Odie's Roadies

Blog Changes

2007-01-03T12:56:00.000-05:00

I have decided to start the new year with a new Blog! So, from now on, you will need to visit www.geeksontour.blogspot.com to see the continuing adventures of Jim, Chris and Odie.

The old blog is getting worn out - just like Marie's shoes after dancing on New Year's Eve!

Actually, it's nowhere near worn out. More likely it's me that's worn out trying to keep up with the changing web technology. Hey! It's a great ride. See you on the 'other side'!

Happy New Year

2007-01-01T13:23:00.000-05:00

The park hosted a New Year's Eve party last night and I just wanted to dance, not worrying about taking any photos. So THANK YOU to Ron who took a bunch of pictures. And, he even put them into a slide show/movie using Photostory 3. Guess where he learned to do that?! That's right, he took Jim's seminar last week. He's already created 2 or 3 movies using what he learned. Check it out:
Photo Credits: All photos, and the slide show, by Ron Morrison, Blue Heaven Bus. Shown here by permission.

A Peaceful Paddle

2006-12-31T21:03:00.000-05:00

What a wonderful way to end 2006. The paddle that I mapped out on Google Earth yesterday took us a little over 5 hours, including at least an hour's worth of stops. It was a great day.

Here's the launch spot in Bowling Green, near Paynes Prairie State Park.

The water level is perfect.

Lots of birdlife.

According to Marie, we have Randall to thank for pushing us to do a longer paddle than normal. So, she didn't hesitate to accept when he offerred to tow her while she 'napped.' The people you see in the water are hunting for fossils by digging up pails of dirt from the bottom and screening it thru a wire-mesh. Lots of people find fossilized shark's teeth here.

Oh! She's awake again.

Ooops, maybe not.

What a gorgeous day!

Back home.

Our cars were waiting right there by the boat ramp, ready to load the kayaks on top and drive back to our sites. How it worked was - when we left in the morning, we found a couple people to ride up with us to the launch point, then they drove our cars back and left them waiting for us. Perfect.

Google Earth

2006-12-29T18:08:00.000-05:00

Jim did his Google Earth seminar yesterday and I'm starting to understand it enough to get hooked! Someone today came up and asked if you could use Google Earth to look at a river and see if it would be a good area to paddle. You know, no dams, no waterfalls, stuff like that.

What a good idea!

We are planning to paddle the Peace River this Sunday (our good friend, Marie, is coming to visit) and we want to do a little more distance than the last time.

Here is a video recording - a 'screencast' - of me using Google Earth to decide exactly where to paddle on the Peace River.

Spirit of the Mountain

2004-07-02T23:14:00.000-04:00

We took a guided hike around Devil's Tower this morning. Way Cool!

*note* added 12/27/06 a Google place marker

Here was our guide, Chris, who is a Lakota Sioux Indian. He is also part Cheyenne, Italian and Irish! He told us lots of stories surrounding Devil's Tower, or Bear Lodge as the Lakota call it. They have no word for Devil.

Devil's Tower is a major symbol of Wyoming by the way - even more than Yellowstone!

It truly is magnificent. And we had such a gorgeous blue sky to offset it this morning.

This place is considered sacred to at least 7 Indian tribes. Here's Chris trying to absorb some of the spirit of the stone:

Legend has it that 7 girls were playing near here one day when a giant bear appeared. The girls prayed to the earth to save them. The earth responded by raising them up beyond the reach of the bear. The earth just kept rising as the bear clawed his way to try to reach the girls. The bear's claws created the columns we see today and the girls reached the sky and became the star system know as the Pleiades or the 7 sisters.

When we got back 'home' we had a relaxing afternoon, basking in the power of this monolith. Gaze at our majestic dog!

Some stormy weather moved in late in the afternoon and cancelled the Lakota storyteller we were hoping to hear tonight. But, I found this website with lots of Lakota stories as well as other tribes. And the storm was beautiful too.

I really like this place. I could stay for a few more days. But, we gotta get going. Talk to you later.

Blog Migration Successful!

2006-12-27T16:38:00.000-05:00

Whew! Y'never know when it's gonna be you that gets stuck in a computer quagmire with something like a server migration such as the Blogger conversion. It took about an hour and a half. I didn't have to do anything but wait, but it was a nervous time.

