Pix to follow.

Hi Sweetie,
Had a great night sleep, woke up to the alarm, since we had agreed I would meet them up at their campsite at around 10:00 and didn’t want to be late, so I fed everyone, including me, got ready, and was leaving camp on Flash by about 9:35. I found the trail Ginny told me about and it was almost exactly one mile up to them, so I made it just about on time. Of course, they weren’t ready, but it didn’t take them too long, and we were leaving camp by 10:35. We got on Trail 10 right next to the bathhouse, which interestingly, isn’t on any of the maps, new or old, so we were off-track right off the bat. We got completely turned around when we reached a trail that was closed, but in the long run, we didn’t get lost, and got right back to camp in just about three hours. What a beautiful ride! It took us right along the Ohio River, then the Blue River, which is a tributary, along gorgeous trails, some with tons of flowers, lots of great old trees, some gravel but mostly dirt trails with the occasional mud bog, but not enough to lost boots or get covered with mud. Really enjoyable! Unfortunately the gravel is big chunky gravel, but there wasn’t too terribly much of it, so we managed okay. A very pleasant ride! After I left the ladies at their campsite, I headed back to mine, made a quick sandwich, then headed up to pick them up, as we had agreed we would all go to town, me for propane and a couple of other things, Ginny for a new microwave, as the one in her trailer died, and Trish for a couple of things for her horse. It was too late to ride again by the time we got back, so I left them, primarily because I had broken the handle on my manure rake and had bought a replacement and wanted to get that fixed. Well, the best laid plans… Turns out the handle I bought wasn’t the right size, but it had a casing around it, which I though was rubbed, and I thought if I could get that off it might fit. Turns out it wasn’t rubber, it was metal, and I tried everything to get it off, but didn’t succeed. So now I either need to get new blades for my jigsaw or find another handle that might fit, though I hadn’t seen any yesterday, they were all for other implements. I was mad because this handle specifically said it should fit a manure rake, and I didn’t see anything else that might work, but I guess I can make a shovel handle work or something. Anyway, that’s a problem for tomorrow. I fed the horses and drove back up the their camp for dinner, and didn’t get back until nearly 8:00. Watched a Wagon Train, got caught up on the email I had downloaded while I was up there, made a new map for tomorrow, and now I’m headed to shower and bed! Good night, sweetheart! Love you!

Pix to come.

Hey darlin’,
Last full day here. I had some computer work to do for a bit this morning after my usual chores, then eventually saddled up Apollo for a short ride. Yesterday on Flash the saddlebags got loose and I had something fall out, and I found it right away, but I thought maybe something came out earlier and I wanted to check on it. Problem is, I reorganized my saddlebags not long ago and I can’t remember everything I’m carrying these days, so I was pretty sure I hadn’t lost anything, and I never did find anything else on the trail today, so that was good. It was only a short ride, just over 5 miles, but I managed to get him to jog a bit more than usual, just trying to get him in shape. When I got back, I put him on an anchor and started packing up a few things in preparation for our departure tomorrow. I dawdled over that most of the rest of the day, reading a little, watching a little TV, you know, the usual. By 7:00 I had fed the horses and put everything else away that I could, so it shouldn’t be to bad getting out of here in the morning. I’ve planned a route that will take me through the nearest town where I can stop at Tractor Supply for propane, Walmart for just a few odds and ends, and a post office to ship out a book order I got last night, where I hope there will be enough street parking for me! It’s only about 65 miles, and that’s going a bit out of my way in order to get to a US highway, since the rest all look like pretty tiny roads and I don’t want to take any chances. One thing I forgot to do was send an email to your sister to wish her a Happy Birthday, but I’m sending one now so she’ll have a belated one in the morning. I’m hoping to Skype with her over the weekend, if I have a decent cell phone signal. I’ve run out of trails here and I’m ready to move on, though I did enjoy the place a lot. Anyway, time for my shower and bed! Good night, hon! Love you!

Pix to follow.

