Thurs-Sun in Phoenix

Thursday evening we had dinner at Ken and Jan Watson's. There were 11 of us there from McCall Church of Nazarene. Wow that was fun. Friday we went to the truck race, Saturday to the Nationwide Race with Chris's Dad and his wife Helen. Sunday was NASCAR race. Ended up being a fuel strategy race - interesting. This year's last race is in Homestead FL and NO we are not driving there. Monday we will head home for just a little while - drop off the RV and dogs. We are then headed to San Diego to help with Thanksgiving with Steve (Roy's brother-in-law who recently lost his wife - Roy's sister). After that we do plan to come home to Idaho for a good 3 months!

Phoenix and Sunshine

Wednesday we cleaned RV and did wash. LaVerne Roberts (a McCall-Phoenix snowbird) came over for Mexican dinner. Today we drove out to the racetrack. Tonight we are having dinner with Browns (from McCall, also snowbirds) and Laverne at Jan and Ken Watson's house (also from McCall, also snowbirds). Tomorrow racing starts with spring cup qualifying and truck race.

Driving through Texas

You never understand how big Texas is until you have to drive across it. It took one day to drive across to the middle of the state to get to Dallas. Now today we drove all day (9 a.m. until 7 pm.) just to get to El Paso. Wow is this a BIG state. It is nice though to be in wide open spaces. Eastern U.S. gets clostrophic after a while. It is nice to be able to see the horizon!!
We will be in Phoenix tomorrow late afternoon. Warm weather and sunshine! Sharon requested a picture of us and the dogs. Gotta to get someone to take one and then I will post it!

Wild racing in Texas

Wow what a day at the race track. We had VIP passes with a pit tour. We toured the Sprint Cup garage, watching the crews adjust their cars and go through inspection. Then we had lunch at the KSCS booth (they are a radio station in Dallas Ft. Worth that we won the tickets from!). Afterward, we crossed over to our seats and watched a wild and crazy race. We were surprised when Jeff Burton ran into the back of Jeff Gordon, totally wrecking both cars. Then both drivers got out and Jeff G. pushed Jeff B. and the pushing and shoving went on until the officials got them apart. Of course, this will be replayed over and over on TV now. The race was pretty good with Jimmie Johnson no longer being the point leader. Looks like him doing a 5-repeat is in question now. Will make our final race in Phoenix a good one I bet. We are currently driving (well Roy is driving) in the RV moving towards Phoenix. Should be there tomorrow night. Will be good to see some friends (LaVerne Roberts, Watsons and Browns) from McCall in Phoenix.

Texas Motor Speedway

Last night we went to the grand opening of a Cavenders (country western clothing) store. Ron Hornaday was there signing stuff. We also entered a drawing and won VIP passes to Sunday's race as well as the store owner gave us VIP hospitality passes for Friday. What fun. We enjoyed talking to Hornaday. Last week he was in a truck wreck where he flipped over and landed upside down. Roy was at the race (I was flying back to Talledega). We do wear our Boise State stuff often (and get lots of comments!)

Today we went to a COPD fair at the Forth Worth Stockyards and Danica Patrick was there. You can sort of see me with Danica as she signed my GoDaddy hat. Roy got so excited, he cut off the top of my head (was he looking at me or Danica????) Ha Ha. Having fun. Thanks for the comment Sharon - - at least I know someone reads these!

Texas and Rain, Rain, Rain

Spent the night in West Monroe, LA and then drove to Ft. Worth, Texas. Rained all night, all afternoon and is currently raining. We are parked in the grassy acres outside the racetrack. We are hoping we don't wake up to a lake tomorrow. Hopefully RVs float??? Races are Thursday - Sunday. Last time we were here, the track church was quite big and it was fun to run into some NNU parents during church. Forecast says sunshine on Thursday to Saturday so we are looking forward to Sun Sun Sun. Looking forward to some R & R the next couple of days.
Miss ya all (is anyone reading this - - a comment would be very welcome!!)

