We will be hunkered down in Orlando, at my mom’s house, for a couple more days and we are happy for this brief respite after all our adventures. We need this time to refresh, do laundry, clean the van, get reorganised, and fix the power steering. Yep, the power steering bracket broke again! It happened back in St. Augustine. This time vibration caused the power steering reservoir to break. I removed the belt and with much difficulty the reservoir. The fun part was getting hot power steering fluid spilled all over my chest in an Advanced Auto Parts parking lot. I inquired at several auto parts stores but none had my part in stock. I finally found one in Jacksonville, about an hour away so I disconnected the belt and drove there without power steering. I got the part but the bracket was now the issue, again. I decided driving without power steering was doable as it would be sufficiently difficult to find a welder at 6 p.m.; besides my mom’s house was only two more stops away. So we drove to and visited my cousin in Jacksonville, then our Aunt and Uncle in Vero, FL, and finally made it to Orlando on Monday 4.09.19.

If you are wondering, driving without power steering was not too hard on the highway, but in town having to make tight turns was memorably difficult. So was kissing a frog!

Anyway… Yesterday we were pleased to find Jody, a great guy, at Alpha Welding Services just a few miles from my mothers house. He kindly found time to fix and beef up the bracket. Kindly, is an understated adverb in this case. Jody is a certified aerospace welder, there are very few of these guys around; can you imagine the quality of his work? I did not know this, but the main job of an aerospace welder is not so much to weld, there are lots of goid welders. Certification is more about following government and FAA paperwork requirements. Procedures must be followed and documented for every areospace job; not so much for mine! It was facinating to chat with Jody. We had much in common and we are about the same age. Later I met his lovely wife too.

This is where the title of the blog post comes in. Jody and his lovely wife are not yet “out to pasture.” They have dreams of traveling more and maybe even doing as we are doing, traveling and camping. We invited them to see Glacier National Park and stay with us whenever they too decide to repurpose their existance.

I have decided “out to pasture” best describes this new phase of our lives, specifically this trip. This country is very large. It’s fenced in, maybe not by walls, but by laws and regulations. We are like old cows exploring the fence line of a huge ranch in Texas or Montana. We’ve no place we really want to go; not one place over another anyway. We are just looking for good food, friendships, and the company of familiar faces. I suppose cows out to pasture want the same things!

We have no timeline for when we will return home, just directions by which way we will wander.

Mom’s house has been a good watering hole with shelter and good food to boot. Yesterday I did most of mom’s honey do list. Today, I finished re installing the pump and bracket, changed the oil, cleaned the van and re-organised the stuff. Jackie and Mom did laundry, shopped for food, and cooked us a nice homemade meal, and i was thankful (see video).

Stay tuned, Saturday might bring us some fun. There are a couple car shows near us. I’m trying to decide which one I want to enter. One is a pure classic car show with judges and prize money. The other is at Old Town in Kissimmee FL. The advertisement reads, “Every Saturday.   Old Town is home to one America’s longest running weekly car show and cruise, the Saturday Nite Car Cruise. Every Saturday, we invite show-quality 1987 and older hot rods, street rods, and antiques to join us along Trophy Row and around the property showing off these classic beauties.” It’s a pretty big event attended by a thousand or more Disney tourists. My old van is not show quality, but it is a classic car of interest and qualifies to join the parade. So, do I want to go to a classic car show and visit with other enthusiasts or be a crowd pleaser and cruise the streets of Old Town? Keep tuned, I’ll let you know!

Sunday night we are going to the Amway Center to see Two Cello’s. We don’t get many top quaslity events or concerts in Montana, so this should be fun!

We will seek other pastures head toward Gainsville to visit more good friends on Monday. After that we will be driving scenic Hwy 98 to Destin Fl and onward to the remote white sand beach of Fort Pickens Campground near Pensacola.