Hey Baby,
Another late start this morning, mostly because I wanted to finish the last few chapters of the series I’ve been reading, but then I got up for chores and breakfast. I spent over an hour on the phone with one company, then another 45 minutes on the phone with another company, then back on the phone with the first company for another half an hour, all trying to follow up on stuff I’ve been trying to accomplish for a long time and getting nowhere. Not sure I got anywhere today, either, but we’ll see. Very frustrating. I seem to remember that in the “old” days, keeping someone on hold for more than 5 minutes was considered terrible customer service, but it seems these days, it seems half an hour is the minimum! Twice I got hung up on, twice more my phone dropped the call, and one time I went through four different people, then waited for 20 minutes, only to learn I was still talking to the wrong department! Grrrrrr! Anyway, I finally got as far as I could go with it all, and needed some quiet time, so I saddled up Flash to do the rest of the trails I hadn’t done here yet. Again, it was a lovely ride, really easy and beautiful trails here, very enjoyable. Did just under eight miles, got back a bit after 4:00, put Flash away, got a beer and went to talk to the neighbors for a bit. Not a very stimulating conversation, so I didn’t stay long, and they were so worried I’d get a ticket from a forest service ranger (whom I haven’t seen any of since I’ve been here) about my fence, I decided to take it down and put the horses up on a high line that I strung between two hitching rails. I was hoping to have the place to myself at some point this week, but they’re still here, and so are the other group of non-horse campers, who dress like old-style gypsies. The next few weeks are going to be busy as I get ready for my trip to Vegas and the Grand Canyon, lots of prep work to do. Eventually settled down for the evening to an old Wagon Train from the PVR, but I’m planning on getting to bed early. So, signing off! Good night, sweetie! Love you!

Pix to follow

Hey Sweetie,
Slept so late this morning, I couldn’t believe it! Didn’t crawl out of bed until nearly 10:00, surprised the horses didn’t wake me up, considering they’re right outside my window! Anyway, got up and did my chores, had breakfast, then saddled up Apollo and got on the trail about 1:00. Today’s goal was the “inner loop,” and it had a lot more gravel than the outer loop, but still all small stuff so it wasn’t much of a bother. This was a very easy trail, not even rising to moderate, in my opinion. It’s interesting, there are nice hills here, making for a varied terrain, but the trails are cut in such a way that the riding is really easy. The steepest hill has such a gentle series of switchbacks you hardly know you’re climbing. Really perfect of Apollo, we did over 6 miles and he did just fine, though when I put him back in the paddock, he didn’t move for quite a while, I don’t know if he just went to sleep in situ or what, but he was stiff as a board for a bit. I spent the rest of the day mostly reading, grilled myself a nice pork chop on the grill, then settled down to watch a movie on the Dish PVR. The night’s are starting to get a bit cooler, which I’m looking forward to, it’s been kind of hot here, but no where near as we had a few weeks ago. Been keeping my generator use down to about 30 minutes twice a day, so far that seems to be enough. We finally got a little sun today, been cloudy since I got here, but more sun is forecast, so that should help me conserve propane, since the solar panel is out and I’m in a clearing. We’ll see! I’ve had other days in the past when I only had to run the generator for 30 minutes once a day, hopefully that will be the case for the rest of the week. Anyway, I took my shower early, so I’m off to bed now. Love you, babe! Good night!

Hey darlin’!
A decent night sleep, this time I thought I’d try it without earplugs, and I woke up a time or two until the workers came in and started using their heavy equipment to haul more gravel out to the trail repairs. Made a final plan for the rest of the few trails I haven’t done out here yet, and saddled up Apollo after breakfast. He’s such an old slug these days, a four-mile trip took nearly two full hours, the slowpoke! But it wasn’t a bad ride, and Lola got some exercise. We were back just after noon, so after a bit of a rest, I loaded the kayak, which I had inflated this morning while the horses were eating, into the back of the truck and headed down to the boat ramp. They have quite an extensive marina here, with scores of docks full of pontoon boats and sail boats, some of which were very nice, and rather surprising considering how small this lake is! If every sailboat in the marina was out on the water, there would be enough wind to go around! I headed upwind to the dam that makes the lake, thinking I would be able to drift back, but it turned out the wind was more of a crosswind, so I had to paddle both ways, over two miles each way! Four miles of paddling should do my arms wonder, get me in good shape for the rafting trip I’m hoping to take in the Grand Canyon in a few weeks. Didn’t get back to camp until after 6:00, over four hours on the water. I removed the kayak from the truck and loosened all the valves, because I’m not going out again tomorrow, so by morning I can fold it up and put it away, along with everything else, since I’m leaving Thurday and heading out to Shirley Creek Trailhead in the Hoosier National Forest south of Indianapolis. I really worked up an appetite, so after taking care of the horses, I grilled myself a nice Angus burger, made some rice and sweet corn, and even had a shrimp cocktail for starters. Of course I had to top that off with some of that wonderful brown sugar bourbon ice cream, so I’m finally sated for the day! Finished off the ST Voyager series, a nice way to end it, so now I’m going to do movies for a while before I find another series to delve into. A nice day, very summer-vacation-y, but now I’m bushed! Time for my shower and bed! Good night, sweetie! Love you!

