Pat Bean's blog

     “On the road again – Just can’t wait to get on the road again …Goin’ places that I’ve never been. Seein’ things that I may never see again …” – Willie Nelson

Hello the Road 

Good-bye Mr. Lake Walcott Bear. Have a nice winter. — Phto by Pat Bean

Today I start a 5,000 mile journey. I invite you to come along.            I begin by traveling from Lake Walcott State Park in Idaho to Ogden, Utah, where I will stay a few days with friends and have my RV, Gypsy Lee, serviced and checked out.

I retired from a 37-year journalism career in Ogden on September 1, 2004. Two weeks before my retirement, I bought a new RV, which I named Gypsy Lee. Gypsy is for my itchy feet and Lee is for my grandfather, Charles Forest Lee, from whom my mother said I inherited my wanderlust.

Good-bye willow tree with the split personality. I’ll miss nodding to you each morning when Pepper and I take our walks. — Photo by Pat Bean

Before the end of 2004, I had sold my rooted Ogden home, and took to the road. After this coming journey, which will be the subject of my upcoming blogs, Gypsy Lee will have over 137,000 miles on her, and I will have visited 49 of the 50 states. I visited Hawaii in the 1980s and Alaska in 2001 before I retired.

Traveling between Lake Walcott and Ogden is a familiar 160-mile trip for me, but my plans today are to take a backroad that will take me through City of Rocks State Park. I’ll try and tell you all about it tomorrow.

Taking the untraveled path is how I hope to travel as my journey takes me across Middle America east to Front Royal, Virginia, before it heads south toward Texas, where my children expect me for Thanksgiving dinner.

Good-bye Lake of Many Moods. I’ll miss you, too. — Photo by Pat Bean

Book Report: Zilch. I celebrated my leaving Lake Walcott with a bunch of mostly old broads like myself, a group of women who call themselves the “Bay of Pigs.” Many of them have been friends since childhood. I feel honored that I got to know them at their First Wednesday lunches this year. I’ll carry their warm wishes with me on my journey and hope to see them next year when my tentative plans are to return to Lake Walcott. While I’m sorry my writing got left in the dust today, I’m not going to beat myself up. It wouldn’t be me if at least occasionally I didn’t let life interfere. That’s been a very hard lesson for me to learn.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: It’s a Bird Thing http://tinyurl.com/bnvf333 Exploring the Rio Chama Wild and Scenic River. My kind of travel. I was fortunate to have met Judy on a bird outing to check out mountain blue bird nest boxes above Ogden.