Blue Bird of Happiness

I had to come to Missouri to find my bluebird of happiness. Missouri is a treasure throb of birds for bird watchers. I had one bluebird when we lived in Pennsylvania and here there are tons of them and the most different species i have ever seen.

We came here to spend a week till the snow stopped in Montana and we will be here a month. We leave on May 2ND. But this has been a month of adventure and relaxation. Much beauty in the mountains, lakes and wildlife, plus the entertainment. I have treasured my stay here and the best part was watching the many birds that came to my feeder. Now on to South Dakota and more adventures.

Table Rock Dam

This is Table Rock Dam, it is open again after forty years it's gates were closed but a couple of weeks ago it opened it gates due to the flooding here in branson Missouri, and yesterday they opened again because of severe rain and Thunders storms that have passed through dropping tons of water again. it's a pretty site to see open but not so pretty for those who live down river from this dam. Parts of Missouri and Arkansas. There were people who's flooded homes were just being cleaned up and fixed and now they have to start again. Hopefully the rain will stop and life in Missouri and Arkansas can get back to a normal life.

Riding the Duck

When in Branson you should ride the duck. It goes all over Branson and shows tourist what Branson has to offer. If you ride the Duck first, after you get to Branson you have a good knowledge of fun things to see and do. It's very informative and lots of fun.

You also get to take a ride in Tablerock Lake. But don't sit in the back seat if you don't want to get wet. We are still having fun in Branson we leave in a week for Rapid City South Dakota.

Branson Historic Downtown

Today we took a bike ride into Historic Downtown Branson and Branson Landing. it is basically a big shopping area with unique shopping. They had neat little shops and cafes. We ate at the Farmhouse cafe. It had your basic American fare. We had cheeseburgers and i had a root beer Float and Leigh had lemonade.

We then walked the shops. They had a real old fashion 5 & 10 cent store lots of dress, leather, quilting and hobby shops. My favorite was the candy store called "Simply Irresistible Old Fashion Candy Store". It was irresistible too. i got some old fashion liquorish (black candy) bad spelling. Leigh got butterscotch. I will be returning there before we leave here.

We then walked down to the river where Branson Landing is. You walk on cobblestone road by the river and there is where all the high end shops, cafes and art galleries are. so we went in a few place including the bass pro show for Leigh. They had an aquarium with all the local fish mostly trout and bass. Lots of stuff bears, deer, fox raccoons and stuff to look at.

And we toured an art gallery and it had nice couple of pictures of bears. The owner stopped and talked to us because we had on our bear shirts and he showed us some pictures of this artist from Nevada that had wildlife paintings beautiful ones.
We then road home to the campground. Another nice day in Branson before the rain comes again on Tuesday.

Montana Campgound

These are pictures of the campground we are trying to get to in Montana. I think it might we awhile until it will be ready for us and campers.

Dick Clark American Banstand

Dick Clark's American Bandstand Theater

Today was an awesome day. We went to the Dick Clark American Bandstand to see what we thought was going to be Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers and Paul Revere and the Raiders.

Well, It was them and Jim Stafford from Hee Haw, Noah-the musical, Barbara Fairchild the gospel singer, David Somerville of the Comets Johnny Lonestar and Clay Cooper, and last but not least, The Twelve Irish tenors( boy were they hot) .

It was such a fun Day. We are finding Branson a wonderful place to visit and it has something for everyone old and young. Branson has tons of fun stuff for children like water parks inside, amusement parks, fishing ,walking , boating, camping for family fun also. But the best is the music, no matter what type of music you like they have it here.

We did not know when we came here Branson would be such a fun place to be. Just another unplanned adventure for "The Page's."

Table Rock Dam

Yesterday we got to see history made here in Branson as they opened up all the flood gates at the Table rock Dam. They opened up all the flood gates due to the flooding we have had in the last 48 hours. The mighty white river roars through the flood gates at the record-setting pace of 34,000 cubic feet per second. The previous record was set in 1961 at 31,000 cubic feet per second.

