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HITHER & YON

Mar 10 - Apr 03 2023

@rondalarue

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2464 Rose Hill Rd, Marietta, NY 13110, USA

Mar 10 2023

….AND THEY’RE. OFF!! (2 rather messy videos at the start :)

STUCK in the “snudice” (snow mud and ice) right from the get-go out of the barn - IN MARCH!

looks just like the entire last 5 months here this year

Ready to set off we go! \240The Frogmires (one seen here) have traveled with us for over 15 years…. They may have their own book coming out shortly…

DAY 1: 10hrs driving landed us just north of Richmond VA - we failed to anticipate 4 hrs to go 100 miles around Washington DC on a Friday afternoon (…in the rain ofcourse). We’re already in significant tree blooming spring.

@rondalarue

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Mar 11 2023

Back roads through southern VA and into NC. Trees in full flowering. Swamplands pretty dank awesome. Headed for sea side estuary overnight spot.

Dreweryville VA

Dreweryville - The truck IS the Post Office in this little old once upon a time railway town.

- a lil ol southern country comfirt on the back roads

lov’n the bogs. \240no gators….yet

@rondalarue

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Mar 16 2023

SUN! (NY covered in snow and we’re in the bright!)

found evidence of mermaid on Tybee Island; Savahnna GA

the swamps and waterways are fascinating me — “can you say ‘metaphor’?”

savannah GA, where you take your cocktails out onto the streets (or your car) in open containers - whoa!

@rondalarue

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Mar 17 2023

POST TITLE (from the country song): “I like (my) women a little o n the trashy side”🤔

OK - Panama City FL - and, well, we’re starting to ‘get’ (as in “get woke” to)

a) Rv Park USA Culture;

b) Florida, as an anomaly in the US of A; and

c) a weirdness that only comes after breaking free from your parents (again) at age 66 and facing their final departure

….From these coalescing factors - combined with a Southern version of the cocktail: The \240Manhattan, which we had privy to purchase from an old brick bar in Savahhna Georgia, and take out into the streets in an open glass \240(gotta be kidding me) - yet, a drink so good, it was repeated tonight from our own newly purchased stock of bourbon, grand marnier, amaretto and cigarette lighter burnt orange peel right here \240in our own new-old 2019 Thor Winds 31’ RV) — comes to you tonight: “

Trailer Trash: The Playlist” (a primer)

[NOTE: Not sure if/how I can share the playlist we started tonight after 2-stepping (sort of) in our (I’m guessing here) 3sqft RV “living room” …BUT this libation all started with the aforementioned coelesense of said drink, in said State of Fl, in said RV “resort park”🤔 … and my immediate obvious connection to the TOTALLY Not politically correct phrase “trailer trash” …. which (ofcourse) brought to mind the infamous country western song “I like women. little on the trashy side” (talk about “UNwoke”)

…And there, my perverse self entertainment this eve which I share now with you. (you’re very welcome …Or, I’m very sorry. \240Take whichever applies)

Title song on my new Apple Playlist “Trashy Side”… (open to qualified additions “y’all”…

https://youtu.be/NVUGCdTVpug

Panama City, FL

RV “Resort” Trashing it

Yep - So Chevy Chase

so this is not the best reflection of the rather surprising “fashion trend” we encountered of girls of all shape and size wearing string thongs (AKA “butt floss”) OUT ON COMMERCIAL STREETS just walking around town. …i admit to having been too initially taken aback to snap a good photo of the 20 or so walking like this along city streets. Are you kidding me?? (no, I’m afraid I am not)

(I add this per above (not representative) photo. : \240. …Still not sure yet what I make of this string thongs wearing out in the streets: i.e., a startling new sense of personal freedom?… or the same ole need to garner a man’s attention with sex…. or both…. doesn’t feel very wise nor equal from this seat.

@rondalarue

1 LIKE

@#Tie LOL!

Mar 17 2023

Wellllll now, here in Panama City FL, we managed to find: both a crazy Florida spring break college “Thong butt” beach town - AND - a very magical more desolate ocean side surf …and \240two only 2 miles apart. photos below mainly from the State park where we spent the afternoon today (including the Alligator Lake swamp walk with those beautiful moss covered trees….

