Well, what a day that was...

Monday afternoon, I had called a Kal Tire franchise near Lindsey's place. They have a full service truck mechanical bay, and I had to find someone to do some work on Sherman that I wasn't prepared to do myself.

I don't mind doing the work, but I know my limits. And when I don't have the proper tools to do the job, it's better to pay the money and hand it off to someone who does.

Help, if you want to.

As you know, Ruth and I are leading an RV caravan through Mexico this winter, and the company that is operating the caravan is spearheading a small earthquake relief campaign on their own.

On October 5th, Caravanas de Mexico will personally go to Cuernavaca to buy groceries and other Items urgently needed for people suffering the consequences of earthquakes in Morelos State. The area was at the epicenter of the Sept 19 quake and the situation is terrible in several towns such as Jojutla and its surroundings.

Picked up the car rental!

We've got wheels again!

Yesterday morning, Lindsey drove us to Dollar Rent a Car near downtown Ottawa. We had a reservation for 10am, and got there right on time. I had booked the deal back in July when they had a special price on their "whatever car we have is what you get" deal.

September Expenses... one of our cheapest months ever!

Well September was a good month! I would have to go back into the records to check and see, but it may have been a record low month for us. We only spent $515 CAD ($415 USD)!!

The main thing we were trying to do this summer was to keep our grocery budget around the $550 per month mark, and we did a lot of stocking up in May and June, sometimes buying enough of a sale item to last all summer. So if you remember, we spent a lot of money on groceries in May ($929) and June ($726).

Too many rules

First of all, I got the new solar charge controller installed and working. And then the clouds moved in and I couldn't properly test it! Too funny. Solar energy works great... but only when the sun is shining!

Today is supposed to be bright and sunny (not a cloud in the sky so far) so tomorrow I'll give you an update as to how our batteries are charging.

I didn't plan that very well...

I found us a fantastic deal on a car rental a few months ago, and I booked it for three weeks during our time here in Ottawa.

Only problem is, I have it starting this coming Monday, October 2nd. I figured that Lindsey and Justin have two cars and that one should be available for us to use occasionally for a few days our first week here. But, it turns out that the one older car needs a major brake job now and it's not safe to drive the way it is.

So we've been without transportation these first few days.

Getting Sherman ready for his adventure

Had a great sleep Wednesday night back in the motorhome. Seems like it only took the one night to get caught up on the lack of sleep from our travels the night before. So that's good. We got our bags unpacked and everything sorted out to live in Sherman on and off for the next three and a half weeks or so.

I say "on and off" because we're headed down to Ruth's sister's for a night, and then Pelee Island next weekend. And then of course we'll be up at Ruth's dad's for a few nights along the way and I've got my guys weekend away on the 20th of October.

Arrived in Ottawa!

When we left off yesterday, we had been at Toronto airport waiting for our flight to Ottawa. The gate agent had offered us $200 cash each to take the next flight at 9:15am, but had said that she had to wait until boarding was complete to confirm that was going to happen.

Everybody was on the plane, and she called our names.

Well that was a busy 24 hours!

Writing this from our daughter's home in Osgoode, just south of Ottawa, Ontario. Arrived here at about 9:30am this morning after our four flight marathon from Regina.

Our friend Wendy drove us to Regina airport from Moose Jaw yesterday afternoon. (Thanks again Wendy!) About a 45 minute ride, and we purposely arrived at the airport a couple of hours early, because it's better to be early than late. :-)

First day of pretirement, and it's going to be a travel day!

We said goodbye to the park yesterday, but it wasn't until almost three o'clock in the afternoon by the time we finally pulled out. Just lots of last minute stuff to do, and all of it had to happen on the last day. So, a couple of hours later than we were planning for, but it didn't really matter.

Then, we had a 258 km (160 mile) drive to Moose Jaw. Uneventful, and we've done this route before a few times, so not much exciting to see along the way.

Today is the day!

And what a beautiful start to the day it is. A little bit crisp out there, but the sun is shining and it will warm up nicely. Supposed to be a high of around 17C (63F), so just a nice fall day.

I went out and took some early pics of our last morning at the park...

Almost finished up

One more sleep here in the park. Still some work to do tomorrow morning, but then the adventure begins!

Pretty much right on schedule. This is our fourth year closing the park up, so we've got it down to a science now. The bathrooms are all winterized and locked up, and today I'll get the oil changed on the equipment.

Campground Manager Couple Wanted - Canada

While we are not coming back next year as managers, we still care about the park and the effort that we've put into it over the past four years.  And so we want to help the park find the right people to carry on where we left off.

Also, we will be coming back through this area next May on our way up to Canada's northern Territories and Alaska, and we have offered to spend some time with the new manager(s) to get them off on the right foot. Whether or not the park board takes us up on that offer will depend somewhat on who gets hired for the job.

Four more sleeps!

Well, we're into the final stretch. Only four more sleeps and it's on to new adventures. But there's still a lot to do here over the next four days. I've got four of the five washrooms winterized, and I'll do the final one today. I've got part of the beaver fencing up, and I'm trying to do a little every day rather than doing it all at once like I've done in the past. Much better this way! And I have to change the oil in the machinery and get it all cleaned up.

Monday morning we'll shut off the water and I've already made the appointment to get the big compressor down here so we can blow the lines out... and then we're gone.

More Saskatchewan scenery...

Well, the park is pretty much empty. I think the last two nights we were the only ones sleeping here overnight, although there are still two trailers here that need to be picked up. Still a few boats kicking around too, but I guess people are hoping for one last boat trip of the season, although the weather for the immediate future doesn't look very promising for that.

But, we did take advantage of yesterday's nice weather!