Greetings from Iowa!
We hope everyone is doing well. We returned from our "Gulf Coast and SW USA" trip on 15 April, a bit sooner than originally planned. I apparently developed a 'synovial cyst' on my lower spine and it reared it's ugly head while we were at Roswell New Mexico around the later part of February. Long story short, I held out until Los Angeles until I threw in the towel and we pulled the plug on our stay there and the remainder of the trip. I could barely walk across room in the RV because of the unbearable nerve pain associated with the cyst. So we 'beat feet' home early and went to the doctor right away. Within two weeks I had an MRI and had surgery, walking out of the hospital that afternoon on my own power, and was home in my recliner at 2:00 that afternoon! Recovery went very well and so my back is fixed up and Doreen's was fixed up last year. We are both now doing great, back to the gym almost every day and ready to hit the road again, hence the new blog! We plan to spend the winter here in Ankeny this year so we can enjoy our new home at Christmas with our family, but planning for our 2020 adventure is well underway. Soon the RV will be tucked away in indoor storage for the winter.
We basically have the southeast and east coast yet to visit - Delaware, Maryland, DC, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. So we are planning to pull the RV out of storage on 15 April 2020 and we will take it directly to Cherry Glen campground as they open that day. That will give us a few days to get it stocked and prepped, and we will depart on 20 April 2020 following this route:
Here is a map of our previous journeys and the states we have visited with our RV:
At the conclusion of the 2020 trip we will have visited 49 out of 50 States in an RV (we rented one in Alaska). As in the past, we will be able to reconnect with several Air Force and Air National Guard comrades, friends and relatives along the way and continue to visit some more Major League baseball stadiums as well. We also really enjoy exploring the historic battlefields and National Parks along the way. This trip will include the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Florida Keys, the East Coast beaches and over two weeks at Washington DC. We will see daughter Jennifer and her crew in Michigan and the Mackinac and Upper Peninsula areas of Michigan. We will again, for the four straight year, camp in Antigo WI and fish with our Air Force buddy Greg Noskowiak and his wife Diane and then down to Caledonia WI to camp with daughter Michelle and their camping group on 'Parent's Weekend'. Most of the reservations are complete already and again, many of the campgrounds are on military facilities.
Our intent like in the past is to update the blog nightly once we get on the road. Please bookmark this site and "stay tuned" as we prepare to head out on our Southeast and East Coast Trip 2020. http://schellhasetravels2020.blogspot.com On the main page you can sign up to be notified via Twitter and email too.
We hope everyone has a safe winter and we may update this site again if anything significant changes before we depart.