On our way to Texas

On Wednesday, Roy and I flew from Atlanta to San Diego. We went to Joan's rosary and vigil. Roy's brother Don talked about her life as a kid and Steve (her husband) talked about her life as a wife, mother and shared some of her last moments. Thursday was her funeral mass and afterward a dinner. Many people came by and expressed how loving Joan had been (especially people in her support group). We cried in sadness but also rejoiced in the life of a wonderful loving woman who touched many with her kindness and faith. I know she is resting with her savior and no longer in pain and suffering.

Roy flew back to Atlanta and drove back to Talladega. He spent Saturday at the truck race.
I flew to Boise and went to my nephew's wedding in Boise, then flew to Talladega on Saturday. Was wonderful to hug Aaron and Rachael!

Seems like all we've done is be on planes!

Sunday, after track church, we went to THE RACE. This is our favorite race, where speeds can go over 200 miles per hr. when they bump draft. Exciting race and again Earnhardt led laps. Unfortunately, he and Burton got tangled in a wreck and so he didn't finish very well. We are so happy to see him running up front though. Looking forward to Texas races.

We are currently in West Monroe, Lousiana - - will arrive at the Texas track tomorrow afternoon and will camp there until next Monday.

Martinsville/Talladega

We enjoyed the Martinsville races. The track is the smallest track on the 36 race circuit and built right next to a railroad track. During the sprint race (which Earnhart led 90 of the 500 laps!!!!!), the train went by slowly (you think the engineer wanted to watch a little of the race?).
We have moved on to Talladega, AL after spending the night in Atlanta, GA. Tomorrow Roy and I are flying to San Diego for Joan's funeral (Roy's sister). She fought a long battle against breast and lung cancer. This last month has been hard and God called her home. We will miss her!

Roy is back!

Roy spent 4 days in San Diego with his sister, who is under hospice care. All his sisters and brothers were there. I stayed with the dogs and RV in Virginia. It seemed like a long time but important time for Roy to be with family. Joan is still in hospice care, but heavily medicated. The cancer has spread from breast, to lungs, to bones. They have discontinued chemo and radiation as she is too weak to continue. Just continue to pray. We will head towards Talladega, AL on Monday after this weekends Truck and Sprint Cup race. Lord, please give strength to all the Stringer/Kapicka family during this tough time. Amen.

Martinsville, Virginia

Since I last wrote, we've done a lot of traveling. On the 9th we drove to south of Boston (Middleboro). (The picture is of me with my lobster!)We went out to Cape Cod (where the rich live!) and walked our dogs on the beach. On Sunday we visited a small church of the Nazarene in Lakeview. On Monday we drove to Richmond Virginia (got stuck in traffic near NYC, Baltimore AND Washington DC so it took forever!). When we got up in Richmond, we couldn't get the jacks up in the RV. Waited all day for a repairman, who finally got the jacks up so we could travel (after multiple phone calls to Winnebego). On the 13th we arrived at the Klondike campground, where we have a lot of friends, for camping at the racetrack. Wed night we went to a dirt track race. Friday we attended a track Bible study, then watched the NASCAR Chef cook (picture of chef at left with Chris) in front of one of the RVs in our campground (we'll be in the background when it airs before the Texas race). We went to an autograph session at the racetrack that had about 20 nationwide driver's, incuding Joe Nemechek and Brian Scott (local Boise boy). On Saturday, we went to a church service at the track and in the evening went to the Sprint Cup race. Sunday we drove to Martinsville. Today (Monday the 18th), I drove Roy to Roanoke VG. He's flying to San Diego until Friday to be with his sister Joan, who has agressive cancer. Please pray for her.

Back in the USA

Today we crossed the border. They walked through our RV and made us open our car carrier but that's about all. Took about 15-20 minutes. Said they were looking for hiding people. We are now in Saco, Maine for the night. Going to Boston for Lobster tomorrow night! We will stay Sat and Sun in Boston then start towards Charlotte NC Should arrive in NC on Tuesday. NASCAR races on Friday and Saturday. Good to be home and have signs in English rather than French.

