North Carolina Transportation Museum

Spencer, North Carolina is located north east of Charlotte on I-85. We are at a campground in the area, saw the Museum sign and decided to visit. Entry fee was $6.00 each plus $4.00 to take a short train ride. It turned out to be a bargain for the small fee. It's a large site that was a railroad yard and repair center. The State of NC and a foundation operates the museum. When you think of a museum, it's usually in a building. This museum involves many buildings on many acres. Lots of railroad history plus some auto and airplane history. The largest building was the Back Shop where locomotives were overhauled. That building is the size of two football fields. It was the largest building in North Carolina for many years. It's being renovated and will contain more displays including a Piedmont Airlines DC-3 airplane. That building opens next year. Here is the link to the web site http://www.nctrans.org/ for more details.

The North Carolina Transportation Museum Foundation has a number of volunteers and some of them actually restore locomotives and train cars in the roundhouse. If you have ever stood next to a locomotive, you can imagine the work that it would take to do restoration. Just the size of the bolts would be a struggle to work with. During operation, these engines required inspection every 125 miles and major work every 250 miles so in their day, there was plenty of employment in the railroad business. At it's peak, 3000 people worked at Spencer. 

The site began in 1896 and closed in 1977 when it was turned over to North Carolina. The first museum exhibits opened in 1983. The 37-stall Bob Julian Roundhouse is very interesting. The turntable in the yard would rotate a train to connect with the track that went into one of the 37 stalls. Inspections and minor repairs were done at the roundhouse with major repairs in the large Back Shop building.

For a history of steam locomotives visit this web site https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_locomotive

I took too many photos to load here but here are some of them:

One building contains antique cars. Most are Fords. I saw a Buick and Edsel.
My dad would know every one of these cars and it's history.
I can't tell you much myself but these are worth a fortune.

A hot rod in it's day

This one I know all about. A Chevrolet Corvair from the 1960's. I worked on these cars at Chris Volz Motors in Milan, Indiana. They were aluminum air cooled rear engines and the screws and bolts always seized up and snapped off in the aluminum engine block. The other mechanics hid from the service manager when one of these came in for work!

The turn table lined up engines and cars to enter the roundhouse

It rotates around to the track to each roundhouse bay.
It's used today to get engines and cars in and out of the roundhouse.

This engine was built by Lima Locomotive Works #1925.
It was hauled to California and won a steam engine race

Another view of the #1925

Several engines were in the roundhouse.
This is an Atlantic Coast Line LEGACY 4-6-0 Ten Wheeler Steam Locomotive

The coal hole inside a steam locomotive.
They had to shovel the coal in from the coal tender that was just behind the engine.

Seaboard Air Line #544, one of over 200 undelivered Russian Decapods

The cow catcher

This diesel-electric locomotive in the roundhouse is the Southern Railway #6900,
built by Electro-Motive Division of General Motors in 1951. It's in service at the museum.

A luxury car used by a railroad executive. This car is huge and long as two regular cars.
It's like a motor home on the rails.

This light was an one of the trains that carried FDR across the US after he died in office.

A mail car used until airplanes took over mail delivery across the US.

This was a hospital car used to carry injured troops to hospitals in the US from WWII and Korea.

Lunch was good at Bebops in Spencer, across the highway from the museum

Jeep Broken in North Carolina

We picked up our front windshield sun screen Tuesday morning in Mocksville, NC. We hooked up the Cherokee to leave and things went wrong. The rear wheels were locked up, the electric steering did not work right and the engine would not run more than three seconds. Error codes show power steering issues. This is similar to what happened  two months ago. This story could take pages to explain but this is the short version. It took another rollback trip. It's at a dealer in Salisbury, NC, waiting for we don't know how many days to be looked at. 

We are at the Cross Winds Family RV Campground near Lexington, NC where we will be waiting until who knows when. Our trip to Hilton Head and then Florida will continue when we get the Cherokee back from the dealer.

Here it goes again.

Freightliner Service

Our chassis is due for it's first oil change, all 7 gallons of it plus other items. Cost is much greater than an oil change for your car! We are at the factory service center in Gaffney, South Carolina for an 8:00 am appointment Monday morning. This will be an annual event since service is required once a year unless we exceed 12,000 miles (probably not). There are RV hookups so we arrived Sunday afternoon. The building only has three service bays so it's not as large as I expected. Everyone says this is the best place for service but we could go to any Freightliner center in the country. We move on into North Carolina tomorrow for one day after our service is completed.