Next, I'm supposed to pick a new, upgraded template. One step at a time. I'll wait an read some more. Maybe I'll upgrade the template tomorrow.

Meanwhile, the main feature I was looking forward to is already available to me. It's called labels and it acts as a way to categorize all my Blog posts by topics that I define. I occassionally debate about whether this is a personal blog (about family, friends, RVing and Travel) or a business blog (about computer stuff). In Jim's and my life, we love what we do and we do what we love, the line between personal and work is very blurry, so we write about it all. We've been keeping this blog for over 3 years now and it would be nice to click on 'WiFi' and see all the posts we've written about WiFi. Click on RVing and see all the posts that have been specifically about the RV lifestyle etc. That's what 'Labels' are for, and I see the place on my screen right now to put labels on this post. I think I'll categorize this post as 'Computer' and 'Blogs'. Then, I'll start categorizing all my old posts and see how far I get.

Blogger migration

2006-12-27T09:59:00.000-05:00

Out with the old, in with the new. This seems to be a good time to migrate this blog to the new version of Blogger. I've backed it up every conceivable way, and I've been reading all the forum messages about other people's experiences. Lots of folks have had smooth migrations, taking just a few minutes and continuing on as if nothing had happened. Others have had 2-3 day ordeals. And a few have lost the ability to post to their blogs at all. So ... I figured I'd post this notice. If this blog is missing in action for a few days - don't worry, I'm working on it. If the worst happens, just go to our home page at www.jimandchris.com or www.geeksontour.com. Both of those have links to 'Blog' and I will post information there about what happened.

Water in the River

2006-12-27T09:23:00.000-05:00

It looks like we picked a good time to be away from Peace River. The whole area was under Tornado watch most of the day on Christmas. To accomodate everyone for Christmas dinner, the park erected a big tent over part of the parking area. We expected to see that blown away when we got back, but it was still there. We were told that it was touch and go at a few points though.

They *did* get a lot of rain though, which means water in the river! The river has been too low to paddle so far this winter, but now it looks good. Here is the view of the river from our bench, just last week:

and, here is the same approximate spot today:

That water level will definitely 'float our boats'!

Christmas Day

2006-12-26T22:10:00.000-05:00

It was a very warm day - even for Florida. We like that!

We got up at 6:30 and went with my Mom to see the sunrise at the beach.

This has been tradition with a group of folks from our dive club for many years. A nice tradition.

Then, in the afternoon, we went to Jim's sister's in West Palm Beach to share a 'Turducken' Christmas dinner with 4 generations!

What's 'Turducken'? You might ask. That's TURkey, DUCK, chickEN. Amazing the work that must go into this thing. They take all the bones out of a turkey and lay it out flat. Then spread stuffing on top. They take all the bones out of a duck and lay it on next. Then more stuffing. Then a boned chicken. They it gets rolled back up into something resembling the original turkey. When it's cooked, you cut it like a cake and it has layers. Quite yummy.

Then we drove 3 hours back to Peace River. Long day.
Today we just veg'd. Finished a couple books. Watched a movie.

It's a Wonderful Life

2006-12-22T20:36:00.000-05:00

We had our 'Movie Night' here at the park last night. It was a beautiful night to sit outside, munch popcorn, drink wine, and watch a movie. Jim discovered a better sound system to hook up to his computer, so, there were even people soaking in the hot tub that could hear and watch the movie! The 'wet' seats.

We showed 'It's a Wonderful Life" with Jimmy Stewart. I think it's required viewing for the week before Christmas! I hadn't seen it in several years ... it really is good.

Next week is Pirates of the Carribbean! Arrrrr! I'll watch Johnny Depp in anything! Over and over. We've lined up our Thursday night shows for January too.
Contact
In Her Shoes
Starman
Walk the Line

These are DVDs we happen to have. We may need to supplement our library come February.

We're leaving tomorrow to spend Christmas with family in Fort Lauderdale.
Best wishes for a Wonderful Life to all of you!

