Ft. Wayne to E. St. Louis (Wed.)

Forgot a couple things I meant to post yesterday.  On Monday, Lucille, for some reason, did not put her hearing aids in, and while we were sitting out on the porch watching the kids play, Joe told her she needed to go inside and put her hearing aids in.  She immediately responded, "why, I can see them [the kids playing] pretty good."  We didn't quite compute that one!

The restaurant we went to last night had a very nice lake in the back, and two beautiful white swans apparently live there year-round.  You can eat on the patio and watch the swans and ducks, but we didn't do that.  (Joe never wants to eat outside, I think it comes from all his years of eating his lunch in the shade of the truck at work.)  

Our days in Ft. Wayne were full and went very quickly.  Joe intended to get the oil changed in the Explorer and also get it washed, but he didn't get worked in, nor did I get to the grocery store.  Nevertheless, it was time to leave on Wednesday.

I had intended to wake Joe up at 8:00 a.m., but I slept until 8:15 so we were off schedule from the beginning.  But we did get on the road about 9:20, Joe dumped our tanks while I drove over to McDonalds for breakfast sandwiches and sodas.  We watched the price of gas jump dramatically, and Jim had warned us that is what usually happens when their local station drops it suddenly a few cents.  But about an hour of of town, Joe spotted a station that hadn't got their prices raised yet, so he took advantage of that ($3.389).  We were finally, FINALLY, heading toward home.  Our GPS Lucille showed that we were going SOUTHWEST.

We were traveling in style, with Lori's roses and a Vincennes watermelon. I tried a couple of different places for the flowers to ride, but finally decided the sink was the safest.  Life is good.

Joe mentioned that he needed to use the bathroom, so I volunteered to drive for a while.  I was going to switch with him at the next stoplight, but suddenly we heard a strange thump and Joe felt something that wasn't quite right, so we pulled off the road to investigate.  PROBLEM.  The return spring on the front leveling jack had broken again, and the foot of the leveling jack had fallen off when the spring broke.  Joe said we had to have that foot (we actually have spare springs with us), so after debating about unhooking the car, he decided just to turn the motorhome around and backtrack a mile or so (we were on a 4-lane highway at this point).  So that's what we did.  Fortunately, he spotted the foot in the middle of the highway, so he pulled over and I ran out and grabbed it while he crawled underneath the RV and took the second spring off.  After we got that taken care of, he still needed to go to the bathroom, so I took over driving for the next 60+ miles, through road construction, several small towns, misty rain, and the highway changed back to 2-lane (I even passed a car while I drove on the 4-lane).  But I turned the wheel back over to him at just the right time, because we ran into a detour that took us about 21 miles out of the way, and the county roads were much narrower than the highway we had been on.
 

We took U.S. 24 across Indiana to Illinois 54, then at Springfield we picked up I-55 into E. St. Louis.  We know our gas mileage isn't as good because of all the small towns and lower speed limits, and it takes longer, when we use U.S. or state highways rather than the interstates, but we get to see so much more of the countryside and Joe really enjoys looking at all the crops.  We are definitely in the farm belt, and came upon more than one wide load.  It's always interesting to see what is being moved down the highway.  This was a dump bed for the trucks they use in mines.   We saw these in use in the copper mine in Utah a few years ago.

With our little mechanical problem and the detour, it made for a long day.  We arrived in E. St. Louis about 6:30 p.m., which is 5:30 local time now, so we gained an hour.  Joe, and I, together drove 401 miles.  As soon as we got parked, we had to replace that spring, which takes all the strength we have together.  Joe crawled under the RV, and I tried to help apply pressure from the outside.  After several attempts, and a variety of tools, we finally were successful.  Joe exerts 95% of the pressure, and I throw in about 5% to get the foot back on the hydraulic jack.  It only took about 20 minutes, but we were both hot and tired when we got it done.  After a short rest, while he took a shower I fixed dinner, using some of our Indiana produce.  Then we went over to the casino for a couple hours (yes, we are at the Casino Queen in E. St. Louis again).  Just as we were about to leave, on my last pull of the slot machine, and with 21 cents left of my gambling money, I hit a jackpot and won $97.70, so we left there happy.  Winners finally (I think we came out about $20 ahead for the night, but we will take it.)

The weather was a mixture of clouds, misty rain and finally sunshine. but it was in the 70s all day.  It was nice not to have the air conditioner on much as we drove.   Tomorrow we are going to try to make Branson, Missouri!