On the way to the start

Tam and I left Florida the 25th of April and met up with the Ehlenbergs in Cincinnati, OH. From there we traveled to Goshen, IN to attend the Holiday Rambler RV Rally. While in Goshen we had our coaches worked on, attended seminars and visited the Amish country. Rich met up with us the last day of the Rally and we traveled to Joliet, IL. Tam and Ray visited with old and dear friends Ed and Patti Antonelli. While in Joliet the group visited the town of Naperville, IL a quaint up scale town near Chicago. Rich had to leave the group for a couple days to attend a funeral of a close friend.

Our next destination was Elk River MN to have more work done on our coaches by a friend we all knew form our past rallies. On the way we stopped at the SPAM museum in Austin, MN. Many of us remember Spam from our childhood or early married life. I know Tam and I consumed a great deal during our early years together.

While in Elk River we visited the Mall of America-- quite a tribute to retail marketing. We were amazed at its' size and the fact that it has an indoor amusement park in the center of the mall.

We moved on to Saint Cloud, MN to await Rich catching up with us. While in Saint Cloud we met up with a group of Monaco Coach people (we all have Monaco coaches) who were having a rally at the RV park. Fortunately we knew several of the couples in the group and they invited us to join in their rally. A good time was had by all.

From Saint Cloud we have been traveling through Western MN and into North Dakota. The terrain is mostly flat and the farms are amazingly large--farm fields extend as far as the eye can see. The population of the state of ND is nearly the same as that of Detroit. The wind is constant out here, I guess you get used to it but is some what disconcerting.