The video of the guy (below) \240on the kite sail was out there for hours- full on - and hydro-plane mostly a good foot above the water ….making the (very good) surfers look like child’s play (or consider our lake alien skiing behind a boat! — this high seas sail is wild by any comparison

Photo replaced Video For booklet

steak on \240arugula back at our \240RV home after State Park beach day

@rondalarue

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@#Tie Looks like stormy skies-beautiful. Not going native? Enjoy everything you two.

4458 Luke Ave, Destin, FL 32541, USA

Mar 18 2023

Lunch stop and beachwear shop at Crystal Sands Beach heading west. Stopped here for salmon salad lunch with toes in the sand. Gorgeous area. Open beaches. Lovely homes for those who like townhouse style living. Heading toward a friend’s place for the night and a boat ride into the deep south swamps with them tomorrow! (“lions and tigers and bears, oh my?’ UHHHH \240how about “gators and pythons and chiggers, oh shit!”

@rondalarue

Mar 19 2023

Wonderful eve and day out in the bayou with 2 former SoulArts clients and dear friends, just outside New Orleans. \240THANK YOU dear “MyAmy” and Adam. What a blessed reunion❤️❤️

So we nixed touring old town New Orleans in favor of this much more personal, \240much more magical and much more eternal time in nature with dear friends at their home and nature paradise. \240Definitely the wiser choice!

Hope you’ll enjoy these little captures….

Been fascinated since Virginia with the swamplands — today we got close and personal with “the cyprus people”

houses afloat in the bayou …only reached by boat

water moccasins hand out if the trees (no friggn lie!)

At the dock of 60,000 acres of bayou back waters

Dear friend Adam - Mississippi Tug boat pilot with his wife Any taking us to their fav local digs

heading into the back waters…

Definitely gators down under

“supposed to be” in the 80’s with the all the “gators and water moccasins, and skeeters (oh,my!) out… BUT it’s \240this years NY “winter” done here today: mid 40’s and not a nasty critter willing to join us… so be it!

VIDEO

well done Captain - not a limb lost nor an eye poked

That’s ONE “plate” of heads still on shrimp! good God can these guys eat the cajun….

@rondalarue

Mar 21 2023

Getting Testy today. 6 days no shower. lots of traffic jams and, highway accidents and mis-moves. Matt grumpy. dogs bored. Cat depressed. Ronda? Riding on the rim of “done”

We did take one more swamp ride — this one today was a commercial airboat tour and we had paid for it before we hooked up with our dear friends yesterday—- $230 non refundable was already spent so we went. (Photos attached).

Our private trip with our friends yesterday was much more beautiful \240…but this one today cost us so much trucking irritation (after rush hour in New Orleans abd then getting stuck on a wrong turn in the deep woods pullung 55feet, no way to turn around and towing our convertible on a friggn trolley that wouldn’t cooperate \240- then missing the morning tour and Matt fried by the time we arrived 10 minutes after the tour took off with 3 hours to wait the noon one …well, you get the idea… We dug in and did it. (Photos attached)

….As for the travel fatigue…. it’s been 8 days on the road in the friggn COLD in the deep south IN \240March! even the FL beaches required sweats. Insane but so. We’re still wearing down jackets while petting a frigg’n baby alligator in a deep south swamp!

…Next stop: Helotes TX where my parents moved just after I was in college and my baby sister was in kindergarten…. SO! We will be stopping and hanging with my baby sister Krista, youngest brother Brent and my awesome neice, Rachel….. and I dare say, with utter confidence, that the “Ackles family fun” (aka projects) we will create while there WILL BE THE REDEEMING value of this entire cross country journey in search of our new homestead…. Stay tuned!….

…I will say this: our airboat alligator tour captain was a total kamikaze comic on steroids - the deep south spring ride may have been un heard of freezing…but it was also wildly great.