Heading south on I-40 through North Carolina.

This I-40 tunnel looked a bit close but we made it with no scrapes.

Parked in the lot for the night.

Back side of the service building.

They have an 18 wheeler for show and tell events.

If the service is good enough for Richard Petty's bus, it's good enough for us.
This passenger bus is parked next to us in the lot.

We had an interesting tour of the Freightliner Factory in Gaffney while waiting for our service work. They would NOT allow photos in the plant.

TOO Cold - Heading South

After two weeks, we left Winton Woods today, heading south. Steve and Lisa Muncey were across the driveway from us and are staying until Monday. We have one night stays at Raccoon Valley, TN, Gaffney, SC, Mocksville, NC, and Columbia, SC. Following that, two nights at Hilton Head then on to Florida. 

Way too cold so south we go

More to follow as the week progresses.......

Raccoon Valley Music

We have been at the Escapees Raccoon Valley RV Park, Heiskell Tennessee, for the past week. The park is just off I-75 about 15 miles north of Knoxville. We will be heading to Winton Woods Park in Cincinnati on Sunday. During our stay, the park has local music talent in on Thursday night. They were all retirees that just like to play when they can. They were actually good with some off key singing but we enjoyed the two hours. Here are some photos.

ReJex and Fall in Tennessee

The tree leaves in Tennessee are hanging on. It's very dry and forest fires are going in several places. The trees that did loose their leaves were dried up brown with not many colors. We are still in Tennessee for another week. The traffic was crowded as usual so you need to be patient. Driving into the mountains last week was almost impossible.

Our friends Steve and Lisa purchased our prior Tiffin motor home. They stayed at Cades Cove last week so we did get to visit with them one afternoon. Steve has added an DC to AC inverter to the motor home, quite a job which he did successfully. It was a clean install, what I would expect from Steve. We did not have an inverter when we owned it since we did not dry camp. In Cades Cove, there is no electric, water or sewer connections and generators are only allowed a few hours to recharge your batteries.

I was busy for 6 days last week, washing and applying Rejex to the motor home.

Rejex is the best polymer paint sealer I have every used. It's not wax, not even close. It lasts at least a full year. It's applied as a paste/liquid, like a liquid wax, drys quickly and wipes off easily. It does not clean anything from the surface so your paint must be clean of all bugs and tar. If you have applied wax prior to ReJex, you must wash and scrub the paint with Dawn dish soap first to get the wax off. Better yet, start using Rejex as soon as you get that new vehicle, of course wait at least 60 days from manufacturing date so the paint is cured. A 12 ounce bottle will do two cars. A 16 ounce bottle will do the motor home. You won't find it in local stores so search Google and you will find several places to order it.

Our location for the last month at River Plantation in Sevierville. Rejex is complete except the roof. That will be completed in a couple weeks. Too much dust here from a rock quarry about a half mile away. Our vehicles get the Reject treatment every year in the fall.

The Apple Barn is a required stop for dinner and stuff you probably don't really need.

New to us, we had lunch at Paula Dean's resturant at the "Island" in Pigeon Forge.
Our friends Barry and Donna from French Lick visited us for a few days. We have been friends for about 35 years, meeting when we were in the Indiana Volunteer Fireman's Association.

This was across the street from Pauls Dean's in case you needed some liquid after lunch.

This is in the center of the Island, across from Pauls Dean's.
It's called the Dancing Fountain, complete with music.

Our Six Month Report

Mary and I have been full time living in our motor home for six months. Our house sold on May 20 so October 20 was six months. We actually started this April 16 when we went to Tiffin in Red Bay Alabama to watch our motor home construction. After six plus months we are doing fine and believe this was a good decision. Here are some things and advice we found since starting.

1. Cost of Living and retiring to a motor home is about the same as our expenses at our house. 

Different expenses replaced the home expenses but the total is about the same.

Our house was paid for and so is our motor home.

We have no loans or credit cards balances so that helps.

Here are the largest monthly expense categories in our budget.

Camp ground rent can be expensive so our budget is $1000.00 per month.

Groceries and restaurant costs are about $700.00 per month.
Medical expenses are estimated $1000.00 per month.
COBRA and medicare supplement is $625.00 per month.
Fuel costs for motor home and toad are $400.00 per month (may go up if pump goes up)
Vehicle repairs are $500.00 per month, this includes coach and chassis repairs.