Today we took a bus tour of Quebec City. We went back to the Church of Notre Dame on Upper Quebec and it was open. This is the church built in 1688. The one picture is inside the church with a ship hanging from the ceiling. This was to bring good luck to the sailors coming up the St. Lawrence from Europe and back. We drove around Quebec for a couple of hrs. looking at various buildings, including the Citadel, which is currently a military base in Quebec. We then drove to the falls of Montmorency (picture). Roy and I walked up to the base of the falls until we started getting pretty wet. We went somewhat close than the picture. We then road across to the Island of New Orleans, a small island that mainly has farmers and rich people with summer homes. We stopped at a Chocolatier (there are lots of these in Quebec). Good thing we don't go into these shops often. Yummmm. We then drove to the Gilles family shop - a family that for over 100 years has been making copper art. This family (father) made the door coverings on the church we were going to visit next. On the way to the church we stopped at another temptation place - homemade bread with maple butter. This area has a lot of maple trees and lots of maple syrup available. Never thought of putting maple syrup into butter, but it's as good as honey butter. Our tour ended at Sainte Anne de Beaupie basilica, a church dedicated to St. Anne, the mother of Mary. This church was extremely beautiful but no pictures on the inside. I found a statue on the outside of Mary very interesting Mary is standing on the serpent (which has an apple in it's mouth). Enjoyed the symbolism there.

Quebec City Number 1

Arrived here in Quebec City, Quebec about 1 p.m. and drove downtown to old town. Quebec is an amazingly old city First established in the 1530s. We drove to old town and visited an old ammunitions factory that was held by the French, then the British. The old city is surrounded by a stone wall. The lower old city is right on the St. Lawrence river which connects to the Atlantic Ocean. You will notice in old city the cobblestone streets are very narrow with lots of little shops along the street of stone buildings - very European. The Catholic church was built in 1688 on the site that Champlain originally built his stockard (an early Canadian explorer). Tomorrow we are taking an all day guided tour. This will be our last Canadian stop. Friday morning we will head to Maine and probably spend the night in southern Maine. In the city 94% speak French so we don't hear much English, although the shop keepers speak some English.

Visits to Montreal

Yesterday afternoon we drove into Montreal and visited St. Joseph's Oratory - a large catholic church. St. Joseph is the patron saint of Canada. This basilica also honors Brother Andre, a healing monk. His heart (real) is on display in the church museum. (We have a picture of it!). We also went downtown to the Cathedral of Montreal, a 1/4 scale church replica of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. It had a very unusual canopy of the altar. We drove by McGill University (Canada's Harvard).

Today we headed down to "old" Montreal, a part of the city that was built in the 1800s. The streets are narrow as you can see in the picture and cobblestoned. We walked to various small shops and to another Catholic church called Basilica Notre Dame De Montreal. This was a huge church built in the 1820's and finished in the 1870's. It had an absolutely huge beautiful alter up front. We actually took a tour from one of the parishners, which was really fascinating. Afterward we drove by the 1976 Olympic park. The big stadium (where they now play professional baseball and other sports) is called the Big "O". They didn't even finish the stadium until 1990. It has had to have many repairs, so we were told the locals call it the Big "Owe". It was pretty impressive. The large wing is a tower that you can ride up in for $$.

Please pray for Roy's Sister, Joan. Her cancer has spread and she is doing poorly.

10/4 from Montreal

Sorry I haven't blogged for a while. We have been in fairly unpopulated parts of Canada the last few days with little internet service. Our last blog we were in Thunder Bay. On Sept 29th we drove to Sault (said Sue) Ste. Marie. The fall leaves were incredibly beautiful. It is impossible to describe the colors. I've seen pictures but pictures do not do the scenary credit. There is every shade of green, yellow, orange and red. On Wednesday we went down to the locks between lake Superior and Heron. Canada has no commerical locks (USA has 4 commerical locks between the lakes though). We then went to a Bush pilot museum. These planes were unbelievable. They were and are used to fight forest fires and fly people in to remote areas, landing on lakes. They can actually fly over the surface of the water and pick up water to then deliver to fires. After that , we went to an Italian restaurant with some friends we met in Charlotte last year (at a NASCAR race) - Bob and Carol McDowells. We hit it off last year immediate. The are Christians and Bob is into cars and Carol is a Nurse Practioner AND they are Earnhart fans - so we hit it off. On Friday we rode the Agawa Canyon train up the Canyon for 4 hours (mainly for the scenary) and then back. After we got back, we went to Bob and Carol's for dinner. They are true NASCAR Earnhard fans as their house is fully NASCAR decorated. On Saturday we drove to the little town of Mattawa, Ontario about the size of McCall or smaller. There were only 4 churches so we ended up at a Pentacostal church on Sunday. Today we drove to Montreal and will be here a couple of days. More on Montreal tomorrow.

