Author: Mary-Ann Knight

Today Pharr, TX.  This will be our first 30 day stay at a resort, Tropic Star

And we’re in Pharr!

Now at the resort.  They drive us around in a golf cart to find the site we like best. This is it!  B2 (puppy in the window) approved.  Sun and palm trees.  There is so much to do here.Allan is happy!  Has several amber beers to sample.

Travel day! Bye bye Cajun Palms and the cold hot tub.  Didn’t get to hot tub last night, unlike what I predicted, it was too cold.

Today’s destination – Camp Walmart in Victoria, TX 

We know we are on the correct route when the highway narrows and there is no shoulder

Hum, Best Hookers in town

The photos do not depict the height of this bridge.

We cross into Texas at 1140a.  We rarely get the Welcome to sign.  Got it now! Picture 2 & 3 are behind the welcome info centre.

Houston off in the distance.  Sure hope we don’t make a wrong turn and end up downtown.We avert downtown, ya! Head  towards Victoria. Traffic has been real good but what’s a trip without,cars cars cars!We make it to Walmart get our supplies.  What a deal on eggsThis is what we learned at Walmart today  Back to Bailey to unload. We are pretty excited to call our kids.  They live in Victoria, BC   We are anxious to say “We’re at the Walmart in Victoria, do you want to join us?”  We don’t fool Kyle but we got Megan (a bit)!

Chinese for dinner then off to bed…

 

Thursday all day:  Rain, rain, rain.  There is no drainage, big puddles are everywhere.  Still no hot tub 🙁   We amuse ourselves with games of crib and even workout in the gym!

  Rain but then… what’s that about 1pm? A few more showers then about 4 it starts to dry up.

We check out the hot tub, YES the heater is on.  We resort to self-help and up the hot tub temperature.  We are hot tubing tonight!!

Saturday & Sunday!! What a difference a day makes!  The sun is out and although windy we much prefer this weather.  Yes we get to hot tub.  We leave tomorrow morning.

Resort photos.  First on is the famous hot tub!

And the work out kids!

Raining.  Raining, raining – unlike any rain I’ve ever seen.  Our weather apps predict the rain will stop.  Rain, rain, rain. No hot tub, cold again.

Here comes 2020!!

Hope you all had a great New Year’s Eve and 2020 will be the best yet!!

 

We’re intent on a quiet day including a hot tub session or 2, see a trend?  Still cold!  BurrrrrWe’ve complained so often likely no point in continuing.  But wait what happens at noon???Now we really feel old but what the heck! Off we goIt has been so long since we’ve played we were impressed with the new fangled cards This is mine for the washout round.  Didn’t win this either.

Cajun Palms is having a gala tonight- you have to buy a table we think we are more

For those of you hosting remember

We did but our gorgeous kids didn’t We have no idea what this is yet or the magnitude that will come  – today, China alerted WHO to several cases of unusual pneumonia in Wuhan, a port city of 11 million people in the central Hubei province. The virus was unknown and becomes knows as Coronavirus COVID 19.

Travel day, New Orleans to Henderson, Cajun Palms RV Resort

Under the overpass as we are reveals NOLA‘s tent cityCemeteries are big here, we see this one leaving

 

 

Some more sights..

This was one of our shortest trips from one place to the next, 2 hour ish and it is the largest park we’ve been in with 450 spots.

Cajun Palms appears to be emulating Caribbean resorts.  We get a wrist bracelet we can use to charge food, drinks, etc.  There are several really nice pools – not open now but still nice.  A HOT TUB that we ensure is open prior to booking here.  A hot tub is on my must have list. Taking  photos not so much so on hot tub photo yet.

 

 

 

 

What! The hot tub is not working!! Many trips to the front office and yet it is still not working.  We are pissed, this  is not a stress free zone  

Complain a little more and we’ll see how warm it is tomorrow.  Night all!

We would have never thought 25 years later we would be living our dream mostly because we didn’t know this would be our dream 🙂  Looking back it’s astounding how things change.  I shall spare you and move on… Spent the day wandering around, these make us feel safe

 Some of the sites, I love NOLA!

Every province/state has some strange laws.  Louisiana’s, IMO, is if there are 2 or more people buying a bottle of hooch everyone must present ID and be over 21.  If you are flying solo, then only you must be over 21.  Logic??? I don’t know.

We search for a great 25th dinner restaurant and settle on Italian Barrel It does not disappoint.  My dinner, Pesto Scampi (love the lemon condom), Allan’s Chicken Parm

​Mossy on back and encounter another street musician.  These kids are talented, STOMP originals..

We see this catastrophe on all our outings, this time we walk closer to it, what happened here?  Hard Rock New Orleans, sad story!

We head back to the RV park.  Last night here, Bailey is sleeping

Travel day tomorrow.