Sittin' on the Bench of the Bank

2006-12-20T10:04:00.000-05:00

The nature trail here at Peace River follows the river and there is a well-placed bench about in the middle where you can sit and watch the river go by. I took a couple hours yesterday and did just that. A beautiful, meditative afternoon.

Odie came with me of course.

This guy was on the other bank, so we could watch him safely. He (or she) didn't move the whole 2 hours.

The turtles are more nervous. You had to be very quiet to keep them from splashing into the river.

I just love reflections.

Now, here's a well-traveled cat!

For more scenes from Peace River, check out this movie that Jim made with Photo Story 3. He's giving a seminar on using PhotoStory3 this week, so he's been practicin'! Click the picture below to play the movie. It takes a minute to load because it uses a different format than the videos I make. It's not too long though.

Namibia Video

2006-12-13T08:12:00.000-05:00

Yeehaw!! I did it! I took 5 hours of Mom's video and created a 6.5 minute 'highlights' video. Or .. to hear Mom tell it I *cut out* 293 mintues of essential stuff! "But you gotta show the termite hills, and the night shot of the rhinoceros at the watering hole, and the villagers inside the smoky hut, and the waves breaking on the pier ... and ... and ..."

Anyway - here it is. If you have a slow connection, you may want to click on the pause button (2 vertical bars) until it downloads sufficiently (the first time you'll need to click twice). You can see the download progress on the dark gray bar. Then you can click on play again.

Click here for a highlights Video of the trip. (6.5 minutes)

Pretty cool huh?

p.s. we're back at home in Peace River now.

The Park is filling up

2006-12-19T10:27:00.000-05:00

With 60 degree nights and 80 degree days, it's sure easy to see why South Florida is a popular winter destination! I've been asked why I don't just say 'Florida' instead of 'South' Florida. This is a very long state. It actually gets quite cold in the northern half. Where we are is approximately latitude 27 which is the same as Corpus Christi, Texas or Chihuahua, Mexico.

Dad and Candy kept saying, "I've never seen so many big RVs!" Since we've stayed at resorts like Palm Creek with almost 2000 sites filled with big rigs, we hardly notice. There are 400 sites here at Peace River. You can see why it's a little overwhelming from the point of view of a little camper van though. We think this park is *just right*. It's big enough to have all the amenities, yet small enough to walk everywhere and have a wilderness campground feel to it.

Solomons Castle

2006-12-17T17:33:00.000-05:00

We decided on today to be tourists. About the only tourist attraction in the whole area is Solomon's Castle. We had visited when we were here in August, but they were closed. So, today, the four of us went. Me, Jim, my Dad, and Candy.

It really does look like a castle.

It's covered all over with shiny metal plates that used to be printing plates used by the local daily newspaper.

We took the tour for $10 each and saw hundreds of Howard Solomon's works of art. Everything he does uses 'recycled' materials. I especially liked the dragon.

and this elephant.

They also had a really good restaurant called the boat in the moat, since it was built to look like a boat and it had water all the way around.

Here's the artist himself, Howard Solomon, with a recent piece of artwork in his shop.

He still lives here with several of his family, all of whom work in the castle or the restaurant. There was wildlife too. I'm not sure which was scarier, the alligators in the 'moat', or this spider.

If you walk just a little ways on a dirt road, you get to the house which they are expanding to be a bed and breakfast. Quite a find, I'd say.

Visitors

2006-12-15T16:28:00.000-05:00

My Dad, Tom, and Candy decided to take another trip in their cute camper van and come visit us. How nice that we could offer them a destination when we've stayed in their driveway so many times!

We're actually hoping to have a lot of visitors this season here at Peace River. Over the years, long before RVs were in our lives, we've come here to paddle the river with groups of friends. Now they can come visit us and maybe bring pictures of those 'roughin' it' days when we camped on the river banks with the alligators on a 3 day canoe trip.

Now we're here in our home - and there are cabins that friends without RVs can stay in. I got a look inside the other day and they're really nice.

Baby AJ Update

2006-12-14T10:16:00.000-05:00

While in Fort Lauderdale, we gotta catch up with baby August James (AJ). He's close to 5 months old now and looking sturdy enough for even me to hold him!

Here's 'Gramps' with AJ.
And here's Devon, the proud father.
They look like 2 happy boys to me!

