A Busy Weekend

We spent the weekend helping Jeni get ready for her move. On Friday Linda boxed and boxed. On Saturday she had another garage sale, and then John took the leftovers to the Goodwill. Jeni can barely get her car in the garage with all of the boxes.

On Saturdays in Pendleton there's a farmer's market with local produce, baked items, flowers, and home made crafts. We were late getting there this week so a lot of the booths were gone, but John was still able to get some cookies.

The market is located on the "square" where there's a building dating back to 1880. It was the city hall, but it's to small for that (government has a way of growing over the years), so now it's a restaurant.

There's some good stores and restaurants around the square, including antiques, handmade items, coffee shops, and bakeries. It's a nice place to spend an hour or two, and it's walking distance from Jeni's house.

Back at the campground, it was very active. The campground was full, and the lake was busy with boats and jet ski's. There was a lot of families, and everyone was having a good time even though the high was 93!

Pontoon, or party boats, are very popular down here. They hold a lot of people, and you can swim, dive, fish or party on them. Some even have BBQs on them for cooking.

On Sunday Linda & I went to Greenville for a shopping expedition. There's a nice mall with Dillards, Macys, Pennys, & Belk, a local department store. We didn't buy much, but John got some nice wine glasses at Coldwater Creek. They have a school of tiny fish in the side of the glass. We had a nice Mexican dinner at a restaurant called Don Pablos. Even in the south they have good fresh southwest food. It doesn't measure up to CA or AZ, but it was good after a long dry spell.

So that was our weekend. More later.

Time Is Passing Quickly

Here it is already Thursday, and it seems like we just got here. We're very comfortable in our new campground and we're enjoying relaxing by the lake. The weather been a little warm to spend much time outside, but we're hoping we'll get use to the humidity.

Linda has spent a lot of time starting the packing. It's hard to know what exactly to pack before everyone gets here, but she's doing her normal great job. The garage is starting to fill up with boxes, but there's still room for Jeni's car. So we have a long ways to go.

We've done a little shopping, but Linda is still looking for the right outfit. Jeni is making out well though as Linda finds new clothes for her. John been cooking most of the meals, but tonight we went out to Ruby Tuesday's for some great hamburgers.

So that's about it, not much exciting but we're really enjoying it. We know it'll start getting hectic next week. So stay tuned for more stories.

In case you're interested in John's iPhone, he's been adding apps like crazy. The iPhone is part phone, part computer. And you can go to the Apple Apps Store to get some amazing software. He'll highlight some during the coming posts in the blog. This time we'll feature Pandora, which is an Internet radio station that you program with your favorite artists or type of music. John picked Frank Sinatra (naturally), Glenn Miller, Michael Buble, and the Boston Pops. He can choose any artist, or choose a random mix of all of them, and the phone will play just those artists. It's pretty neat, but the iPhone needs earphones to get the best sound. But it does use the battery quite a bit. You can also listen to Pandora on your computer with access to the Internet. More next time.

We Move MoHo to a New Campground

Our week was finally up at the Anderson KOA. Here's a picture of our site, and as you can tell it's mostly rocks. What you can't tell is the bad slope towards the left. We were more than ready to relocate. The owners were real nice, but it wasn't a good fit for our needs with Pearl.

We decided to move to Twin Lakes Campground on Lake Hartwell. It's another Corp of Engineers(COE) facility with 50 amp electricity, good for the air conditioners, and water hookups. We don't have a sewer hookup, but there's bathrooms with showers & a dump station. Here's a picture of our new site, #95.

As you can see, it's very wide and has a sand base. Pearl loves it, and there's grass on the front of it. We're all very happy. We're about 5 miles away from Jeni, and Clemson. We'll be here until August 1, when we get ready to go to the Smokey Mountain National Park. This next picture is the view from our passenger side windows. We also have a view of the lake out the front window.

The campground is only about 1/3 full, but this weekend its sold out. So our views will be partially blocked by new campers in the vacant sites right on the lake. This is one of the problems with a 100% reservation system at a campground. Here there are not any first come first serve sites. The sites can all be reserved. So the locals reserve the best sites right on the lake on the weekends, but during the week there's tons of open sites. But if you want to stay for 1-2 weeks, your choices are very few and they're in the worst areas. We believe there should always be some first come sites available for travelers to use for extended stays. The fees here are $20, or $10 with an access pass. Very reasonable.

John walked down to the lake shore at sunset to get a picture of Lake Hartwell.

Lake Hartwell is huge, with part of it in GA, and most of it in SC. Clemson is right on the shore of the lake West of our location. And I-85 crosses the lake and has bridges over the different channels. Here's a link to maps of the Lake.

The weather has been pretty good, mid 80s with about 60% humidity. But it's supposed to get warmer towards the end of the week, with thunder storms. Hopefully they won't bother us or Pearl to much. We're much happier here at Twin Lakes.