Your costs may be less and ours vary depending on the area we stay in.
If we stay healthy, medical should be less, we hope.
Our motor home and Jeep are both new so repairs should be less, we hope again.

Our budget assumes the worst so we are always prepared if costs go high.
If you pull money from the bank to meet expenses, the general rule is you need
$240,000 in savings to draw out $1000 per month. With 4% interest you will not run out!
Of course, interest is low so other investments may provide the 4% but be careful.
If you need $2000 per month, you can do the math.
Do not start retirement if you owe money on your house, cars, credit cards, etc.
Read this book by Wes Moss "You Can Retire Sooner Than You Think".

2. Medical Expenses can be high and have the potential to be much higher when you retire.

I am on Medicare and so far it has paid my expenses except for the deductible items.

A Medicare supplement pays what Medicare does not pay.

The supplement does cost $92.00 monthly and will increase with age.

A drug plan is another $18.00 monthly expense.

Some drugs are not covered or the quite expensive ones can have a high co-pay.

Mary is on a COBRA plan until she turns 65 so that is another $525.00 per month.

The COBRA plan does have good nation wide providers which we need when traveling.

Locating doctors when there is a problem looks like the main difficulty.

We continue seeing our old doctors when we are in the Indiana area.

If your health is good you need to keep it that way!

3. Internet access and a PC is a requirement. Do not even consider doing without.

Do not rely on camp ground internet, they usually don't work.

If you do use open wifi, do not do any banking or credit card purchases!

A good PC with a flatbed scanner and laser printer are required.

Use some external hard drives for your storage, not the PC. 

Use at least two, backup the first to the second unit.

Hide the external drives. Better yet, hide one somewhere else as the backup.

Use encryption on the drives to prevent data loss if stolen.

E-mail is required to send and receive documents such as insurance,  medical, etc.

The printer is required to print documents that you will receive from various sources.

The scanner is needed to scan in signed documents as PDF's to e-mail back out.

We use a Verizon phones and MiFi which has worked well and works almost everywhere.

Our data plan now has 22 GB and it is usually used up by the end of the month.

Travel plans require plenty of research and that requires plenty of data.

4. RV Club Memberships can save you money. Here are the ones we use.

I won't spell out the details so visit their web sites to see for yourself.

Savings on camp site rental usually more than pays for the annual cost.

FMCA https://www.fmca.com/ first year is $60.00, renewal is $50.00.

Good Sam Club http://www.goodsamclub.com/ first year is $27.00.

Passport America http://www.passport-america.com/ first year is $47.00.

Escapees RV Club http://www.escapees.com is great for full time RV'ers.

5. RV Forums are a good way to learn from others. Here are the ones we use.

There are many others available is you search. 

Use caution because what you read may not always be the best info.

Turn your BS filter on before you start reading.

General use forum is http://www.rv.net/forum/, select your area of interest.

FMCA has a forum but it's down as I write this. Try them later.

Escapees RV Club forum http://www.escapees.com 

Tiffin Motorhomes forum http://www.tiffinrvnetwork.com/forum/ is very good.

Most RV brands have a forum so search for your brand.

6. How to locate RV good camp grounds? Lots of choices, here are the ones we use.

Look carefully before reserving. Resorts are usually not a resort, some are.

Full hookups are best for longer stays but cost more money.

Extended stays save money, monthly rates can be the same as a 2-3 week stay.
State and other http://www.reserveamerica.com/ with reservations.

Federal lands http://www.recreation.gov/ with reservations.

Good to find almost everything http://www.allstays.com/ with filters by state.

Another to find many parks with a map http://www.rvparky.com/.

Reviews are a big help with BS filter activated http://www.rvparkreviews.com/

Good Sam also has reviews. Search Google for reviews and there are many more available.

7. Google Earth is required! Here are some things you can do with it.

Don't reserve until you use Google Earth to see for yourself, up close.

Search for Google Earth then download the small program.
Check the area around the camp ground, see what is there.
Where are the trees? Sometimes hard to see on Earth but you will have a general idea.

Use Google Earth /Street View to "drive" the roads leading to the park.

Use Google Earth /Tools/Ruler to measure the camp sites and road widths.

Pigeon Forge, TN

We are in Pigeon Forge and will be here a total of four weeks, leaving here November 6. We usually spend a week or less here every year during vacation time. Now that we are on a permanent vacation, we can stay as long as we want or as long as we have money to spend. It can be expensive!. 

