lucy's big adventure


I have posted before, but not for a long while.
Myself and the wife have been traveling around the states, looking for somewhere to settle down and start a family. She had been living in Boston MA for the last 14 years, and I am not a fan of snow, so we decided to take a year or so off, have a road trip and find somewhere to call home. I needed to be near to the cost, she wants hills, i want hot, she wants cool. I don't feel humidity, she hates it, so we have our work cut out for us finding this magical place...:)

The trip was originally supposed to take 3 months coast to coast and be done, that was Dana's {the boss} idea. I said 6 months, and when she wanted to argue I said 9 months. Her 3 and my 6, we are, now blowing that one too, and have decided to make a year of it. :)

so here is lucy's big adventure
 
this is how we bought Lucy

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a few short weeks later she looks like this

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we are planning on driving Lucy all the way south to Florida, then all the way west to California

taking in as much of the US as we can, between 3 and 6 months, I'm hoping on 6 months, mrs rubbachicken thinks 3 months

we'll be updating this thread from time to time {when we have interweb access}

we were hoping to leave on the 1st of November, that didn't quite work out :roll: then tomorrow, it's now looking like the weekend

our first stop will be new york, then DC ,Virginia and North Carolina for thanksgiving with family.

we've got some fun things to do on the way round, some scuba diving, snorkeling with manatee's in Florida, the Kennedy space center

if there's something cool in your area that you can recommend to a traveler, please feel free to let us know, or if you are on our rout and want to meet up with us or can offer us a shower... that would also be very welcome.
 
After a very late start on our trip, we met up with the Send-off party people in Srewsbury, Lucy's Send off PARTY!


You were ALL so COOL.



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We were sure we would be there with one or two people, and that would have been fine, but the turn-out was overwhemingly wonderful.
You guys were SO nice and even though we were so so so late for our own send-off party, you were there with hot cider, hot chowda, pizza and a baby, (so cute!) waiting for us, and most importantly, waiting for us with a smile THANK-YOU!!!



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Then there was Dale who saved our day with an old starter from his stash... ONLY in circles like this, can one turn up with a dead starter, and someone say: ''I have one in my house I can give you''... I mean, REALLY??? You Crazy Crazy WONDERFUL people!


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can you tell which one is the new one ?

So THANK-YOU, THANK-YOU, and once again, THANK-YOU!!! to you ALL!!!

And with that, we made it to Chester NY.

and took a senic ride up to Bear mountain.


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--
Dana Crake
 
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lucy made it to DC Very Happy
we had a stop over at the bus depot, this morning as the fuel pump is louder than the engine Laughing and i don't really want the tailgate dropping on my head, so we bought a new pair of struts, an uneventful drive thankfully, she gets the day off tomorrow while we go and see what's to see in DC

we are in richmond virginia, on the way south we stopped off at the bus depot for some bits

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a day in DC

we went to see the prez, he was in hawaii

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there's not a lot of reflecting going on in the pool, wait a minute no pool only mud

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i found kilroy around the memorial

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we had 2 and a bit days on aleric's ramp getting a few more bugs out

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a stop at the air and space museam, a quick flight

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looking for a new motor for lucy, which one

merlin
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radial
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maybe a bigger radial
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then there was this funky motor
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finally something very BIG flew by

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monday morning we are off to see the blue ridge mountains, headed for charlotte north carolina
 
our way to north carolina was along the lue ridge parkway, some steep hills
and some nice views, shame about the pictures

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we over nighted in one of the over looks

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our first meal in lucy, tasted a LOT nicer than it looks,, pasta

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we went off roading, "gods foot print" in burkes garden, lucy got very very very dirty :lol: it was a scarey drive muddy, slippery and a narrow track with steep sides down hill
only video of that, and i don't know how to shrink the clips :(

discovery place kids was a blast, i got to ride in a nas car :wink:

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flew my first plane :lol: and crashed it into a window :D

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and the kids had a good time too

we are headed out that way again, we were in a rush, so i hope we can see more before we head to aikin south carolina to see friends
 
we are in ashville north carolina, awaiting the opening at 11am of 12 bones {a bbq and ribs place} we missed them by 20 minutes yesterday, then we are heading for the smokey mountains, in the hope that the roads are open, much of the sourthern blueridge parkway is now closed :(
wehad a look at blowing rock the other day, there was so much snow falling we couldn't see it, an that was standing right next to it
last night was the coldest yet 28°f, we woke up with ice inside
now the sun is up it's warmer
 
yesterday we went hauling hay, 6 bales and 3 big bags of horse feed

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after that we thought we'd found the perfect wheel, looks like quite a bit of clearancing would be needed, 12" x 26" multifit rims, a bit more bling that we can cope with

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this was the fellah that needed the hay

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our last night in savanah was in saint simons sound, a beach front capsite
we left savannah and headed south finally into florida, our first night was in amelia island, another beach front campsite

this was on the beach, i like shells, so it's now tied to the roof

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next time we hit the beach was at st augustines, we have been around to many of the beaches here, did the wine tour {mrs rubbachicken can't handle her wine} so she was a bit worse for wear

we went fishing, a first for us both, actually catching a fish that is

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we are currently camped outside the hampton inn, in fernadina beach, they are kindly letting us use their wifi
we will be here until monday, the beach is too nice, and there's probably not much else to do over the holidays, so it'll be swimming and fishing for me on christmas day
i hope we can catch our christmas dinner or we'll just eat the bait
 
happy holidays to all from us chickens


our christmas dinner was this

all day out on the pier and this is all we caught

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it was yummy
from st augustine, we headed down to daytona, and met samba member and his family, very nice people
they put up with us chickens for a while
while we were there, we took time to go to the beach
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we also went to the reptile center at deland florida
and got to meet some of the locals, this is an albino ball python

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and a four year old gaitor named Sasha

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more fishing, more food

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we also went to the daytona race track
to see the practicing for the 50th rolex 24 hour race at the end of the month, and saw these

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then walked through the pit lane to see the pro's at work

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if only vanagons came apart so easily

then another fishing trip, not so successful we only caught this blow fish, and a small bait fish {both went back}

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after leaving the daytona area we went to titusville, we found a nice place to overnight under a bridge

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astronaut jon mcbride met us

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one day at the space center is not enough, if you go upgrade your tickets, $13 a head for the year, we've already gotten our monies worth
there's a military rocket launch on the 19th on january, so we will go back to watch

next we went wildlife spotting, these things are HUGE

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we went back to the kenedy space center, i like that place a lot
we met with 3 astronauts now, they all have very different, but interesting things to say about space flight

we had a lot of fun at the rolex 24 hour race, thank you steve
some of the previous winners

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i love the audi's

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back down the coast, we spent the day walking around down town miami, we found the miami ink studio, they were very friendly, chatted to us about our tattoos, alas we could not afford for them to tattoo us


the trees are something like i have never seen before

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we went to the everglades yesterday, those airboats don't do migraines a lot of good

the locals seemed friendly enough

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some were in for a bit of dental work

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