Jan 27, 2015 On the Road

Yesterday we spent 4 hours on the road to this new location on the Panhandle of Florida.  A good part of that 4 hours was a two lane road through the swamp (another one). Our Garmin GPS always suggests the highway. We like traveling the back roads, even in the Lark.  We get a lot of "recalculating".

It's not that we don't love the Garmin, we do.  Great in traffic and six lane highway ramps.  For us, there is nothing like the open road with little traffic as possible.  There is another strange but friendly tradition among RV'ers.  It turns out you need to consider waving to every motor home/trailer driver  coming the opposite way on a two-laner. I guess a sort of brotherhood (or sisterhood, lots of women drivers)  road warrior thing. It was so desolate yesterday on our route the Fed Ex driver even waved to us.  It's a rather nice human  interaction with strangers. Quick but nice.

We are getting our sea legs... can't drive 45MPH because we have a "harmonic" tone that makes you crazy.  Seems this isn't unusual when you are blasting through the atmosphere in a rolling bread truck. (So far impossible to find the source)

Can't go 70MPH because you are topping out with no extra speed for passing.

So we go 60MPH and that seems slow until you are in the cab with 14,000 lbs attached to you.  Seems like you are flying!  Best gas mileage is probably 55MPH, but Ed just can't hold her down to that. Have to remember for the last 50 years, starting with a 1967 GTO  455 8-cylinder 4 Speed on the floor...Ed has not been passed on the road, he does the passing.  A new world out there for him and he's doing great.

Mellowing a bit???

*****

Merlin   Bird Variet

Back to Garmin: on the lonely road yesterday we had to entertain ourselves. I have a habit of naming things near and dear. So..what shall we call our Garmin?  Needed to be a bird, of course.  But I like a double meaning.  So, after many miles we came up with "Merlin"  a fast and sleek falcon and a magician.   In the Lark we are fast and sleek in our own minds and we believe Merlin is rather magical, with it's uncanny road information.  I'll spare my readers how we got "sullmates" on another road trip to Virginia in 1995.