VIDEO - deleted for booklet

smaller of the 5 or so we saw on this frigid day

matt with his new bud

great bridges in LA

One of “a gazillion” Louisanna bayou’s we’ve passed by on the major interstate

Kato “hunting” on the dash

Not going to even show a photo of myself or Matt tonight. \240Not pretty…

STAY TUNED for San Antone TX….

@rondalarue

Mar 23 2023

ARRIVAL SAN ANTONIO: Home to my brother Brent and wife Linda; my sister Krista, and niece Rachel & with her husband Jarod (and a whole lotta other folks we didn’t really come to see)

Today marks 2,560 miles since leaving Marietta NY 12 days ago.

So a bunch of photos — listen up cousins: This is just the start to what promises to be a deep dive into life out in the country here in the Lone Star State…

tiny homes built by the H.S. students then sold to help fund the schoos programl

students in a building work class

Video deleted- next, quick stop 10 miles down the road from Krista to where Brent leads the Labs for an emissions testing faciliity

testing facility grounds

Start toward Rachel’s ranch and Krista’s aadjacent country property in the TX Hill Country heading out from the Helotes house Krista bought from my parents and has restored

(Adapted from VIDEO)

OMG - riding in the ranger with Krista to her outback homestead property adjacent to Rachel …and where it’s now apparent that she took me REALLLLLL SERIOUSLY about doing “ a project ir two” while we’re here a couple days!!!….

Tomorrow it appears that Matt and I have 5 acres and a good months worth of 9 hour days of dead trees and brush to cut, haul, stack —- um, this should make up for 2 weeks of driving and no exercise…..

Along with this, I imagine there will be guitar singing, boot stomping, dinners at old dance halls, a good deal of beer drunk, along with some old family memories shared …and best: some new ones made. \240

It’s great to be with my youngest siblings here in TX where my parents moved and lived 20 some \240years before moving back to NY for their final chapter.

y’all Stay tuned now, y’hear? ❤️ Did I mention the dwarf cows to herd; the pigs to feed; the quail to cook; the skeet to shoot; the bunk house to party at?…. Here we go. We are in TEXAS!

@rondalarue

Mar 23 2023

Day 1: TEXAS HILL COUNTRY - our RV parked beside the dwarf cows, pigs, quail, chickens, large farm equipment, 2 dogs and a pile of cats at Rachel & Jarod’s ranch.

First things first: Martine’s for “The Monster”..

Totally amazing (just exactly as described)

the “restaurant” (seriously)

side gate to indoor seating and outdoor bbq party spot

this side door enters into the “seated dining”…(see video below)

outdoor bbq party area

what? no beer? and where’s Willy Walon and the boys?

ERIK Glass - for your schoool mate…

VIDEO deleted for booklet)

And just to bring you into the seated dining, this video.

The MINI monster

It was terrific pre outdoor work fare… What’s next?….

OK - on to —- ah, of course — \240brush clearing at Krista’s mini ranch adjacent to Rachel and Jarod \240- just Matt and me on 4 \240hours of good physical labor after 2 weeks sitting on our butts driving all day— Oh and accompanied by our new fav “junk yard dog Reba” wiith her jaw fav (something) bone (not looking too closely on that…)

AND YES! This is me weildibg a chain saw…. “when in Rome (err the Texas Hill Country) as they say….

don’t ask no questions here…just walk on by…

Familiar Brent sight

dog cool off with Brent and his new pup Emma

City lap dog meets country cousin piglets

NO tell’n what tonight’s activity will bring — we’re scared…. Rachel Jarod abd Krista arriving back from their work day shortly…. (pray for us!)…

pull together dinner and drinks \240

lots of stories about culture, the world of teaching today, and living on the ranch

Rach in a animated story about a ghost bull and a kangaroo on their ranch.. (had to be there!).

their awesome long horn BBQ grill

my EMPTY drink

walking back to our RV for the night -

Tomorrow: Faux saloon door painting, more brush clearing, run up to Bandera for supplies and to see the gazillion Helks Angels storming through—- and who knows what else.

Really special time tonight with family I don’t get to see very often - precious actually.

