Back Home At Ocean Isle Beach!

We pulled into the Waterway Family Campground located across the Intracoastal Waterway from Ocean Isle Beach late afternoon today. Our site, #18, was right on the ICW and we pulled in so our windshield would capture the entire view of this wonderful waterway. This will be our home for the month of December, at least until after Christmas. We then head out to Arizona to meet up with our friends Hank and Lillie who are also full time RVers.

It is kind of strange to be about 1/4 mile from our home here, yet, we are staying in the motorhome because all our clothing and general "stuff" is in the coach. The first leg of our full time journey was a great "shake down" cruise. We realized we had forgotten some things and also figured out we did not need other things. Many trips to and from the house will equalize our needs.

On November 18th we headed up to the Raleigh/Durham area to visit with another of Peg's cousins, Dwayne and Nancy Lee. They recently moved to Durham from California. It was the first time we saw their new house and it is a large home. They needed more furniture to help fill it up so they "acquired" much of our furniture when they first moved here and it was interesting seeing things we recognized all over their house! We had a great time in the two days we were there. They took us to the Duke University campus and we saw the Duke Chapel. A beautiful building build just before WWII. It was impressive as was the entire campus.

We also got to go to a Trader Joe's store in Chapel Hill and we finally got a chance to get some "Two Buck Chuck". This is Charles Shaw premium wine for $2.99 a bottle! They call it two buck chuck because, on the west coast, it is sold for $1.99 a bottle. I guess it costs a little more to get it to the east coast!!

I write these notes towards the end of our stay here (December 23). The weather had been mostly good, except for a few wind storms. We are pretty exposed to the elements here on the banks of the Intracoastal. On the many good days, we enjoy watching the boat traffic, gazing at the sunsets and just enjoying the area we call home.

We are roughing it since our microwave/convection oven decided to stop microwaving! The convection part still works, but it is really inconvenient not to be able to heat up some hot chocolate or pop a bag of popcorn. We will get it fixed on our trek out west.

We have met our next door full time neighbors here at the campground and have chatted a bit. Jarrell and Emmie are staying a few days longer than we will be here and plan on traveling more after the New Year.

We have a few dinner invitations left before Christmas and it has been fun seeing friends and family for the last three weeks. Guess we'll grab a bottle of wine and head out to see another one of mother natures miracle sunsets. Hope everyone has a safe holiday, prosperous new year and a healthy 2008...