Our grandson Zach was with us last week to spend some time at Dollywood and the mountains. We drove through the mountains and spent an afternoon at Cherokee, NC. The Smokey Mountain area is very busy and will probably be more busy this next week when the tree colors are at the peak. Do not try to drive over the mountain next week, you will just set in traffic. The weather has been great, temps in the 80's during the day and low 60's at night. The big change arrives here Thursday night when a cold front drops temps about 20 degrees.

Zach in line for the Dollywood Train ride

The locomotive was originally used in Alaska to build the oil pipeline. It's been at Dollywood for the trip up the hill for a number of years. It's a real steam engine and they have a complete repair shop at Dollywood to keep it maintained. It's very popular and it runs the loop all day.

Zach liked the visit to Bass Pro at I-40

Cades Cove is a popular place to visit.
We took the loop drive and stopped at the visitor center

Ice cream at the Cades Cove Campground. This was my first selfie and the sun was in our face.
We will see the Muncey family here next week. They purchased our previous Tiffin Allegro motor home.

The final day with Zach was at the NASCAR go cart track.
Zach had plenty of time to ride the various tracks.

Zach in the middle car

FMCA Campground

It's been a while since I added to the blog.... We are still in the Cincinnati area. We were going to Gaffney, SC for the six month Freightliner service but that did not work out. Our new Jeep Cherokee towing kit from Jeep has not worked properly and I had some health issues so we are staying here where the rate is great and full hookups are provided. FMCA is at Newtown, Ohio. If all goes well, we are heading to Pigeon Forge, TN on Saturday, staying for four to six weeks. Our grandson Zach will be going with us for the first week while he is on fall break from school.

Our site at FMCA

Moon over FMCA, visiting with our friends Bob and Jan. They happened to arrive here the same time as we did so we had four days to visit. They are full time and we met at Red Bay, AL while we were both watching our new motor homes being assembled at the factory.

FMCA entrance to a very nice RV park. Their annual membership dues are well worth the price and we recommend the FMCA to all motor home owners.

Versailles State Park Grass

We stayed eight days at Versailles State Park, leaving Tuesday Sept 13. While we were there, my guys showed up each Monday to handle the yard work. All I had to do was sit and watch. The guys seem to show up wherever we stay so I hope they keep up with the grass cutting. We are now at the FMCA  park on Round Bottom Road in Newtown, Ohio. The guys showed up right after we arrived and cut grass and weed trimmed again. This happens every week and I don't even ask them to do it! 

Someone moved my fire ring, the guys moved it back

Cleaning up

All I can do is watch because we don't own a lawn mower

FMCA for the next five days. Check the grass

Rose Island

Charlestown State Park is in southern Indiana in Clark County. The park borders the Ohio River. The park land was a part of the Indiana Army Ammunition Plant (INAAP), opened in 1940 for producing war ammunition and abandoned in 1992. I would love to have access to the old property. It's a huge place and many of the old buildings are still standing. I also discovered the old gunpowder bunkers, east of the park. The next time we are here, I will be attempting a drive to that area, access looks open on Google Earth. Check Google Earth for a view of the property. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Army_Ammunition_Plant for details. 

We never know what will suddenly appear when we go to a new area. We discovered a special tour of Rose Island was available during the Labor Day weekend. It is inside the state park property, located on the Ohio River. The tour was quite a hike down a 1/2 mile steep paved hill, round trip about three miles. We walked out and up the steep hill in the dark on Saturday evening. Details about Rose Island can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_Island_(amusement_park). 

Ohio River overlook at the south end of Charlestown State Park

Our friends Doug & Marla were staying in their motor home next to us

Abandoned water pumps on the river provided water the to ammunition plant

Entering the Rose Island trail

It became very steep, descending about 250 feet to the park entrance. It became very steep as we went on down the path. Downhill was hard on the knees. Walking back up in the dark was like a treadmill test. We both passed OK.

This bridge was added in 2012, moved from another county

Bridge dedication plaque

Fourteen Mile Creek

Entering Rose Island with over 100 people on the tour

Our DNR guide did a great job. The concrete was a large ice water cooler. Water came from the well and they had an ice plant on site.

Original arches entering from the west end

This was the river landing where the steamboats brought people to Rose Island

The hotel was near the river boat landing, completely washed away in the 1937 flood.

Rose Island was wiped out by the 1937 flood and abandoned after that.
The ammunition plant took the property in 1940