Up and on my way pretty early this morning. Travel days aren't my favorite days, usually because I've stayed up too late the night before and need to be up early enough to get out in a reasonable time. Might as well take a few moments and explain what that all entails.

   Once I'm up and showered, ( that didn't happen today because of the busted T&P valve in the hot water heater), there's time for a quick breakfast and a chance to check email, FB and read a few comics. I often start putting things 'away' the night before, but if not all the dishes, food, toaster, electric kettle, books and other misc stuff needs to be stowed somewhere so it won't go rolling around while the trailer is in motion. There are plenty of cabinets and under seat stowage, so it doesn't take long. All the windows and roof vents need to be closed, the trash taken out and the slide-in couch has to be brought in.

   On the outside the 4 scissors jack's need to be raised, the truck backed up and the hitch lowered, that's a job in itself if you're alone, the the hitch load levelers are put on and the anti sway bar hooked into place. Disconnect the water hose and coil it up, disconnect the shore power line and stow it and get ready to go. If you are at a site with a sewer hook up, you of course drain all your tanks, rinse the hose and stow it in the back trailer bumper. If there isn't a sewer hook-up you need to go to the dump station before leaving and do all of that there. Nothing real difficult about any of it most of the time, but it still takes 45-60 min's to get it all done and ready to go.

   Today was no different and I was on the road around 9:30. Took a minor side trip over to the Camping World RV store and picked up a new valve for the HW heater before getting on the highway headed west. Decided to do the interstate this morning even though I've been trying to stick to the side roads as much as possible. I've already been on a few of the roads up through these mountains and I'm not sure I want to be dragging a trailer on some of them. It was difficult enough just driving the highway this morning. Sure was a pretty morning to be up and about though. Seems like I'm going through spring once again as I moved up in elevation from where I was. The hardwoods are just starting to leaf out again and the Red Bud and Dogwoods are all in bloom again.

   Only took one wrong turn on the way up and it didn't turn out to bad, just took me in towards the downtown area of Asheville, it was fun getting back on the hwy though with the short, uphill entrance ramp right into a lane of traffic. My GPS, Emma, (cuz she has an english accent and reminds me of the charecter Emma Peel from the 60's show, 'The Avengers'), said I was 'there' before I was even close of course. Fortunately I knew the RV park was right on the river so I just went down the road a little farther until I found it. Kind of a neat little place, only one line of camping sites and those all back right up to the 'French Broad River'. Indeed my bumper is actually sticking out over the bank a couple of feet, very pretty though with a couple of ducks and geese to keep me company.

   Got all backed in okay, I'm getting much better at that these days, and unhooked and got all settled in. Essentially just a reversal of everything I did this morning. Took a little time to get my HW valve installed. A little Teflon tape, a big wrench and only a little cussing saw it all back in place and the gas turned back on. Time for a shower!

   Spent the remainder of the afternoon just goofing off. I'm finishing up a book my friends in Colorado gave me. It's 'The Journals of Patrick Gass', one of the men along on the Lewis and Clark expedition. Really a fascinating read for someone like me, but I can't help but wish I could of been along on that journey.... Also spent some more time working on the computer and getting it back up to speed. One problem I had was that all of the 'Playlists' I'd put together for my iPod were no longer on iTunes, nor were they available on my back up disk, or at least if they were, I didn't know where or how to access them. The one place they still were however was on my iPod, but how to get them back onto my computer since 'Apple' seems to think we shouldn't be able to manipulate any of our own music in any way except the way they allow. So I went online..... no problem finding some free shareware out there to do the job, and even some Youtube videos to walk you through the whole process. So that is done, now I just need to deal with all of the duplicated songs that I have inadvertently copied onto iTunes. That task is going to take a couple of days I'm afraid.

    Hope to be out and about tomorrow. Not sure what is in the area to look at other than the Biltmore Mansion of course. Will do that one of the days I'm here, but probably not until Monday or Tuesday. I think I'll go in and explore the down town area tomorrow. Maybe check on line and see if there is any good music or a play to go to and of course I need to check and see if there is any dancing to do here this week. Even retired it seems like there is way to much to do and to little time in which to do it. Still beats working though.