3 hours from home to home

2006-12-11T22:28:00.000-05:00

Since we're wintering at a park that's just 3 hours from 'home' - we figured we'd visit about once a month. We're in Fort Lauderdale right now, staying at my Mom's. We also scheduled a dermatologist checkup for today. Jim got an A+ from the doctor and I got 4 of those annoying pre-cancerous spots frozen off my face. Ouch, I hate that, but I feel good about catching them early.

We'll go home tomorrow.

Mom just got back from a trip to Namibia (southwest Africa). She took 5 hours of video and I'm trying to edit a 5 minute clip to upload to her website. It's fun, but it's time-consuming. Unfortunately, I need some software on my computer to complete the process, so I won't be able to upload the finished product till I'm back at Peace River. That's really too bad because she has such a nice fast connection to the Internet. I love my satellite connection, but you realize what speed should be when you use a land-line DSL like at my Mom's, or a Cable connection like at Jim's Dad's. Especially when talking about uploading several megabytes of video!

More later

Sedona

2006-03-08T07:42:00.000-05:00

To get to Sedona from the north, you take highway 89 south of Flagstaff. This takes you very steeply down into Oak Creek Canyon. Yikes!

But Jim was well prepared for this drive because he'd already 'flown' over it using Google Earth. Using satellite photography, Google Earth can actually simulate the view from your car window and 'drive' you along a specified route. It's something you download to your computer and it accesses images from the web. It's a lot more detailed than the plain google map, but even the google map shows a lot:

We decided to splurge and stay at an RV park right in Sedona. Rancho Sedona - cost about $40/night (once you add the dog fee and the taxes), but we're able to walk right out our door and take a hike:

Bike ride, Friends, Florida Gulf Coast

2006-12-06T08:26:00.000-05:00

Andy and Diane are RVing around Florida and stayed at a cute little RV park on the Gulf Coast yesterday. They're just a little over an hour away from us, so we decided to go visit and explore a little.

Pretty spot. Take a look at the dock they have in their backyard.

But, the reason they chose this park over others in the area is because of the free WiFi. Interesting ... after location, WiFi is their number 1 priority for a place to park. You know you're going to get some exercise when you visit Andy and Diane. They bike, hike and kayak everywhere they go. Ok - let's bike ride to lunch!

oooh - nice spot.

and we even got to watch dolphins playing right offshore.

Then we got back on the bikes for a little while. Till we got thirsty for a beer anyway :-) Now, where is that outdoor bar?

It takes a while to find your way with these kind of signs!

There's just something so "Don't Worry Be Happy" about the shop colors here y'know.

And the white sand on the beach is remarkable. It was a gorgeous day.

This is a sand sculpture!

Movie Night

2006-12-09T10:07:00.000-05:00

We've done 'movie nights' a few times over the years, but always just at our own site. We've always wanted to do a movie night for the whole park. So, we talked to the folks in charge of activities here and agreed on Thursday night outside by the pool. I made up flyers and they posted them on all the bulletin boards.

It was a beatiful night. The park provided bags of popcorn for everyone and we had a great time. I think we're going to do it every Thursday night now. And - it gives Jim a reason to buy a sound system he's been wanting. That was the only thing that could have been better - more volume.

Diandy's Visit

2006-12-09T09:49:00.000-05:00

After we visited them on the coast, Diane and Andy came over to Zolfo Springs and visited us for a few days.

We didn't go kayaking as we had planned because it got cold on us - 50 degrees is just too chilly for us Floridians. But we did some walking and lots of visiting.

Jim had to go to work. Here he is with his 'doctor's black bag' bicycling to the office!

Andy and Diane and I walked up after him and we all had breakfast at the park cafe.

But, most of the time Diane and Andy did the same thing that Jim and I normally do ...

I guess I'll stick with Blogger

2006-12-06T13:38:00.000-05:00

If you want to understand what's going on at Blogger, here is a good video to watch. You can also read more at Blogger Buzz.
Click here to watch video.

I am still concerned about using FTP to publish my site, and where photos will be stored. Blogger beta supports using FTP just like I have been, but I won't be getting the advantages of the new Blogger. Oh well, as long as this keeps working, I'm happy. Right now I'm still on the 'old blogger'. Someday soon, I expect to see an invitation to migrate to Beta. When I do, I will. Maybe I'll start a brand new blog on January 1. Still thinking.