Hi Babe!
Another great night sleep (this is starting to become a habit!), did my usual morning chores plus a few extra jobs that have popped up. Somehow the screen in my bedroom window had started to escape the rubber track bushing so I got my special screen tool and rolled that back in to place. Then I did some overdue housework, dusting and mopping the floor, then I finally settled down to the real business of the day, taking Flash for a ride on some of the few remaining trails I have yet to record via GPS. I was actually waiting until it seemed most of the camper had come back from their morning ride and were packing up because I didn’t want to be on the trails with Lola with so many young people and kids on the trail, should they not be used to dogs. But by 2:00 it seemed most folks were pretty much getting ready to leave, so I saddled up Flash and we headed out, with Lola in her new and improved orange safety vest. I had the same problem, though, one of the trails was closed so I had to find an alternate route, but then I decided to go my planned route backward just because it seemed to work out better that way. Still managed to get lost a few times, the trails are really poorly marked here, especially the intersections, so I kept my Garmin GPS on the whole time to make sure I didn’t miss any turns (for long). It was a beautiful day, a very nice ride, Flash was on good behavior but needed a rinse off when we got back, naturally. I actually gaive them both a bath yesterday, which I forgot to mention, so Flash was nice and clean when I left, not so much when I got back. While he was tied up by the spigot, I decided to go ahead and move my highline between the posts of different campsites, something the manager said I could do once the crowd left. Someone was supposed to be in the spot next to me but never came in, so I could have done it last Friday when I took the fence down, but who knew? Now they’re both on a true highline, and one of the first things Apollo did was roll! Point made! Filled there water buckets, had a nice chat with a woman who had been working on the trails and stopped me from going down one that had huge chunks of a base layer down, but I managed to find a way around, and she later stopped by to apologize for yelling, which of course was no problem, I just had to find an alternate route. The camp was pretty empty when I got back except for a big group (whom I had passed on the trail), and of course, Lola wandered over to say hello to the kids over there, so I had to go retrieve her. With the forecast saying that rain is likely this evening (I’ll believe it when I see it!), and with my neighbors gone, I moved the truck and transfered the eight heavy bales into the stud stall. The first six aren’t bad, but those last two take some real strength and cunning to get them up top, but I managed it. These bales are nice and heavy, especially compared to the last ones, which I swear couldn’t have been more than 25 lbs. She had no right to be asking $5 for them, not very fair. Lesson learned, I won’t accept bales that light again! Meanwhile, the horses are loving this new hay, and they’re loving being on a highline instead of a hitching post. Everything’s put away in advance of the supposed rain, but it looks like it’s all going north of us. The campground is empty now except for one camper all the way on the other side, love it when it’s this quiet! Anyway, I’ve had my shower, my fill of TV and now I’m headed to bed. Love you darlin’! Good night!

