Tin Cup Campground, Illinois

     For some couples a perfect anniversary day would have flowers and a romantic dinner.   Not so much for Rick and I.  We had a great day traveling in our RV through Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, and into Illinois.  We parked at a mostly empty, very grassy and shady campground called the Tin Cup, not sure why.  As we checked in a lady waiting in the office told me that her favorite place to camp was just down the road from our house in Apple Valley at the Lebanon Hills Campground.  It is such a small world.   After getting set up at our site, we really whooped it up and went OUT for pizza and a beer.  It was a great way for us to celebrate 40 years of traveling together.  

     Our drive today was easy.  Although we went around several big cities, it is Sunday and mostly we just had to avoid potholes in Indiana.  However, we have had a few issues lately with the routes chosen by our special Rand McNally RV GPS.  It is supposed to take the height, width, length and weight of our camper into consideration when planning our route so that we don’t get sent on roads with tight curves, low tunnels, weight-limited bridges.   When I looked at the route the GPS suggested yesterday, I was surprised to see that we were routed off the freeway and onto a Kentucky “Parkway.”  These parkways are usually four lane roads going through scenic areas.  I looked at the map and saw that the parkway was quite curvy which is slow going for us and the freeway was quite straight.  We ignored the GPS headed onto the freeway and watched the change on the GPS.  Our freeway route was 10 miles longer, but I knew that we would arrive about an hour earlier due to the easier driving.   But that is not the biggest deal for me.  As we drove the freeway we saw a sign for the Parkway that warned us of a long tunnel that would not accommodate a vehicle wider than 8’6”.  With our mirrors we are wider than that.  I am happy that we did not blindly follow the GPS and have to turn back when we got to the tunnel. 

     Earlier in the trip the GPS sent us on a route into Shenandoah National which was a dead end.  Although the road existed, it ended before it got to the park boundary.   Today we were again routed on a parkway and I have had to manually route us away from downtown Chicago.  Is there any RV owner who wants to be driving the Dan Ryan Expressway in and RV when you are just trying to get around Chicago?  So, my job as a navigator is to plot our trip, double check it on the maps, and then check it on the GPS.  If I do my job right and the road repairs don’t reroute us, we have a pretty smooth drive.

     So here we are having a quiet evening in an out-of-the-way campground with a few folks who have traveled here for football games in Urbana/Champaign which is just east of us.  It’s going to be cold tonight, but we have electricity and our nice little heater.  I’ve still got a couple good books and the sun is supposed to be out tomorrow.  I’ve had the maps out looking at places to go next year.  We are so lucky to have had these 40 wonderful years.  I’m looking forward to number 41.