They had to evacuate several homes and have opened shelters. We are above the flooded area so we are fine.

Severe Weather

Well, last night the rains, winds, thunder and lightning has struck Branson. The weather channel has tornado and flood watches.

Sometimes the wind blows the RV so much you think it's going to blow over. It's like a big swamp around our RV park. We are not liking this weather. So we are staying inside today watch the weather on TV. This storm is suppose to last through Saturday so the weather channel says.

We will keep you posted.

Branson Fest

Today is rainy in Branson, but I was not going to sit in this RV another day. So off we went to Branson Fest.

Branson Fest is when all shows here gives free concerts so you can get a taste of all the different shows that are here. Today we saw 11 different acts. Comedians, country, rock, soul, gospel, and bluegrass. And I forgot to take my camera.

I met one of the original Drifters. Leigh and I won free tickets for one of the show by getting and dancing. We got tons of autographs. We just had the greatest day and it was all free.

Branson has something for everyone here. it's a great place to take kids as it has water parks and tons of stuff of kids and adults to do, not just the best music anywhere.

Life is good in Branson!

New Friends & The Lambert's Cafe

Since I have been thinking of going on the road , I have read the workamper forums on the internet to hear from people who do live and work on the road and to get their advice.

since I have been reading this forum one name was there answering questions on all different topics. His name is jungle jim and his wife pnut. They have given advice on over 1000 topics.

Since I needed advice on lots of subjects, like how to get a job, what can we pull the car and motorcycle with. Where we can stay cheap while waiting for our job in montana. Mr Jungle jim was there answering all those questions.

Well, since we were here in Missouri and he and his wife was up the road about an hour from here. We decided it would be nice to meet a workamper and get some of his sage advice. So Leigh and I went to Ozark, Missouri to meet this couple. Well, they were the nicest couple and after talking to them Leigh and I felt like we knew them forever. They answered all our question and then they took us to the most awesome place to eat.

Lambert's cafe, home of the throwed rolls. The throwed rolls is just that. They take these fresh homemade rolls still hot from the oven and throw them to you from across the room. you just raise your hands and they throw a roll at you.

The decor was rustic with signed dollar bills all over the walls and balloons on the wooden booths. They was license plates from every state, flags of every sort on the walls.

The food was a southern fare . Some of they special was fried chicken, chicken & biscuits, meatloaf, hamburger Steak, chicken livers, chicken fried steak. You get 2 sides with your meal but they have this thing called pass-arounds. Pass-arounds are things like fried okra,fried potatoes and onions,macaroni and tomatoes,black eyed peas,and the famous rolls and sorghum. Sorghum is a molasses based syrup that you put on your rolls. So needless to say you don't go hungry on this place.

I had chicken livers, turnip greens and mashed potatoes and gravy. Leigh had hamburger steak smothered with gravy, bell peppers, mushrooms, fresh onions and tomatoes. This steak was a full pound. If you like southern food you would be in your glory here. The food was the best I have ever tasted. I thought I was in heaven. The rolls alone was to die for.

So if you are ever in Ozark, Missouri we must stop at Lambert's cafe of of Route 65 and enjoy the experience of your life.

Birds at my feeder

Pretty Birds

We put out our bird feeder as we do everywhere we go and we are getting some pretty birds, We have gotten a pair of cardinals, a pair of woodpeckers and several chickadees, bluejays, and doves. We love birdwatching. Life is good.

You may be a redneck if......

We took another walk along the Tablerock Lake. It was another beautiful day in Branson.
As you can see there is still flooding here and there may be more in a couple of days because the rain is coming back.

We took this picture of 2 girls trying to get out to a picnic table. This is a nice place and I think we may want to come back sometime. The people are very friendly and it seems peole in Missouri love the outdoors.

