Our Two Month Vacation Has Begun

 We left on our two month long vacation last Friday.  We left about 8 a.m.  It was a rainy morning, but we only had to drive for about a half hour in the rain.  It was a long travel day as we didn't stop until 6:30 p.m. 

Here I am watching from my van window.

Oklahoma has a really nice welcome center.  It has two big dog parks.  One dog park is for the little dogs and one dog park is for the big guys like me.  There were no other dogs, so Mom let me explore the dog park.

Oklahoma Welecome Center Dog Park

 We stayed at the Camping World in Tulsa, OK.  They actually offer free camping in their parking lot with hook-ups for six campers. It was actually a nice place to spend the night. There was a lot of grass for me to walk on plus the sidewalks went on longer than we wanted to walk.

Our van at Camping World.

The next morning, the folks decided to do some shopping at Camping World.  Our toilet had leaked on our previous trip and Dad thought he had fixed it, but it was still leaking on this trip.  They were able to buy a new toilet at Camping World. They also bought some other things that they decided they needed.  Our free camping night ended up costing us $170 after their shopping trip.

We left Camping World around 10 a.m. We made several stops and arrived at Grandma's around 5 p.m.

Waiting to hit the road.

Placing my order at Steak N Shake.

Picking up chocolate for Grandma.

Relaxing at Grandma's.

We are at Grandma's for a few days and then we head to Abilene, KS for a greyhound event.

Jaxson,

The Greyhound Who Is Trying Out This Travelin' Thing

It Is Tough Being A Beach Boy

 I go to the beach almost every morning.  When the conditions are right, I get in the water.  If the bacteria is too high in the water, I am not allowed to enjoy the waves.  Mom gets an email that tells her the bacteria levels. After I get out of the water, I have to take a shower to wash the salt and sand off of my body.  The vet told Mom to do this with Joey.  Joey developed several infections after moving to the beach.  It may have been his age or maybe it was the beach.  Regardless, I have to take a shower outside before I am allowed inside the condo.  It is not as bad as it sounds.  I don't really like the shower part, but I like when Dad dries me.  The first thing he does is squeegees the water off of me with his hands. That is what he calls it.  He then shines me up with a towel.  He makes sure he gets under my tires (my feet) too.  Isn't he silly for saying he is shining me up and doing my tires. 😂

I like a good massage.

Shining me up.

The little towel is usually not enough to totally dry me, so Mom dries me with a big towel when we get inside.  She then rinses off my harness with soap and water because the salt causes it to rust. Going to the beach is a lot of work.

Jaxson,

The Greyhound Who Is Going To Miss The Beach While Traveling

Are You Ready For Some Football?!!!

Use your announcer voice when your read this post.  😀

The ball is loose. Jaxson grabs it!

Jaxson could definitely run faster if he wasn't being held back by his Dad.

Look at the jaw strength.  Folks, how he is doing that?  The ball is almost bigger than his mouth.
It is pure determination at this point.

 

Oh, No! Jaxson is having to slow down to cross the street.  Well, it is better to be safe on this folks.

Touchdown!!!!

Jaxson,

The Greyhound Whose Mom Had Many Technical Problems With This Post.

Preparing For Our Two Month Road Trip

 We are just a few weeks away from our road trip that will take us to two greyhound events and several National Parks.  We are planning on leaving around August 27th but if a hurricane starts heading our way before then, we will begin our trip sooner.  The worst part of hurricane season is usually from the end of August until the end of September for us.

Dad is busy making a few changes to the van to make it better for us on our long journey.  He has added heat which we will probably need in UT and maybe even Colorado.  He made a table top that will fold down when needed to give Mom more cooking space.  He has moved the microwave to a new location.  I think he said something about adding an inverter which will charge our batteries while driving. 

Mom asked Dad to get the van inspected early so that she could get the license plates renewed before we leave.  He did that and also had the oil changed.  However, as the guy was moving our van out of the oil change garage, he didn't notice that the garage door wasn't all the way up and he ran into it. It damaged our AC unit cover.  We still haven't received the money for a new AC cover but it is supposedly in the works.  We will not go into the long story of the round around that we had with that but we think Mom accidentally called someone big because after she spoke with him, things started happening in our favor.  Dad still needs to replace the cover. We purchased it but he has been busy with other projects.

Mom has been busy organizing our reservations. She has a binder with all the reservations and she made a calendar that shows us where we should be each day.  The binder also has a place for their Covid vaccinate records incase that is necessary somewhere along the way, my shot records too and a few other important documents.   She has a book that she will record each of campground stays just for fun and for the memories.  She went to Office Depot and that put a spiral binding on it for her.  She also has her National Parks Passport Stamp book that she started back in 2012 ready to go.

The reservation binder, RV Logbook and the National Parks Stamp Passport

Mom ordered the America the Beautiful card which will get us into all the National Parks for free. We will definitely get our money's worth out of it since we will be visiting so many places.

Dad ordered Mom a new set of pots and pans for the van.  You have to remember that our van is very tiny and we don't have much storage space.  Mom said the little skillet will work for breakfast but not for much else.  Dad really wanted the kettle for making coffee on days when we might not have electric.  The sauce pan will definitely work.

It all stores in a mesh bag.

The small items are a scoop, a spoon, sponge and the red piece is a knive, spoon, fork, wine opener.

Mom bought a Chromebook for the trip.  It is much smaller than her old laptop and so far she likes it   It the kind that you can flip and make it a tablet.  The reviews said it was used by a lot of schools and good for kids because it is so rugged.  It can have liquid pulled onto the keyboard and it still works and it can be dropped without breaking.  It may be good for kids but my Mom is clumsy, so it works well for her.  She got it for a really good price because it is "renewed".  It looks brand new and so far it has been fine.

We ordered a duvet for Mom's van bed last night.  She plans to sleep on top of it to add more comfort to her bed and then when it gets cold, she will use it like a blanket. She is pretty excited about that and I think I will like it too.

Jaxson,

The Greyhound Who Is Excited To Start Traveling