Thunder Bay

Today we drove to a beautiful waterfalls called Kakabeka Falls, then into Thunder Bay city proper on Lake Superior. The city port is lined with huge grain silos, where grain from western Canada is trained to here to load on ships. We spent some time around the area, then went to Fort William. This is not a military fort, but a reconstruction of the inland headquarters of the NW Company (which later fused with the Hudson Bay Company). It was a huge fort with multiple buildings. We had a "period" tour guide that took us and another couple from Michigan through the fort for about 2 hours. The fort was fully supplied with furs, gardens, and furnishings from the 1800s. Tomorrow we are headed to Sault St. Marie ("Soo" they call it) which is a city between Lake Superior and Lake Heron. We will stay a couple of days there. We have some friends we met at the Charlotte NASCAR campground that we hope to visit with.
Comments on the blog are welcome!!!!

These are pictures from the legislative building in downtown Winnepeg. This building is supposedly worth the most in N. America. The large "golden boy" on top is covered with gold. The building was made of limestone. Inside was a stairway lined with huge bronze bison, a popular wedding picture site. The guard told us 8 wedding parties were scheduled that Saturday. Upstairs, besides the chambers, was an original Magna Carta on display. This particular Magna carta was brought to Canada this summer by the Queen and given to Canada. U.S. also has an orginal copy in Wash. D.C.

Sunday we went to a Nazarene Church that had about 100 people, mostly Asian. We think they were either Korean. Winnepeg (city of about 1 million) has two small Nazarene churches. We enjoyed the service a lot. We came home, watched NASCAR and then watched the replay ob the Oregon vs. BSU game on ESPN. We weren't able to get the original broadcast.

This morning we drove down to the financial district and went to the commodies exchange. There wasn't much to see as its all done on computers. We came back and drove to Thunder Bay, Ontario which is on Lake Superior. We will be here for about 2 days.

Winnepeg

We drove in to Winnepeg today. People compare Winnepeg to Chicago, both in type of city and weather. We went to "The Forks", a fork in the river, where an old railroad terminal has been converted into shops. We also went down to the Legislature building. This building was made of limestone and has a "golden boy" (as they call it) on top covered with 23 1/2 karat gold. (Picture in next post) It is said this is one of the most valuable buildings in North American. We also visited the Ukrainian Museum. Thousands of Ukranians came from E. Europe in the 1900's to post WWII and there are lots of them all over Canada, as well as many Orthodox churches. Tomorrow we plan to go to a Nazarene church, come back and watch NASCAR and then BSU game. We can't get the live BSU game but it is being repeated on ESPN tomorrow.

Across the prairie to Saskatoon

Today we drove all day across the prairie - looks so much like Nebraska or Oklahoma. We are staying the night in Saskatoon, but headed toward Winnepeg tomorrow. It may take us a day and one-half to reach Winnepeg unless we drive into the night.. We'll see. We plan to stay the weekend in Winnepeg - watch the BSU game on DirecTV. We were told our DirectV wouldn't work in Canada but it sure does. There still was hectares and hectares of unharvested grain crop. The ground is extremely wet so they are weeks from harvest - again may not make it. I'm thinking I should go buy futures in wheat!

