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Ed & Johanne's
Notes from the road

Page 13

Home

The rather poor camground that the peacocks were in is located in Hammond, Louisiana, just a short distance from
Interstate-12. One night and we continued on to Lake Charles,
LA and a nice but nearly empty campground.

March 23: This morning we walked over to the Care Center to say hi to our friends and let the volunteer coordinator know that we were "in the park" and if an opening came up early we were available. It just so happened that a volunteer left early and there was an opening.....so, five weeks early and we are going to work.
      To start, the semi-annual Care Garage Sale was scheduled for the weekend and preparations were going full force.
      Johanne really got into the swing of it and helped out many customers as did all of the staff and volunteers.
      Reportedly a very successful sale.

We are scheduled for volunteering starting May 1st, but we are coming early to attend the Health Faire that is scheduled for next week. We will have some medical tests done at considerable savings. Then we will take care of other chores, like motor vehicle inspections and so on.
We arrived mid afternoon and the park was FULL! Well, they never turn anyone away and we were placed at the end of a row of sites and camped the first night without electric and water.

March 22: This day we head HOME....Livingston, TX the Escapee's Headquarters, Rainbows End. Our home base.
We were greeted in Texas by some really lousy roads. Interstate-10 is in very poor condition, it really shook up the RV, but no major problems. At Beaumont we left the interstate and the last 75 miles was on decent country highways 105 and 146 to Rainbows End.

I was busy moving the RV from dry camp over to the Care Center's Volunteer Row. Also helping out in the kitchen.
By the next day (Sunday) I had come down with cold and spent two days in bed. I recovered and then Johanne came down with it later in the week.

    Some of the things we did during the next five weeks included going out to eat several times with various friends. A funny trip to the small town of Silsbee, a little more than an hour from "home". Four couples (all volunteers) traveled in two cars to this town. We stopped at an old Victorian house that one of us (Linda M) had found on the internet as a point of interest and we were going to take a tour. We located the house, Linda got our and went up to the front door, opened it and called out "hello, is anyone here?" A woman came -and- told her that it was now a private home and there was no tours.
      We got very silly over that, especially when a police car headed toward us. (but, drove on by) We then went to a local Italian restaurant, Joe's Restaurant, and we universally agreed that the food was authentic Italian and very good. Joe was originally from Italy by way of New Jersey and his family was the staff. We complimented them on such fine food.
       I had the eggplant parmesan and it was better than most and definitly the best I have had out of the last 5 or 6 times that I have ordered it.

But, the main reason we drove so far was too visit The Ice House Museum that had a bluegrass/country music session scheduled for that evening. We arrived and meandered around the museum rooms while waiting for the band to set up their equipment, which they were doing. Then wait and wait until we were notified that part of the band had gone to a wake that evening and would not be coming. Those members that did show up then started packing up. One man, with guitar, felt bad for us and started singing and strumming. After four or five songs we thanked him and we took off for "home" stopping for Ice cream in Livingston.