Trippin' with Susan Straley

 I love that you are with me in spirit right this moment.   I feel the glow. A neighbor at my RV Park who is a Florida Gator fan got this cute Christmas Decoration from her Gransdon.  It lights up at night. May you be blessed with some pain-free days and good nights of peaceful sleep (can you tell I am getting old?), lots of warm hugs and laughter, positive thoughts and good news, and of course fun, fun, fun in the next few weeks as we slide into 2024.  Time seems to go faster and faster as the years go by.   Tonight, Steve and I are hosting our first Christmas Eve party together.  We have some of his friends from his neighborhood coming, and some of our bicycle friends are coming.  And even, Joan who we met briefly in North Carolina at Oscar Blues Brewery is coming with her son from Zephyr Hills, FL!   We attended another large Christmas Party with many of our biking friends in attendance.  We did a white-elephant gift exchange of $10 gifts.  Steve got these cute socks. We had a littl

September 20, 2023 Today I noticed that the blog posts from our travels in August and September arrived in your inbox out of order.  Whoops! Hopefully you figured it out when the last two arrived out of order. I had wrote that you probably would not hear from me until we returned to Florida in November.  But, again as usual, things happen differently than we plan.   We decided once we got to Steve's house that it would be rushing ourselves to spend over 10 days riding the GAP trail and the C&O trail before we head to Florida.   We were ready to be in one place for a while.  So we canceled our bike trip! I don't have regrets.  I am hoping we will do at least the GAP trail in a couple years. In one place, we can attend to banking and washing our trucks and trailers and getting the yard ready for Steve's absence over the winter and next summer. And be here to visit his fun mother who is having health problems. We are planning on fun while we are here too.  Maybe a two day

September 10, 2023 You should feel special because I could have given up after I lost the looong letter I wrote to you.   Then when I recreated the looong post, it must have went to most everyones junk mail or spam inbox because the open rate was down to almost zero.  I miss my friends.  I am really looking forward to reconnecting with my Florida friends.  I didn't want to leave you hanging.  I don't want to be forgotten. I want to keep in touch with you.   I am back in Wisconsin, near my Sister.  It is a rainy day.  Steve is reading a very funny book.  Every once in a while he starts laughing and laughing.   Anxious People  is the title.  And I am at my computer writing and writing and up loading pictures.   I hope I didn't bore you with all the pictures and stories of these past few days. Tomorrow we head back to New York.  Taking five days to do it.  Then we will start preparing for our third bicycle tour of the year.  Washington DC to Pittsburgh all on trail... unless a

 It is Thursday, September 14, 2023 I have just removed my things from Steve's trailer and put them back in My truck and Weeroll. My weeroll was full of stuff because I made toom in my truck bed or Steve's bike. My home is looking  more like home now. I am at 4-mile Creek State Park Campground near Niagra Falls, NY. I will tell you why I moved my stuff out later. That has nothing to do with the do over. I noticed that my last post was way too long.  I had said I would post every day of our bike tour. That didn't happen for so many reasons, time, energy, lack of cell service, among them. The do-over is breaking up the post into smaller, hopefully more iinteresting posts So here goes. Cooling off in Spring Green, Wisconsin Hurricane Idalia missed our friends' homes and Steve's house in Florida.  Yay!  Though there was a lot of damage in our county (Citrus) along the coast from the surge.  I hope you and yours are OK. I posted something on Facebook about our hike on Mt

 I said I wasn't going to write to you again until I got back to New York in September.  But, I couldn't do it.  It's too long a time to not touch base. I am excited for my friends Jim and Ann at are also traveling this summer.  They have made their way from Florida up through California and into Oregon.  They are spending time in each lovely place and enjoying the views.  We reach out to each other once in a while and send a couple pictures. Then I think of my friends that are working their way through health challenges and I send them love and Tinkerbell sparkles. Last I wrote to you I was near Niagra Falls in New York.  I was about to cut through Canada to arrive back in the USA north of Detroit.  I was worried about the crossing and my dog spray (pepper spray).  Well, as usual with worry, it was wasted energy.  I went early in the morning and they asked me if I had any weapons. Rather than explain my kitchen knives and pepper spray, I said, "Nope!"  Is that a