(Widower 7) The rest of year 2008 and the year 2009.

I stopped to visit relatives in Portland, Modesto, Hanford, Bakersfield, Van Nuys, and Pomona. Then for the long trip across Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and half of Louisiana. I stopped the visit Bill and Lois Friel in Las Cruces, NM. The reports indicated bad weather across North Texas so I visited the Friels for four days. They sure know the places for good Mexican food. One night we had supper in a restaurant where Billy the Kid had a meal.

2009
In May I went with a group of veterans on an Honor Air Flight to visit Washington DC and in particular to visit the newly finished World War II Monument. This was a grand day with a plane full of WW II veterans. We left Shreveport early in the morning and returned late the same day. While we were visiting the WW II Monument my nephew Daryl came and went along with us for the rest of the tour. We visited almost every monument in DC.

I planned a trip to the East Coast that included a stop at a Bluegrass Festival at Bill Monroe's boyhood home in Rosine, Kentucky. What a lot of wonderful music. After several days of music I headed east.

I spent a day sitting on Jackie's grave. I watched several funerals. One was for a Navy man. The firing squad was made up of sailors in dress blues. One lady asked me if she could take a picture of me sitting on the grave. I said yes.

Daryl came and picked me up. We drove to his home on the Easter Shore. On the way we drove as close as we could to Annapolis. You could only see through the gates. Very disappointing. I would like to see West Point. Jackie and I had a good tour of the Air-force Academy during our RVing days.

Daryl and Jane's home was in Cambridge, Maryland. A high light of my visit was a detailed tour of a crab processing plant. Daryl took me on  tours of some remote areas of the Eastern Shore of Chesapeake Bay.

I drove south to Virginia Beach. I drove across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. A large part of the bridge is a tunnel under the bay.

A very interesting bridge. I drove on to Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. I really enjoyed the Wright Brothers Monument and the educational displays of their flight. It was a high light of my trip.

I then drove south along the coast to Charleston, South Carolina. I spent a couple days there, I toured Fort Sumpter and took a gray line tour of the city.

Then I headed westward Ruston, Louisiana. Whoops! I had to stop in Atlanta at the Jimmy Carter Library. Very pretty and interesting place.

Yon would think that would be enough for the year. It was not. I joined the Robert and Nancy Wright family for a week stay in Idaho, close to the Tetons and Jackson Hole. Their son Matt (my first and oldest grandson) was to run a hundred mile foot race on the side of the Tetons. I am serious. Bob and I drove to the start point about four in the morning to see him off. 28 hours later he finished the race! His whole family was there to see him come in. Bob and I met him once at a watering place during the race. What a grand finale for the year.