We leave today for #nola.  This was a day trip on the only cruise we ever took, we loved it and have wanted to return.  Allan is anxious to have a hurricane  We plan to leave about 10, drive today about 3h.

Against my better judgement, we go back tot he casino and our favourite machines.  I’m convinced today is a refund our $20/ea and head out.

There is a guy using Allan’s machine so we do a lap of the casino.  Come back he’s gone.  Plunk ourselves down. I’m down to $10 and win $40; 751aI don’t have the opportunity to savor my win when Allan’s machine goes nuts!

Just keeps going! Woohoo!!

Jack pot!!  The attendants rush over!  We are in heaven.  Win $1,267!  Do we want them to withhold the required taxes?  No thank you!  It’s not long until they are back.  YES they are withholding as we are Canadians.  30% or $380. bitch is – if the jack pot was $1,200 or under no taxes are withheld.  We can claim back.  Happy Santa aka Allan!!Spin again as we await the long process of collecting and bam, another $100Full look at the winning machine!!!This was a pretty, amazing Christmas morning.

Sad to say good bye to Wind Creek Casino.

On the road at 1030a.  Later than we wanted to so much richer!!

We leave using Knight St:)

Photos do not give the scenery justice.

We arrive at French Quarter RV Resort about 3p and get set up.We tour around a bit…

Little police car to keep us safe!

Walking the streets, drinking the drinks!

A hanging around local!More sights

Wish you all the best Christmas!

Rise and shine and indulge in a coffee with Bailey’s in Bailey.   Such fun to laze.

We walk to the casino and look around for a slot machine that is calling our names.  When we were in Las Vegas we liked the “Wheel of Fortune” machines.  We find the 25 cent ones and start playing.  We are such big gamblers we each do $20/day.

Wow 948a and we up!  Cash out$52.50

Hand out $20 to each of us and keep playing.  951a win another $62.50.  This time on the $ machine.

This can’t be happening, we are not that lucky!  We’d better quit while we are ahead. Back to Bailey we go.  Chill a bit then walk the outside grounds.

As we are up we decide to gamble another $20 each.  316p just can’t believe our luck.

We saunter around a bit and decide to go back for a bevvy and dinner.   As Allan says the @TraegerGrills smoking never gets old

Having gravy with our dinner but still no can opener.  Perhaps Santa will one!

After dinner we pop back to the casino.  Select our now favourite $1 Wheel of Fortune machines,  this can’t be happening! Win again 637p  $100702p more wins!!!

We’ve paid for our stay here with the wins.  Can’t believe our good fortune.

Side story:  Yesterday when we were grocery shopping we selected from some meat – Allan picked up a package priced at 9 something.  I see one for $8.88 and start to walk away but then turned back and told Allan we must purchase that one for good luck. 

8 (八, BĀ) – LUCKY:  8 is the luckiest number in Chinese culture because 八 sounds like 發 (fa), which means “wealth”, “fortune”, and “prosper” in Chinese. Multiples of eight are even better, as 88 bears a resemblance to 囍 (shuāng xǐ), or “double happiness”. While the Chinese will go to great lengths to avoid 4 in daily life, they will try to incorporate 8 wherever they can. In the Beijing summer Olympics, the opening ceremony began at 8:08 pm on 8/8/08. Since the number 8 is believed to bring good luck, many airlines in Chinese-speaking countries will use combinations of 8 as flight numbers.

I think the 8s coupled with Mom, who loved to gamble, watching over us paid off.  LOL

Back to Bailey for the night.

Go pick up Bailey day!

This is our maybe itinerary

We’re up at 215a, OK only me is up, to get ready to go to the airport to fly to Atlanta at 615a.  Yes I’m crazy to be up so early but that’s me. We’re excited to use our Nexus cards for the first time.

Nexus is the way to go!  Line ups were crazy long even at this ungodly hour but we breezed though.  Should have got one years ago.  We hoped Delta would leave on time but that didn’t happen.  Wasn’t too late, we opted to not catch our connecting flight from Atlanta to Columbus Ubering it instead as it was quicker.

We arrived at CoachCraft at 1030a.  Bailey had her annual service done and mechanical stuff that was neglected.  Service invoices  areWe treated Bailey to a hand wash and wax, including the roof.  She is beautiful!  But of course, it’s raining!  They had parked her in a shelter so at least we started off dry.

Today’s adventures takes us first to buy groceries then on to a 2 night stay at Wind Creek Casino RV Park in Atmore, AL  We arrived at 330p (gained/lost an hour) got set up or at least the slides out and stuff put away.

We think we’ll head to the casino for dinner. We encounter Santa who wishes to disclose my Christmas presents. Having none of that…Proceed to dinner. $20 for the buffet! What happened to inexpensive buffets? The killer was no wine!

Headed back to Bailey for a delicious dinner prepared by Chef Allan, neglected to take a photo 🙁

Long day so, shortly off to bed  Night all.