Calgary

You might wonder why we went through Montana. Lady or Mrs. "G" as we call her (our Garmen) sent us that way so we went through Great Falls. Yesterday we drove to Calgary and we are camped about 2 miles north of the 1988 Olympic luge/sled area (picture R). It has been very cold all summer in Calgary (the people talk about never seeing the sun). On the way here we saw lots of unharvested, green wheat that likely won't make it. They've had snow already in Calgary and the Rocky Mtns. in view from here are covered with snow. Today we went to the 1988 Olympic village where they did the bobsled and luge runs as well as the ski jumping. The ski jumping towers (picture L)were unbelievably high and to think they are higher now - that is one thing NOT on my bucket list. We also drove down to the Calgary Stampede park, where there is a huge rodeo grounds (always a July rodeo) and the ice skating center for the Calgary Flames. We were a little dismayed that the grandstands for the rodeo are actually quite a few meters from the actual rodeo arena for most of the seats. Calgary also has a space needle with restaurant, very similar to the one in Seattle. Tomorrow morning we are heading easterly.

Heading toward Canada

Today we drove from McCall ID to Great Falls Montana. Tomorrow we will cross the border between Montana and Canada and head to Calgary. It was a pretty uneventful drive but beautiful. When we went to set up, we had to reteach outselves how to level the RV, get the slides to go out, etc. Our on-board computer seemed to need nudging as it didn't work for a while. Guess sleeping in the RV shed from early June til end of September, it needed a few tries to wake up. Pray for us as we cross the border - don't really want any big hassles. We will be driving east across Canada and drop down into Massachusetts. Need to be in Charlotte NC by about October 13

Wyoming

We are getting closer to home = we are in Laramie Wyoming. Feels and even looks like homeland with mountains and open spaces. I cannot call something only 3000 feet high a mtn. like they do in the east. They have no clue. After a while I also get that closed up feeling with all the greenery and folage. You drive down the road and cannot see more than 5 feet in from the road. I do like being able to see for miles. It will be good to be home again in 1-2 days.

Nashville and Beyond

Rachael flew in late last Wed night. We went downtown and had dinner at midnight. Thursday we wandered around downtown and went to the Country Music Hall of Fame. We spent about 3 hours going through all of the exhibits. That evening we went to the Rhyman theater to a Classic Country show (not sure how much Rachael enjoyed that music). Friday we drove over to Lynchburg and that evening went to the Grand Ole Opry (which was held at the Rhyman due to flooding at the "new" Opry house). Saturday morning she flew out. Roy and I went to a Nationwide NASCAR race outside of Nashville. Sunday was the Cowboy Church. This church broadcasts, the preacher is married to Johnny Cash's younger sister, who sang. Sunday afternoon we headed out. Spent the night outside of St. Louis. Today we are in Doniphan NE about 80 miles out of Lincoln NE. We are slowly moving home.

Nashville

We arrived yesterday in Nashville. You all recall the horrible flooding they had here. Everywhere you look, people are gutting lots of first floors of buildings. We are staying in a KOA that was completely under water. The owner told us she took a boat floating over the top of their shower house early in May. Wow. This 100+ lot KOA only has about 20 spaces open and no amenities. Fortunately, we do have power, water and sewer at our spot but no shower houses, etc. Rachael arrives tonight and we hope to go downtown and check out the country western scene at "The District" as it is called.

Second Week in Charlotte

This last week in Charlotte was a rainy one. Amazing that all of the races were on time except for the dirt track race. As the saying goes, it was spring racin' in Charlotte. We also went to two driver autograph sessions and got to speak for a while to Bryan Scott (from Boise, ID, driving in the Nationwide series and currently Rookie of the Year contender). We also visited Wood Brother's shop, who sponsors Bill Elliott's car. We went down to Speed Street, a street fair during the week whose theme is NASCAR. Friday we went to the largest hamburger feed inside the Charlotte track, sponsored by Coca Cola. After doing a 1 1/2 mile walk around the track, we ate hamburgers and chicken from a 1/4 mile long grill and drank Coke Zero. What a hoot! Monday we started driving towards Nashville TN where we will spend a few days. Rachael (daughter) is flying in on Wed and we are going to two performances at the Reiman Theater and visiting the Country Hall of Fame.

