T is for Travel

T is for Travel

Travel is something we love to do.

It felt wonderful to get back on the road in the motor home on Sunday morning.  It was a good day for travel as the sun was shining and there was just a slight breeze.  Our trip for the day was to drive from Branson, MO to Quapaw, OK otherwise known as the Downstream Casino.  It was 136 miles from Branson View Campground (hard to say good-bye and the campground looked so sad with not a camper in sight) to Downstream Casino.    We left Branson at 10:04 a.m. and are ETA was 12:31 p.m. But that was not to be.  Once we were on the road Ron realized there was a problem with the Jeep…it was swerving all over the place…something was wrong with the tow bar.  And of course, no place to pull over, for eight miles 😦  I stood in the back of the rig keeping an eye on the Jeep and Ron  drove very cautiously.  We finally got to the Walmart in Branson West ~ big empty parking lot where I pulled forward, Ron worked on the tow bar, I pulled forward, Ron worked on the tow bar, I pulled forward then backed up a little and Ron worked on the tow bar.  After about 15 minutes all was hooked up correctly and we were ready to get back on the road.  Problem: the left tow bar would not catch correctly.  Giving thanks to God that the Jeep didn’t let loose while we were driving, that no damage was done to the Jeep or the Motor home and all it took to fix it was a little time and no money 🙂

We drove about an hour and a half and then found a nice place to pull over and eat lunch.  And what a delicious lunch it was ~ leftover rib eye steak sandwiches from dinner the night before.  Thank you Renee for a special evening out.

We arrived at Downstream Casino at 1:01 p.m. just 30 minutes past our original ETA.

The view from our campsite at Downstream Casino.  So peaceful to look out the passenger side big window.

Cost of camping: $0 – we signed up for a Qcard (free) and with it we each get one free night of camping.  Along with the free nights of camping  we also each received one free buffet meal ~ so we went there on Monday evening.  Usually $16.99 per person.  That is more than we would normally pay for dinner at a buffet but free was good 🙂

On Monday we decided to do a little sight-seeing and decided to go to the Precious Moments Chapel and grounds.  It was beautiful.

This rig was parked a couple down from us at the casino – love the picture on the back of their rig.

Funny place to park a truck if you ask me 🙂  This was on the drive from the casino to the PM chapel.

I took over 150 pictures so put them into collages.

These include the signs leading to the Precious Moments Chapel and grounds.

The entrance and the fountains welcoming you.

Different scenes inside the Gift Shop and Cafe.

Walking towards the chapel.

Inside the main room of the chapel.

Bottom left picture is of the ceiling.

The four scenes with the red borders are the chapel grounds in Spring, Summer, Fall & Winter

In the picture above the ceiling one if you look close you can see little ones playing basketball in heaven.

The middle picture top row has 15 murals…Mr. B painted them all in 4 days.

This is the Remembrance Room.

The center picture top row look out onto the garden island.

The stained glass windows were original paintings the Mr. B’s daughter-in-law made for the hallway.

This is leaving the chapel and heading back towards the gift shop.

This is a planned development that has a chapel, gazebos, a few large homes and a huge horse barn.  You can rent the chapel & gazebos for weddings and parties.  The large white home in the bottom left of the picture faces a river on one said and has many large windows all the way around – what a pleasant and peaceful view.

The drive back to the campground.  The skies got dark and the rains started.

Hope you enjoyed the trip to Precious Memories.

Tuesday morning we left Downstream Casino to head to our new home ~ Big Chief RV Park and working for Amazon.

It was not an easy drive as we battled wind and rain most of the way.

And no trip would be complete without some type of mishap 🙂

On the drive on Tuesday morning besides fighting the wind and rain we lost two totes on the road.  And as you can see there really is not much of a shoulder to be parked on.  If you notice the big white truck – the guy passed us, stopped and turned around and helped gather the stuff from one of the totes.  One tote never lost its lid 🙂    You also see Ron heading back to pick up stuff.  And then working to secure the remaining totes ~ it was windy and rainy ~ absolutely no fun.  You can see the two totes and the Christmas bear and dog that got soaked.  Put them on the counter/in the sink to dry.  We did lose one thing – a ceramic angel with fiber optic lights that shone on the nativity scene.  It was a gift from Ron’s sister, Judy the first year we moved into the rig.  Ron said it was shattered into way too many pieces to try to fix 😦  All this happened 11.5 miles from the campground in Coffeyville 🙂

And then we arrived at Big Chief RV Park in Coffeyville, KS.  We are parked directly across from Amazon.  The campground has 132 sites.  We are parked in the furthest corner from the entrance.  The upper left picture if our rig as driving towards it.  Our view is of the two far right bottom pictures.  We are parked right next to the booster antenna for wifi – we have a great signal 🙂  The freeway is along the back side of our rig.  But looking our our living room window on the passenger side we have a beautiful green field and some trees and no one will park on that side.  It is very relaxing to look out the window.  They have had quite a bit of rain so there is lots of mud around right now.  The weather is supposed to be nice for the rest of this week, a little rain expected early next week and then we should be in for a nice long dry  spell.  One thing we don’t have is TV – we cannot pick up any channels with our antenna and there is no cable.  We are going to check into Netflix.  The downside is we won’t know who wins the Amazing Race or Survivor ;(

Well that end’s our trip from Branson, MO to Coffeyville, KS.

If you are in the area of Coffeyville, KS give us a shout out.  We love to meet up with other RV’rs.

Stay tuned for our next adventure ~ working for Amazon.

**Edited on April 25th, 2013 ~ thanks Jw for letting me know about the name of the Precious Moments Chapel**