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2 June…I’ve been in Maggie valley NC a couple of days now…nice to get away and ride some old familiar roads on the new bike…the thing is perfect…had a good ride on Hwy 209 today up to the tiny community of Trust for a coffee and to rock in one of the chairs on the porch…when I lived down the road a few years back I’d come here several times a week.

I’m set up (again) at my friend’s motel (Holiday Motel) in downtown Maggie. Rob and Gabi, the owners, have a big grassy field next to the motel and let me park (camp) anywhere I want anytime I’m in the area….nice folks. Gabi is also a real estate agent. I asked her to keep an eye out for a nice little patch of property I might want to buy to eventually build an off-grid tiny home here in the mountains. I love the west but really miss the roads and people around here…we will see.

The blue bag on the back of the bike holds my spare tubes and tire repair tools…the tank bag has all my makeup.

On the way up the other day my Dometic fridge took a crap…had to stop and buy a cooler and a bag of ice to keep my stuff cold…I’m not traveling with as much perishable food stuffs theses days so a medium sized cooler is working well. Instead of going through the hassle of shipping the Dometic to a service center for $150 then paying who-knows-what for the repair I’ve decided to purchase what’s considered to be the most well built, highest quality, most reliable fridge/freezer in the world….an Engel. They’ve set the standard for rugged, reliable fridges for over 50 years. Their US headquarters are in Jupiter Florida, about 3 hours from my place. I’ll drive down there next week and pick the new one up.

Engel MT45F-U1CD-P platinum series AC/DC combination Fridge/Freezer

All stainless steel construction and a swing type compressor that draws 30% less current than the Dometic I’ve been using. The unit has a three year warranty…from all the reviews, I don’t expect I’ll ever worry about the thing taking a dump.

Will be about $1,100 well spent.

I can use this unit as a fridge or a fridge and freezer combination by adding the partition seen in the middle in the bottom photo…I’ll mainly use the whole compartment as a fridge but when I may want a gallon or two of butter pecan ice cream I can use about half to the compartment as a freezer…pretty slick set up.

4 June…it’s 3:46 in the morning and I’m out and about…I love walking when the air is cool and the wind is calm…not a creature is stirring, not even a mouse…I count the steps as I travel along the main road through Maggie…not a car is moving…really nice and calm…this is my favorite time of each day…I hit the rack early and rise early…usually a small cuppa…I bought a little candle the other day from a Cracker Barrel store…cinnamon scented…I like that smell…the light it gives off goes well with my coffee and mood most mornings…will get another when it’s done.

My iPhone does a nice job with very little light…this image is only illuminated by street lights.

Kinda rainy yesterday…this is what I did between naps and walks :)…just watching people’s lives go by

Nice early lunch yesterday at the Mex joint across the street with my friends Roger and his lovely wife (the Bosslady)…good conversations over some good Mexican grub…I’ve been eating the same thing at that place for almost 30 years…one beef enchilada with beans and rice…never get tired of it…it’s nice to eat at a place where the food is consistently good over the years.

The rain is supposed to be negative most of the day today so I’ll be out for another ride…the bike is running perfect and so am I.

5 June…it’s another beautiful day for a ride in the mountains 🙂

20 June…I’m back in Maggie valley NC set up at my favorite spot at the Holiday Motel… I brought the little Red Rocket this time…I’m gonna enjoy puttering around on nice little mountain roads…I carried it on my Mototote carrier…I modified the carrier by taking off the stock cheesy metal support for the wheels and replaced it with a piece of aluminum channel…works great…I have a jack under the carrier to unload the suspension as I’ll be parked here for a week…OCD that’s me!

Woke today to a gentle rain…stopped around 1100 so off for a walk I went…I love sauntering along the sidewalk looking like a dork. No girls waved at me as they were driving by…will try again tomorrow 🙂

Oh BTW…my new Engel Combo Fridge/Freezer is keeping my Ensure nice and cold.

21 June…today was a nice day for a ride…cool, partly cloudy…the little bike is brilliant on the small deserted country roads…so nice around 35 to 40 mph…just the speed I like to ride in the country…moved the van to a nice shady spot to keep the afternoon sun off it so I don’t have to run the A/C much…had a nice coffee and rock in the chairs on the porch of the Trust General Store before lunch…always a treat…got BIG rains coming tonight and all day tomorrow…will be in my cocoon most of the day reading, relaxing, and napping.

Jack, a dear friend in Alaska sent me this photo today…here I am on my first of many rides to Alaska…I was leaving his home…I was riding my Yamaha WR250R I’d set up for long distance adventure travel…this ride was over 13,000 miles from the lower 48 up to Prudhoe Bay Alaska on the Arctic Ocean and back in 2016.

22 June…my new Engel fridge is working great…the thing is a work of art…so glad I did the upgrade…should last me about a hundred years 🙂

24 June…0500 am…thinking about heading down to Two Wheels of Suches Motorcycle Campground in north Georgia this afternoon…may spend one night there before starting the drive back to Fl…we will see…have to let the morning coffee kick in.

Nice ride through some beautiful mountains yesterday…was thinking about how I love being a minimalist these days…I only have things that I actually need to live comfortably and make me enjoy life…in the past I owned lots of things…but I didn’t really own them, they owned me…in the end all the stuff people have goes away when they die…now I refuse to let anything dictate what I do…an example…when I had my mountain home the property dictated how I traveled…I couldn’t get away for very long because the property needed mowing…the grass owned me…not anymore…feels great.

26 June…I’m back in FL…didn’t go to TWoS…stopped by the Camp Toccoa Military Museum in Toccoa GA…Toccoa is where the 101st Airborne trained soldiers for the invasion of Europe on D-Day…awesome museum.

My friend Len’s wife’s father was in the 506th PIR regiment of the 101st. They are known as the Band of Brothers, the most decorated company of soldiers in WW2. HIs name was Gordon Carson. The main training area was closed when I visited so it’s a destination for a future trip. Here are a few photos from inside the museum.

Every member of Easy Company, The Band of Brothers, has their medals displayed in shadow boxes. A sobering sight.

My friend’s father, Sgt Gordon Carson.

His decoratons

We owe our lives and freedom to men like these.

There will never be another generation as great as this, thank you.

5 July…my friends Kaye and Gary in Australia just got a beautiful Latitude motorhome a few days ago…they’re simplifying their lives and are about to hit the road exploring Australia. Good on ’em!

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