On the morning of Tuesday, October 3rd, we pulled out of our site at Rose Point Park Campground in western Pennsylvania and drove an hour and a half westward to Akron, Ohio. We stopped in Hubbard along the way for an RV and Truck wash at a Blue Beacon Truck Wash — Very happy with that! Unfortunately, as I was later to discover, washing the RV is a hazard to our refrigerator. When we arrived in Ohio, we noticed our fridge was blinking and giving us an error message on the digital display. A little google research revealed that this is a common problem after washing the RV. Water comes in through the refrigerator vent on the side of the RV, causing the high temperature switch to fail. The switch, and other fridge components are totally exposed to the elements through the slits in the vent. After some further research and a couple of calls, I spoke with Ron, at Ron’s RV Service (googled him). He was familiar with the problem, but was tied up and unable to help us. He did, however, give me instructions in how to fix the problem. I purchased a small 3/4″ magnet from the hardware store, removed the vent, and placed the magnet over the LED light on the temperature switch, and… Voila! It was working again!

Parking our rig in front of my mother-in-laws house.

Our main purpose in stopping in Akron for a couple of nights was to see family and friends, and to allow them to see our RV. We were going to set up in a nearby RV park, but they wanted to charge us $10/person to even visit our RV. We politely declined their offer and, instead, were blessed by the hospitality of our good friend of many years, Nelson Carter, pastor of Calvary Apostolic Church. He and his wife, Judy, so graciously allowed us to set up our RV next to the church and supplied a regular extension cord for some power. On the day of our arrival, about two dozen friends and family stopped by for a visit. Wednesday was a little bit of a work and errand day for me. I recently bought a tire-pressure monitoring system for our 5th wheel tires and discovered they were quite low. So, I bought an electric pump and brought the tire pressure up to recommended levels (110 PSI). I installed a low-flow shower head in addition to taking care of a few other things on the to-do-list. And, finally, I bought a 3400 watt inverter/generator for the RV. Wednesday evening, we attended the midweek service at Calvary Apostolic. The next day we would continue our journey southward.

Rainbow from our spot parked at Calvary Apostolic Church.

Flowers for the ladies.

Denise, Mom, and Nancy at Open House

Christy, Beth, and Cindy at Open House

John and Gloria at Open House

Tammy and Barry at Open House

Mark and Debbie at Open House

On Thursday, October 5th, we departed Akron with an additional adventure-seeker. Christy, my wife’s twin who joined us on occasion aboard our sailing vessel, Beatitude, has now begun her periodic visits aboard our land vessel, Beatitude II. We were happy to have her join us for a week and a half of RVing fun. Our drive to Louisville, Kentucky, was not all that fun however. It was the longest drive of our brief RVing experience, and almost the whole trip was carried out in a steady rain. Yuck. We made it safely, however, and set up in our site for a two-night stay in the Derby City. Our first evening, we grilled some burgers for dinner and hung out at the RV.

Driving in a rain storm.

Our RV site at the Louisville South KOA

Grilling out at our campsite.

Friday was exploration day. We began with a trip to Churchill Downs, home to the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday of May. It was exciting to visit the Kentucky Derby Museum located on site, as well as enjoying a short walking tour of the facilities. The founder was the grandson of William Clark, of Lewis and Clark fame.

Churchill Downs – Home of the most exciting 2 minutes in sports.

The pre-race stables behind.

My two fillies at the starting gate.

Practicing my jockeying skills. Now, only to lose 100 pounds.

The storied track

“And they’re off!”

Appropriately sized stallions.

We then drove downtown to visit the Louisville Slugger Museum, home to the famous baseball bat. J. F. Hillerich opened his woodworking shop in Louisville in 1855. Hillerich’s seventeen-year-old son, John “Bud” Hillerich, who played baseball himself, slipped away from work one afternoon in 1884 to watch Louisville’s major league team, the Louisville Eclipse. The team’s star, Pete “Louisville Slugger” Browning, mired in a hitting slump, broke his bat. Bud invited Browning to his father’s shop to hand-craft him a new bat to his own specifications. Browning accepted the offer, and got three hits to immediately break out of his slump with his new bat the first day he used it. Browning told his teammates, which began a surge of professional ball players to the Hillerich woodworking shop. Thus began the famous baseball bat factory. On the factory tour, we did get to actually go through the factory and watch bats being manufactured. The MLB players’ bats are manufactured using a higher grade wood and on different machines than the minor league bats and bats prepared for mass production. The museum was nice to visit as well.

The “largest bat in the world” outside the Louisville Slugger Museum

Holding Mickey Mantle’s Bat

My Babe and The Babe

Christy and Ted

After walking around town for a little, with a stop at a bourbon tasting, we had a steak dinner at Texas Roadhouse. We then returned to Beatitude II in anticipation of an early departure the next morning to Nashville.

Walking the streets of Louisville

Stopped in at the Evan Williams Bourbon Experience. The tours were filled, but we did get to have a tasting.

Dinner at Texas Roadhouse