These husks are littering the ground around our campsite.

Also, a woodpecker has been happily pecking away during our time here. Yesterday I was motivated to see if I could find it. Its pecking got louder as I walked toward the sound, and I finally spotted it up high in a tree. Just about the time I'd get it focused in my camera lens, it would fly to another branch. Eventually it flew away, but I was able to get a good look at it. It's a red-bellied woodpecker. I found this image online. He was very pretty.

(Image credit: "Red-bellied Woodpecker" by AcrylicArtist is licensed under CC BY 2.0.)

It's our last morning here. We'll be moving on to Hamilton, Missouri, today. We have a spot in a nearby RV park that will mean I can walk to the quilt shops. We're expecting rain today, and I'm hopeful the weather will improve by tomorrow. If not...well, I have a rain parka and an umbrella. I am an Oregonian. Rain doesn't scare me. Tornadoes and ticks...that's another story.

So it's time to get myself around. It'll be a relatively short drive today. I'm way behind on laundry, having been without a water or sewer connection for the past four days. When your laundry is done in a small RV combo washer/dryer, four days is a long gap between washings. That'll be at the top of my list when we arrive at the new spot. So buckle up, my friends. Day after tomorrow, we'll be in Kansas...our 49th state. Try to contain your excitement until we get there.

Just now, I noticed this guy sitting just outside on our picnic table. It's one of those faster-than-lightning fox squirrels.

He'll be happy when we take our cat and get out of here. Okay, Mr. Squirrel. We're going.

A Day for Slow

Good morning, my friends. Happy Mother's Day to all who celebrate. Well, it was a lazy morning yesterday. We were moving slow. The kitties put us in the mood right from the get-go.

I spent a little time on my slow-stitching. I did a little more in the afternoon.

Before I go on, I want to say we've seen several butterflies flit through our campsite. As I've mentioned, it's nearly impossible to get a picture of a butterfly. They rarely light anywhere, and it does no good to chase them down. I found the two pictures I was looking for online. One was the Zebra Swallowtail.

(Image credit: "Zebra Swallowtail, Megan McCarty69" 

by Megan McCarty is licensed under CC BY 3.0.)

The other was a Viceroy.

(Image credit: "Viceroy" by hmclin is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.)

When we couldn't stand our lazy selves any more, we decided to take this hike listed in the brochure we were given when we checked in.

It was a loop that started from the entrance gate and ended there as well.

Here are the ways you could die out here today. 

As for the ticks...did I mention I found a tick on my abdomen a couple of days ago? It didn’t register with me that it was a tick until I’d already pulled it off (it was attached), looked carefully at it, and then flushed it. After flushing it, it dawned on me that it might have been a tick. The tick appeared black, but I couldn’t see any legs or antennae, and it was not enlarged at all from feeding. It was about the size of a tomato seed. I don’t see any tick parts left, but there is a pin-prick hole with redness around it. It's not itchy. In any case, we're being super careful now. We paused here to tuck our pantlegs inside our socks.

Okay, so taking one step, I noticed the first blue blaze. Stick with me my friends. I won't lead you off the path.

It was an easy-enough hike. I took my hiking pole with me, but I didn't need it.

We crossed over these rickety bridges in a couple of places. 

About one-third of the way in, we spotted three white-tail deer. They were shy, and leapt away from us every time they caught sight of us. I was able to zoom in close to get this picture.

Eventually, the trail crossed the road.

We continued on. We were waiting for a view of the lake, as promised by the name of the trail. About halfway in, we saw it.

Eventually, we walked alongside it for a bit.

We saw several of these fox squirrels. They were very quick and went leaping across the fallen leaves.

At our campsite, we've noticed these holes in the ground. Our neighbor in Oregon, who has lived in her house for less than a year, sent us pictures like this as well. They're holes where cicadas emerge from the ground.

When I spotted a few holes along our trail, I started looking for them on the trees. After emerging from the ground, they'll sit for a while before flying off to do cicada things. This year's emergence is special. For the first time since 2015 a 13-year brood is emerging in the same year as a 17-year brood. For the first time since 1998 adjacent 13-and 17-year broods will emerge in the same year. For the first time since 1803 Brood XIX and XIII will co-emerge. It didn't take long before I spotted one of them. 

The Google tells me that the northern brood will emerge in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, and the southern brood will emerge in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. So, this would be one of the southern brood.

We've heard them across the lake from our campsite, and we heard them in certain sections of our hike yesterday. I made a very short video so that you could hear the sound they make. Turn up your volume. If you can't see the video, click right here.

Eventually, we started seeing the limestone walls like we saw in Kentucky and Arkansas. The path took us between that tree with the blue blaze and the wall. It was a narrow space.

Nearing the end of the loop, we saw another white-tailed deer. This one was accustomed to people. He allowed us to get fairly close.

At the end of our hike, we were hot from the humidity, and so we headed back to the campground and enjoyed a Mike's Lemonade while we relaxed for the rest of the day.

I imagine some of you have enjoyed the Northern Lights this past couple of days. We assumed we would be too far south to see it on Friday, and so we didn't even bother looking. So sad. I know people farther south than we are who were able to see it. Our son texted us an image from his home in Portland, and he was able to see it. Then yesterday, we received a text from one of our neighbors with these two shots near our home in Oregon. That's our wind turbine in the lower right of these images.

We're bummed that we missed it. Instead, we went off to see a solar eclipse. Who knew we'd take so long to get home? Well...I guess I did. I just didn't know the Northern Lights would pay us a visit while we were gone.

So, okay...at least someone documented it. Another time, I hope.

Today we probably really will sit around and do almost nothing. It's our last day at this park. We'll be on our way to Hamilton, Missouri, tomorrow to see Missouri Star Quilt Co. Our next stop after that will take us into Kansas...our 49th state. We'll be filling in the last open spot on our map. You might want to start popping some popcorn now because it's going to be the thrill of the century. 

Okay...time for some pancakes. It's Mother's Day. Treat yourself. If you're lucky enough to still have your mother, then treat her too.