Hi Baby,
I had another great night sleep last night, despite the number of trailers that came in yesterday. It’s amazing what room darkening drapes and earplugs can block out! I had a leisurely morning, putting some hooks on Lola’s safety vest to she can’t roll it off, and I still haven’t heard back for Equity about my questions, though the guy claims he sent me a response yesterday, I still haven’t got it, even when I asked him twice. Sigh. Well, everything seems better after a ride, so I saddled up Apollo and headed out on a circuit I had GPSed. Nevertheless, I still got turned around a cut off a corner I had planned on. The trails here aren’t very well marked, and as I mentioned before, there are no markers on the map at all, just dashes for all the bridle trails, so that’s not any help. It wasn’t a bad ride, but there’s still a lot of mud out there, though not so much on the trails I took today. It was a short ride, less than five miles, but it was enough. As soon as I got back to camp, after I rinsed off Apollo and Lola (who loves nothing more than to lay down in every mud puddle she could find), and just about the time I was finished, a DNR guy came along to tell me I had to remove my fence. We had a very civil conversation about the dangers of a hitching post, and he ended up calling his supervisor, who came out and furthered the discussion. They weren’t willing to let me highline on any trees, but there were a few sites that weren’t being used and they said I could put my highline between a couple of posts out there. It was a ways from my campsite and I had just finished filling up three water tubs (there is a site that’s reserved between me and the spigot, so I figured I should stock up this morning, topping off my house tank and filling all three big tubs), so in the end, in order to cause less trouble, I decided just to put my highline up on the posts at my site. Not ideal, but it was a lot easier than moving everything over, then having to carry everything all the time. Anyway, got that done, then settled down to read for awhile. I sent a text to my childhood friend Mary wishing her a happy birthday, and she called and we chatted for awhile. Lots more trailers came in, this place is just about fully booked, what with it being Labor Day weekend. Got the horses fed, and now I’m all set to settle down for the evening. Looking forward to more of that delicious ice cream! So I’ll sign off a bit early, since you know what the rest of my evening will be like! Love you, sweetie! Good night!

Hi Sweetie,
I had a fantastic night sleep! In bed by 9:30, asleep shortly after, slept straight through till 7:30, stayed in bed to read until 9:00, felt so rested, yay! I really needed it. Well, after breakfast and some work on the computer, I saddled up Flash and we headed out on the trails. I’m glad I GPSed a trail to follow, because while the trails are actually marked with letters (A, B, C, D), none of those letters are on the map! In fact, there’s no guidance on the map whatsoever as to what trail you’re on, so I just kept following my GPS map as best I could. Unfortunately, the first trail I came to that I wanted to go down was closed off, so all my plans changed anyway. It’s not that big of a park, so there’s no getting lost here, I just kept going until I found trails that were open and went in the same general direction. It quickly became clear why they’re improving the trails with gravel, though, some of the trails are complete mud bogs! The sections that they repaired recently are really well done, Flash had no problem with them at all, though he did have his boots on. I was actually surprised how long they stayed on considering how much deep mud we went through, until he finally lost one climbing a hill in a bog, which I retrieved, then took the other one off. The rest of the trail was mostly dirt and mud, we only ran into the tiniest bit of small gravel after than, and it didn’t seem to bother Flash at all. It was exactly 8 miles, just the right amount for a first day of exploration. We essentially did the entire perimeter of the park, except one section I somehow got off track on, and the only thing really left here are a few internal trails that go between the perimeter trails. Like I said, it’s a small park. It has a nice lake, though, so weather permitting, I’ll inflate my kayak and have a day or two on the lake while I’m here. Meanwhile, we got covered with mud, so I had to do some horse and equipment cleaning when I got back, then settled down for the evening. I’m going to try to get to bed early again tonight, just so I don’t get run down again. There’s rain in the forecast tomorrow, so I might just go get my weekly shopping done while I have the chance. Anyway, I’m headed off for a shower and to bed, and to keep reading an interesting Dean Koontz novel about a very smart dog. Good night, darlin’! Love you!

Hi babe!
All went according to plan today! I had a good night sleep, and after breakfast I saddled up Apollo and headed for Buckskin Canyon. The guys up the hill decided to take the pink trail that I recommended, they were looking for something challenging, and that one certainly has it’s moments! Other than losing a boot a couple of times (there are some thick bogs after all the rain the other day), but only for a few minutes, thank goodness. We finally made it to where the red trail turned off, and I took what looked like a forest road downhill a bit, but that quickly turned into quite a challenging downhill grade, quite scary at a couple of points, but we made it down just fine. Thank a nice but short stretch along the creek before another almost straight climb out. What I didn’t understand was the third arrow on the intersection. The trail I took one way I thought was going to bring me back to that point, but it never did! So I have no idea where that arrow was pointing, but I’m not worried about it. According to the map, when I overlaid the recorded GPS trail, it was a perfect match to the map, so I’m happy. So I’ve ridden and mapped every single trail in Hocking State Forest now. I wanted to get it done, because I knew I would regret leaving it, since I don’t plan on coming back here for many years (if at all), simply because there are too many other places yet to visit! No regrets! It did make for a long day, though. The ride was just about 3 hours, then I had to start putting everything away for my departure tomorrow, and that took the usual few hours, plus I did three loads of laundry, checked all the essentials on the truck and trailer, etc., so it was a busy day! Didn’t do as much housekeeping as I usually do, but then I did some earlier this week, so it’s not looking too bad. I think Lola will be happy to go someplace new, she’s exhausted from all these long rides we’ve been taking. Like me, she seems to be stiff first thing in the morning, but that could just be from all the exercise. We’re both going to need a day or two off to recover! I like this place a lot, but I’m ready to move on to the next few places, none of which I’ll have time to stay two weeks in, so it will be a busy month of moving. I’ve had dinner and fed a big dinner to Lola (I made her another batch of satin balls, with all this exercise she’s been looking thin again), so she’s content now, too. It’ll be an early night for me, need to get a good start in the morning. That’s all for now! Good night, my love!