First week in Charlotte NC

We are here in Charlotte for our NASCAR Members club convention and the All Star Race.

On Wednesday our club went out to Petty's Victory Junction Gang Camp and stuffed "goodie bags" for the campers coming in June. This camp is a free camp for kids of particular disease, such as sickle cell anemia, cancer, etc. This is the 3rd year we have worked at the camp. The camp was built to honor Adam Petty, Richard Petty's grandson who was killed during a NASCAR practice. We were priveleged to meet Adam's brother, Austin (Kyle Petty's other son) at the camp. We had the picture taken with him. Wednesday evening we went to the Pit Crew Challenge, a timed event putting various pit crews against each other. The winning crew gets to choose their pit at the Allstar race. On Thursday we went to NASCAR Research and Development. This is one of the perks of the club because they don't do public tours. They have finished the seat requrements and next year all driver's seats must meet certain safety requirements. They are now doing experiments on the crushability of the roof of the car as well as side panels. They are trying to develop better ways of protecting drivers without greatly affecting th weight of the car.

Friday we met at the new Hall of Fame. It is a wonderful place with lots of cool memorabilia, as well as lots of exhibits explaining the hows and whys of the car and racing. Our picture is on what is called to "Glory road". It started our flat, with a car from the original Daytonna beach racing in the 50s and ended with one of Jimmie Johnson's cars on 33 degrees banking. Our picture is a little past midway on the road where the banking of probably 25% or so. Talledega track has 33 degrees banking on its curves.

It took a few hrs. to go through the 3 floors of stuff.

Saturday was and Allstar race. What a race - only 13 cars finished as there was a fairly large wreck towards the end of the race. Kurt Busch won the race.

Sunday after track church, we went to a Christian celebration put on the the Gibbs family called "Taylor's finish Line Festival". Taylor is Joe Gibbs grandson who had leukemia, was treated and now is cancer free. This festival was to celebrate this and raise funds for cancer treatment for kids who cannot afford the treatment that Taylor was able to receive. There were lots of NASCAR driver's running around the playing with the carnival stuff with kids. There was also a Christian concert by Toby Mac in the evening. We saw Michael Waltrip playing minature golf with kids. Joey Lagona and Bobby Labonte each played Wii racing with kids (go figure). Juan Pablo Montoya also played minature golf. The picture of me with Michael is especially for Sharon!

Monster Mile 2 + Joey Lagono

We had a great time at the Monster Mile track although the Monster never came out and there really weren't any huge wrecks.This concrete track is famous for becoming very slick after tire rubber gets laid down on a warm day and there usually are lots of big wrecks. Kyle Bush won 2 of the 3 races (Carolyn Korn should be happy) and Jimmy Johnson was speeding on pit row and lost the race for himself (he had the best car all day).

On Thursday night, before the races started we went to a famous seafood restaurant in Lipseic Delaware, famous for crabs. While we were there, Michael Waltrip came in and Ryan Newman came in to eat. Michael placed hand on Roy's shoulder, so he says he's never going to wash it again. I got Michael's autograph.

I forgot to write when we were in Darlington, we went to a Home Depot to meet Joey Lagano. He was all smiles and friendly. He spoke to everyone as he signed their hat, tshirt or whatever. You can see Roy's picture with Joey above and mine below. We are now headed for Charlotte North Carolina where we will spend two weeks.

The Monster Mile Post 1

We have arrived and are parked just outside the Monster Mile Track in Dover Delaware. Its raining which is not good for racing and practicing tomorrow. Hopefully this storm just moves straight on out to the ocean. Today the dogs got away from us and we chased 3 dogs around the field. I guess they are getting tired of being "cooped" up. Acres of grass are probably too tempting for Beagles who really want to chase the eastern squirrels. Tomorrow we plan to sit around a little and then head to Sambo's for fish and crab. This restaurant is suppossed to be famous among NASCAR fans in a little city called Leipsic (lip - sick) Delaware. We' ve heard them talk about this restaurant on Sirus 128 for years. We'll see if it lives up to itss reputation.
So - Hello from Delware!! :)