@rondalarue

Mar 25 2023

RACHELS

Started today with early 7am breakfast with Krista at the historic cowboy town of Bandera. We ate at the 101 year old restaurant OST (standing for the Old Spanish Trail). It’s a VERY OLD TEXAN LOOKING town which we will likely visit yet this weekend…

Bandera TX

OST Restaurant: \240Was a bit surprised by the “art” hanging in the one women’s bathroom stall I visited (see below) ….Couldn’t help but wonder what they put in the men’s…

the one women’s bathroom stall I happened to visit (3 photo surround… . I mean, begs the question: what do they think I’m in here for?…

wall 2

wall 3

The rest of the day we spent at Rachel’s wallpapering…with 9 of us sharing Fajitas out under a canopy of trees that eve

Rachel and I hanging her cow wallpaper

…and the cows grazing at their front yard

Just says “Texas country eve” to me

@rondalarue

Mar 26 2023

Rache’sl and Krista’s tandem Ranch lands

Another big day at Krista’s: clearing trees, carting and burning brush. \240GOOD God, that woman (my little sister) is a maniac pilgrim-like, homestead-building worker!!! Unbelievable amount of very heavy duty land clearing, building, homesteading mostlily on her own from scratch. I am in awe…

Today started with breakfast in the woods at the old log cabin, followed by some very heavy duty trees knocked down; brush hauled and burned and then beers and Ronda pizzas over at Rachel’s with several other family and friends in the eve.

It’s been wonderful to have stepped into -and been a part of- their lives these past 4 days! And so hope we lended some step up help!!

Breakfast on Krista!s land just at the perimeter of Rachel’s land at the old cabin - just prior to a shitload of unbelievable tree downing; brush clearing/burning work today… Big worker breakfast fare: Jalapeño poppers, fried eggs, sausage and peppers, avocado, coffee.

one of probably 10 loads of brush we hauled to the burn pile in getting the long dirt drive ready for gravel.

trees knocked down and stumps taken up

Matt felling 2 dangerous trees over the old cabin

my one (and probably last) attempt at chain saw sculpture

Midday day tired break

THE Dog Whisperer

Rach with the pack of family dogs

Behind Rachel’s bunkhouse and between the garden

Back at Rachel’s bunk house for a much needed shower and to map out plans for setting the place up for a wedding here next weekend

@rondalarue

@#Chip_Mochel Ronda, I just came in for another travelog update. I thougt I love Krista and Rachel's property. LOL, does it say Texas or what! Makes me want to come for a visit. The first thing I thought when seeing these photos of Krista and Brent in Texas now was that they seem to have really embraced it. Put another way, I’d guess it would take something extraordinary to get them to leave the Lone Star state. Glad to see you and Matt are getting warmed up for tree work! 😂

Mar 27 2023

Oh gosh, it’s our last day here with my brother Brent and his wife Linda; \240my sister Krista; my niece Rachel and her husband Jarod and their friends.

I find it beautiful and rich and curious (and in some ways sadly hopeful) how spirit will sometimes offer her great gift of grace in these final moments together…

For me, tonight was such a gift… And here’s the catch: None of the real magic will ever be caught in any video, photo, poem or prose….

And so my only hope is that enough is implied here as to stir a sufficient curiousness of soul so that the great doorways of creative realization might sneak into our hearts and infuse our actions…

Jarod and Rachel heading to join us at the old cabin for cocktails and laughs (wee-she!)

our last night: the cabin in the woods

VIDEO (hard to see play button above)

last eve: cocktails in the woods

VIDEO replaced for booklet

fluffy backwoods sandals?

Says Rachel: “Comfortable cocktails at the cabin, with good company”

ummm \240“ranch slippers” emphasized!

Earlier dinner and walk with Brent and Linda…. and new family dog Emma

Brent Linda and newest family pup Emma

Linda with Emma in field of Texas springtime bluebonnets

Our journey: Finding/Sharing HOME all along the way…

@rondalarue

Mar 27 2023

DEPARTING our San Antonio Family…. Was a wonderful blessing!