GOT Seminars?

2006-12-05T09:25:00.000-05:00

Our new business name is Geeks on Tour. Jim realized that it spells GOT. So, GOT Seminars? We do!

I was planning on spending the day yesterday using my Coldfusion skills to program a calendar into displaying on our www.geeksontour.com home page. I wanted to use Coldfusion so it would link to a database where I already have all the seminars and dates, times etc. all entered. I know how to do this, but I'm not very fast at it yet. Jim says, "why don't you just use Google Calendar? You can embed the calendar right on your page."

hmmm, ok, I'll take a look.

It's done.
That was easy.

I'd still prefer it to be getting the information dynamically from my database - but the difference of getting it online in 10 minutes vs. 6 hours is pretty compelling. Go to www.geeksontour.com and check it out.

Or, I can embed it right here as well ...
Make sure to use the 'agenda' view.

New Orleans

2006-04-06T21:18:00.000-04:00

We planned to visit New Orleans today. I've never been there - and it's been a long time for Jim. No plans to stay long, just wanted to see what it looks like 7 months after hurricane Katrina. We avoided the area completely last summer when we went thru right after Katrina.

We started at Lake Charles in a Jellystone park.

Highway I-10 wasn't as bad as we were expecting. Not the greatest road, but we didn't see any obvious hurricane damage.

Here's Baton Rouge.

There's a large stretch of I-10 that goes thru swampland. Pretty interesting road.

As we got closer to New Orleans, I expected to see more evidence of hurricane with downed trees. I remember driving thru South Miami a full year after hurricane Andrew and seeing fields of what looked like fallen matchsticks - what once were trees.

Maybe the devastation isn't that widespread.

Then again, I could be wrong. This view was just after the Lake Pontchartrain sign.

They sure want you to believe that all is well.

I don't think you can see them in this photo, but there are workers on the roof of the Superdome - making repairs.

Here's the high-rise hotel right next to the Superdome with so many windows still blown out.

We took the exit to the French Quarter, hoping to find some place to park the rig and go walking, get some lunch, and sightsee. Well, we never found a place to park, so all you get is some photos taken thru the window. Lots of trees still intact, and the French Quarter was busy - restaurants open, beautiful weather, lots of people out and about. I even took a moment to 'View Available Wireless Networks' on the computer because we had heard that New Orleans had a city-wide WiFi network. Sure enough, one of the networks was named 'City of New Orleans'. It was only one of many, however - at least 50 wireless networks showed up on my screen when we were in the heart of the French quarter. Within a few blocks they were all gone.

But you didn't have to look too hard to see evidence of destruction and renovation. The generic, white, FEMA trailers are everywhere. That's where people are living while their homes are gutted. Dumpsters overflowing.

And, just around the corner.

This was not a place for a 30 ft motorhome, towing a car, to be driving. So, we got back on the freeway. From there, you could see whole neighborhoods of FEMA trailers.

By the time we reached the exit where there were supposed to be a couple of RV parks, we had lost any desire to stick around. So, we just kept driving.

Oh my God. East New Orleans. Here are the matchsticks.

And abandoned neighborhoods.

Even abandoned shopping centers.

We just kept driving. Soon, we were in Mississippi. We figured we could just park in a casino parking lot for the night, so we stopped at the Welcome Center to ask for advice on which casinos (GulfPort or Biloxi) were open and had parking. They said there were two possibilities in Biloxi - so we decided to take the coastal road - hwy 90 - the 'scenic' route.

I think the image that sticks in my head the strongest is the piles of trash. I didn't even click my camera, I was so overwhelmed. Outside of many establishments there were simply piles of what had obviously been the contents of the buildings. The piles were 10 feet high and more. I thought about how those piles were people's belongings, business's appliances. And, they were still in piles 7 months after the hurricane.

Somehow, in all the billboards, road signs and Welcome Center staff, there had been no mention that the causeway on Highway 90 was out ...

So, we had to backtrack a little to get to I-10 again.

I wonder where Dorothy is?