Hey Darlin’!
I went to bed last night convinced it would be too rainy today to ride today, and by the time I woke up, the whole forecast had changed to almost NO rain, cloudy in the morning and clearing in the afternoon! Evidently the front moved through faster than they expected (are they EVER right these days?), so after chores and breakfast I saddled up Flash and we headed out just before noon. Since there were still a couple of trails way out on the eastern side of the forest I hadn’t done yet, I decided to take the opportunity to do so. We weren’t out 15 minutes before the sun started coming out, and it turned into a glorious day! Of course, some of the trails were quite muddy, as I expected, but we managed to keep his boots on until we hit one very mucky spot way out on the orange trail, and I knew that most of the rest of the trail was just dirt, so I took them off for awhile. We rode all the way into the valley to Twin Falls, and I thought the map showed that the trail kept going, so Flash and I started up a very steep hill before I realized there was no trail there, so we had to come down, very slowly, switch-backing every two steps to keep from sliding down the hill. Then we went back and rode into Chapel Cave, which was pretty cool, both literally and figuratively, then came all the way up the orange trail until we got to Airplane Rock, where I stopped to rest him for a bit. There were two girls and a guy there when I stopped, and we got to talking, and would you believe it? The guy used to be a counselor at Skymont Boy Scout Reservation under old Harvey Raper!! I told him how Harvey was the first person we became friends with when we moved there, and we got to chatting about that for awhile. What a small world! Well, they moved on, and we rested for a bit before heading back. I put his boots on again as we started getting to the gravel parts, and we managed to keep them on almost all the way home, losing one on the very last really deep muddy spot on the last hill home. Before we got that far, though, I met a couple of guys, Dane and Jeff, who were camping up here. Both recently retired and tempted to do what I’m doing, but I don’t think they have the partners for it. Anyway, we chatted for quite a while before I finally started back to camp. The whole ride was over 14 miles, but it was over 5 hours in the saddle with all the stops, but a thoroughly enjoyable day! I rinsed Flash down and put him away, and started getting dinner ready, since I had completely missed lunch! Had a nice fat pork chop on the grill, one of the ones I was given at Tippecanoe by a camp neighbor, it was practically an inch thick! Delicious! Then I filled up with water since I have laundry to do tomorrow, and I was down on the final red light, so I wanted to make sure I didn’t run out tonight while taking my shower. After dinner, I walked up to the guys’ camp, we had been talking about Brown County, and I had a trail map from there so I took it up to them. We got to chatting again, really nice guys from my era, I did my Snowy River for them and they seemed to be duly impressed. We might ride together tomorrow. I usually don’t ride on the day I pack up, but I really would like to take Apollo for one last ride (he was literally pouting with his back to me after we got back to camp and I was letting Flash eat clover!), and I still would like to try to do that one final loop down at Buckskin Canyon, now that I’ve seen the map more closely I think I can make it okay. That would mean I would then have mapped every single trail out here! And it’s supposed to be a gorgeous day tomorrow, with lots of sunshine and cooler temps, down in the 50’s tonight, yay! I figure it only takes me about two hours to break down, I should have plenty of time to do that, and I can still spread it out through the afternoon and evening. I do have to move my hay from the truck into the trailer, but these bales are so light I won’t have a problem, and I’m down to my last bale in the trailer anyway. Well, enough pontificating, time for shower and bed! Good night, my sweet! Love you!