Alive and well...

Well yes we are! I didn't count on the fact that we would have no service for a couple of days and sketchy internet at best.. so here is a preview of what has been happening along the way.
videos will be uploaded when we have secure internet. which has not happened yet.
So from the beginning.. We left Sandy Hook early Sunday morning and drove slowly down to West Virginia. The ride was cumbersome and we hadn't got our groove with the trailer yet. I (Cynthia) tried driving and had a major meltdown when the passing traffic set up a vibration that set the trailer swaying down a curvy mountainside. That was the end of driving for me. Rick has been a trouper about driving but I see it wearing him out.

The routes we have chosen have been just amazing! Each state very different from the others. Pennsylvania Dutch country with it's beautiful farms and rolling hills. Maryland near West Virginia has mountains! West Virginia mountains set us on a path of friendly folk who were willing to share their stories, their resources and plenty of time with us! You will get that full story later. The countryside we drove was drenched in poverty only in the things department. There is a church every 1/2 mile, and I am not kidding! This community is alive and well. We arrived in the vicinity of our camp at about midnight on Monday morning. The GPS on my phone simply said "arrived" and then "No Service" which left us in the middle of nowhere.We drove up and down the deserted narrow mountain road and finally decided to pull over and see what we wanted to do.. Should we sleep in the parking lot of a church? when out of no where an angel in a beat up little red car drives up to our window and says, "Ya'll need hallp?" We tell him where we want to go and he drives 3/4 mile out of his way to help us safely turn around and then at least another mile or two to get us to our turn! Just one of the amazing souls we have met. One of the men we met, Mark, said he had taken on a young man from his youth group who had just lost his mom. The boy/man was camping with he and his family. Mark had lost his own wife not that long ago. We had a very long conversation about family, community and getting folks out and into nature. It is the absolute cure all. The Couple next to us shared everything they could think of with us. offering advise, food, extra hose for water. You name it, they were right there for us. We were sad to leave the peace of this camp and the beautiful folks we met, but as we made our rounds of good bye we knew we would carry these stories in our hearts with us. They kept asking, "what are ya'll doin' here?" like they couldn't believe we found the place and why would we come there and not some more pricey place. I just kept saying, "Because it's beautiful." I had a magical moment with a bee and then with some dragonflies there. We also keep spotting Great Blue Heron. We have seen them flying and in the water both. I am taking this as a good blessing.

Our next drive was a tiny bit easier... We drove through the rest of Kentucky, Indiana and across Illinois to just outside St Louis. The Hills of Kentucky with horse and farmland into Indiana with fields of corn and beans. One huge farm after another. There is a Cynthiana Kentucky as well as Indiana. We stopped at the one in Indiana.
The stay at Carlyle Lake was also beautiful. These are both Army Corps of Engineer managed sites so they are well maintained and managed. Again a great Blue Heron had it's nest in a tree over our site and flew by me in the morning with a squank. We woke up early and got on the road fairly quickly driving through St Louis across the mighty Mississippi and into the West!
We have decided that Missouri has the best sense of humor with it's billboards on the road. One such billboard led us to this place. A silly respite in a fake town of Uranis. Upon entering the store, a woman shouts,"Welcome to Uranis!" and when leaving she says, "Thank you for picking Uranis." Silly potty humor abounds in this roadside stop. OK I am sooo tired .. writing you from Flagstaff at the moment and so much to catch you up on but I need a break from slow computer land  so for now I will say.. We send love and healing from the desert where we just had an amazing thunderstorm. Honey in the heart keep checking in. I think service will be better!

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