Table Rock Lake

What a beautiful day God has made. Today after cleaning and re-organzing our Rv. We took a walk to Table Rock Lake. There was so many people out enjoying this day, as it has been flooding raining and cold. Today was the first day sunny day since our arrival.

There were bass fishermen, families having picnics, campers in the State Park, boaters and tons of house boats.

We walked around the lake where we could because some of it was still flooded. But all in all it was a beautiful day at Table Rock lake.

Flooding in Arkansas & Missouri

The trip to Branson Missouri was very eventful. After leaving Tennessee and heading into Arkansas we found lots of flooding. The more we traveled the more flooding we saw. The worst was about 30 minutes outside of Branson.

Another event which was not fun was our GPS system. We call her Bullier. Well, she decided she was wanted to go the scenic route instead of the interstates. So she took us through country roads where we saw lots of farms and really nice rural America. That part was great and I said to Leigh " gee this is cool no traffic and what great scenery. Well, the great scenery became scary as we went into the Ozark mountains. Imagine a 35 foot RV towing a car and motorcycle, so that is about 56 feet. Imagine that rig going up and down mountains with high grades and no guard rails and you look out and see big drop offs. This is a country road very narrow. And there was no pull off so we had a few trucks behind us with no place for them to pass. Well, that was what most of the trip was like. I was gripping the seat I was so scared and poor Leigh's neck was so tense as he was keeping us on the road. A 6 hour trip turned into 9 hours.

Morale of the story is, check map against GPS and use your own judgement as to the best way to go.

One thing was for sure

Beale Street & Gibson Guitar factory

While here in Memphis we could not leave without seeing Beale Street, so we went there and walked all over downtown Memphis. While on Beale Street we ate at BB King's Place. We had a BB King sampler. It was delicious, Hot wings, BBQ Ribs, Potato Skins, and Fried Pickles.
If you never have tasted them you need to try those fried pickles. The whole meal was great and the atmosphere was great.

After eating we went to the Gibson Guitar factory where we watched the famous guitars played by the best musicians in the world. Gibson is the only guitar made in the USA. The Gibson guitar was made by Mr Gibson's about 100 years ago. He made them one by one and sold or gave them to friends. His guitars became so popular he hired 5 people to help him. One of those people was Les Paul who invented the electric guitar and for recording music the multi-tracking.
Me Gibson decided he was tired of making the guitars and sold his business to the 5 people he hired for the sum of $2500. Can you imagine what that business is worth today? Some of the guitars are worth that much for just one guitar. Another tidbit it is Gibson made the Lucille Guitar for BB King and that is one of their best selling guitars today.

So tomorrow off to another adventure.

Check out my Slide Show!

Graceland, Memphis, Tenn

We arrived in Memphis around nine in the morning. guided by our new Garmin named Bullier. We found our campground on Elvis Presley BLVD. It was right behind a fried chicken place and a used car lot on a busy low income part of town with a housing project behind us. Which is where Graceland is in Memphis. Elvis must be rolling over in his grave to see what happened to the neighborhood where he bought Graceland. At the time he bought it, it was in the country with nothing around it. He bought the mansion from a rich doctor.

Graceland is such a beautiful place and seems so out of its element with all the business' and stuff that has grown around it due to his death.

The Graceland experience once inside was wonderful. To see how he decorated the place and the costumes and awards, and just his lifestyle when relaxing at home was awesome. The interviews playing and his concerts on televisions all over bought Elvis back to life for a small moment in time for me.

I loved Elvis my whole life. When I was married I had a big poster of Elvis over my television. I'm sure my kids remember that. I had a photo of our living room somewhere with his picture over TV but I don't know what happened to it.

Anyhow, while in his mansion Elvis was there alive and well for me. His mediation Garden where he, his mother, father and grandmother are laid to rest was so peaceful and beautiful.

I really enjoyed spending a some time with the King. I'm just so sorry his neighborhood has gone downhill. I know Elvis has left the building to live in the hearts of all of his fans.