Goodbye Celina

We had planned to leave the Mercer County Fairgrounds in Celina, Ohio somewhere around 10 or 11 AM yesterday morning. But then Greg, Jan, and Miss Terry decided that it would be nice to have breakfast at the Fountain Restaurant, across from the courthouse. I’m not really a breakfast person, but what the heck, if everyone else wants to go, let’s do it.

Stu and Donna McNicol joined us, and as usual, we had such a good time that before we knew it, it was already 11 AM! I guess we will have to move that departure time back a little bit, won’t we? But that’s the great thing about the fulltime RV lifestyle, our plans are always written in Jello, and all we have to do is stir it a little bit when things change.

The Fountain is one of those friendly little small town places where everybody knows everybody, the waitress calls you Honey and touches your shoulder as she takes your order, and the coffee cups are bottomless. Here are Jan, Greg, Stu, Donna, and Miss Terry enjoying a fun start to the day.

By the time we got back to the fairgrounds, got our motorhomes unhooked from the campground utilities, and our tow vehicles hooked up behind them, then said our last goodbyes to Stu and Donna, Tom and Barbara Westerfield, Pete and Jo Peters, and a couple of other rally holdovers, it was after 1 PM when we finally pulled out.

We traveled south on US Highway 127, passing a lot of nice-looking farmland, and eventually hooked up with Interstate 70 and took it west into Indiana. At Richmond, we turned south on US Highway 27 and followed it to Liberty, where we continued south on State Route 101.

Our route took us through several charming little small towns and past 5,260 acre Brookville Lake, which seems to be a major recreational area and is part of the country. Most of our route was a good two-lane road, but there were quite a few short but steep descents and uphill climbs.

Eventually we got onto Interstate 74 and took it west a few miles to the Indian Lakes Thousand Trails preserve, a few miles east of Batesville. This was our first visit to this campground, but I’ve been impressed with what we’ve seen so far. It has 682 RV sites with power and water only, and 44 full hookup sites. I was surprised that we had no problems getting two level pull-through sites with 50 amp full hookups. I’m sure during the summer it is a lot busier than it is now. Here is our Winnebago on the right, and Greg and Jan’s American Eagle on the left.

We hooked up and settled in and about 5:30 PM we all went into Greensburg, about 15 miles to the west, for dinner. Greensburg is a friendly town with a very interesting attraction, a tree that has been growing from the top of the courthouse tower since the early 1870s. At one time there were as many as five trees atop the tower, and people from all over the world have come to see them.

We saw some folks in a parking lot and asked them if they could recommend somewhere good to eat and they pointed at the back door of Storie’s Restaurant and said it was one of the best places in town. They were right; Storie’s was very much like the Fountain in Celina, where we had breakfast. A small town place serving delicious comfort food, served with a smile. The fact that our table afforded us a great view across the street to the courthouse and its tree was just icing on the cake.

The plan today is to start out slow, and then taper off. We don’t have any place to be, or anything to do, so we are just going to take it easy and probably stay home all day. Terry has some post-rally paperwork she wants to get caught up on, and I can always keep busy at the computer. And who knows? I might even fit time into my busy schedule for a nap!

Thought For The Day – Honesty is the best policy. But insanity is a better defense.

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