The Lady in Black

We spent the last week in Florence, South Carolina near Darlington International Speedway or the "Lady in Black", also nicknamed "the track too tough to tame". Living up to "her" name there were lots of cars with the "Darlington" stripe on their right side, due to scrapping the wall. There were also a fair number of wrecks, one taking Jimmie Johnson out of the race. We enjoy this track a lot and enjoy the KOA where we have stayed now for 3 years. Each year they BBQ a pig on Thursday and have a big picnic in the evening and provide breakfast on the weekend. We also enjoyed some great fresh tomatoes from a local market and had our traditional hot salsa. We left on Monday and drove a significant part of the Blue Ridge Parkway through the Blue Ridge mtns. in North Carolina and Virginia. Today we drove onto Maryland and will be in Dover Delaware, parked just outside the racetrack tomorrow. It has been raining in the northeast but supposed to be warm (80s) this weekend.

Richmond Races

Friday night we went to the Bubba Burger Nationalwide races. (Only in the south would they sell "Bubba burgers" - I kept thinking they must be purchased by Billy Bob). It was an exciting race won by Keselowski but Kyle Bush gave him a run for it. Saturday night we went to the Sprint Cup race. Even though it was a good race, we were dismayed when Kyle Bush won. Oh well! Our driver got hit by Bobby Labonte, lost a tire and had to pit, putting him 5 laps down. Such is racing. The Richmond speedway put in the a new sign board which you can see in the one picture. One picture shows a skydiver bringing in the U.S. flag (when I see this, I always think of Wally Benton bringing in the flag at the first BSU game in the new stadium. If you don't know what happened to him, email and ask me!). The last picture is the view from our seats. Sunday we went to Hanover Church of the Nazarene, a church slightly north of the racetrack. Monday we headed out and got to Florence, South Carolina near Darlington Speedway for the week. Its warm and nice and dry. With all the rain in Tennessee, we expected it to be wet. I guess we will have to wait and see - they say thunderstorms tonight and the clouds are rolling in.

Richmond Virginia

Thursday, April 29th

Today we went shopping to get Roy a swim suit (a new one every 10 years isn't too bad!). Afterward we headed downtown Richmond to the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. They have the largest collection of his memorabilia here (clothes, dishes, furnitures, and much of his writing). He was an editor of a literary journal published in the 1700s while he lived in Richmond. Afterward we came back to the RV and sat outside in the sunshine. We then headed to Bass Pro Shop where Jamie McMurray (winner of the 2010 Daytona 500) was signing autographs. As you can see, we both got his autograph. Races tomorrow night and Saturday night. We'll head to South Carolina on Monday or Tuesday.

Wild races and weekend

Today we left Talladega and a wild weekend. All evening Friday and all day Saturday we were on tornado watch. The winds blew and it rained and rained. We lucked out with a high spot while many others got out of their RVs to many inches of rain water. We watched a tent go flying in the air, hit a car and break the windshield. The Nationwide race was cancelled on Saturday due to "dangerous" weather. No kidding! Sunday was a beautiful day. We went to church at the Cornerstone campground church. After that, headed to both the Sprint Cup and National races at the 2.66 mile Talledega Superspeedway. It was a fabulous race. Our driver led off and on all day but got shiffled back to 13th at the end. (He's still 8th place in the points though!!). The weather couldn't have been more perfect. This morning we packed up and headed towards Richmond, Virginia. We drove about half way and will be north of Richmond tomorrow. Hope this finds you all well.

Talledega --We are here

We left Idaho on the 15th. Took 2 days to get to Phoenix where we visited some dear friends, LaVerne and Harold Roberts. We left on the 17th and arrived in Talledega Alabama on the 20th after 3 long days of hard driving. We are camped right outside Turn 1 and can see the track from our RV. The dogs were happy to be able to run around a little. Snoops barks at everything so we have some training to do! We will bel here until Monday. It was nice to sit in the sun and soak it up today after we spent a couple of hrs. "decorating" the RV outside with all of our Earnhardt Jr. stuff (gotta get in the racin' mood!)