Time to depart and head on west. \240Was a great 4 day stop

entrance to Rachel and Jarod’s farm

See this Linda- Brent?!

this big guy at the camel ranch a few doors up…

Turn at the Camel ranch for Rachel Jarod and Krista :)

Hill Country at departure today

Awwww Rach

We’re already miss’n y’all!❤️❤️

all back in our places…

Headed west into the desert from Bandera TX

—— OK after the first hour or so heading west we came to AT LEAST 3 Hours with no gas stations, no homes, no humans…. Fortunately Sharla and I ran into this 10 years ago — and even more fortunately, I REMENBERED, and so we had plenty of gas and water bottles to survive. \240Below is the first gas station after that long dry spell - it’s also called a town but that’s all that’s there is this one ancient gas station and equally ancient women who runs the pump. \240Then - no more gas again for a really good god long spell… 94 miles I do believe

Remember this Sharla? We didn’t know 10 years ago whether to laugh or cry when this station rolled into view (well on empty for the past 40 lonnnnggg minutes). We did know to hug the old woman at the pumps… She said “everyone does”

ummmm - a lot of this…,

our Mecca for the night - still not out of Texas and still a couple hours shy of El Paso. Everything is bigger in TX

@rondalarue

Mar 29 2023

On the road again…. (an experimental drive by video)

VIDEO - images extracted below for booklet)

El Paso (“I’ll pass”)

REALLY?

lone rider way out in the desert frontage road

the box cars all over the US have amazing graffiti art. wish I’d captured more

Pastatio tress I believe

trees arted

An enchanted find tonight in Dragoon AZ - Texas Canyon Horse Ranch RV …Here was the first real soulful remembering in a long time….

Texas Canyon

Magical Spirit place

We found our next Doorway earlier this am and then came upon this spontaneous ceremonial “following”…

1) old broken almost buried sign pointing to another sign and a doorway….

2) “this is how our (new next) story (life) begins…

We walked up and through the gate way to honor the sign….

emerging from the shadows

@rondalarue

Mar 31 2023

Stunning Magical Sedona, Arizona!

Blessed to be visiting dear friends who recently moved here and share in their new lives in Sedona. Much good conversation; outstanding healthy gourmet meals by Cyd; lovely wines; so much ease and acceptance and caring! \240Gratitude abounds….

And what a gorgeous sedona style home; spectacular views of Sedona’s famed red rock sculptural mountains; hiking trails — and, of course indigenous sacred grounds and healing vortexes that have famed Sedona with its gazillions of healers, artists, chrystal shops, and tourists.

Sedona is it’s own unique “mecca”…

view walking outside our friends, Cyd and Ralph’s home

our morning coffee on their front patio

sitting in “my” chair on their patio (oh, “this’ll DO II guess” 😉

view out their kitchen window as a storm comes in

Matt and Ralph having coffee while Cyd and I walk the dogs on the golf course

The Sedona AZ style art

Sedona is the Zenith of New Age

(note the Alien healer behind Matt - I’ll be \240watching him VERY CLOSELY tonight …from a safe distance)

The ultimate 3lb cinnamon roll

yep, chrystal healing at the Sedona art fare - what else?

I was treated to a 3-hour private healing session up here - wow

sunrise hike on our last mimorning

such treasured connections and blessings. \240thank you Cyd and Ralph!

sunrise hike and spontaneous marriage renewal ceremony

Our “new story” start

The spectacular Maya Ortiz pottery piece we bought to honor our next path

@rondalarue

Apr 03 2023

Final Day

Here marks our rapid stop - and one VERY WINDY RV night- in Vegas and the last day drive to reach Matt’s family ranch in Fernley NV

I once said i’d like the epitaph on my gravestone to read “she died never having entered Las Vegas” (no kidding) — Well: this (along with the crazy casino scene - not included here because we totally avoided it) is why….

“FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS”

excerpts from the video

video excerpt

The below images are again Drive By snap shots like much of this blog as we traveled from Vegas, through the (mostly barren) desert to Matt’s family Ranch in Fernley NV