A Meeting with Myrddin

We left Quincy about noon on Tuesday for the 200 mile leg of our next adventures that landed us at our overnight destination, Rantoul, IL, at the Prairies Pines Campground.

Back in April we had met Jim and Linda Smith at the RV-Dreams Rally.  Their motorhome, named Myrddin,  writes their blog, Myrddin’s Travels. I had noticed awhile back that they had good things to say about this Rantoul campground which just happened to be at almost exactly the halfway point between home and Elkhart, IN, so we set our trip plan to make this our overnight stop.

I was thrilled to notice earlier this week that Jim and Linda were actually back in Rantoul and so we let them know we’d be there.

They were wonderful hosts.  When we got there Jim had already talked to the office and had us in the site right next to Myrddin.

After spending time re-acquainting, we decided it would be a good idea to throw some food together.  Jim got his grill going and we did brats.  Linda just happened to have thrown together one of Ken’s favorites – green bean casserole.

We continued our visit inside their coach.  Myrddin is one impressive 1993 Beaver motorhome. It has this massive digital control panel over the driver that looks right out of Star Wars and absolutely beautiful woodwork. 

It’s easy to see why Beaver is considered such a quality coach when you see one like this 17 years old.

By the way, Myrddin is actually another name you may have heard for Merlin.  It’s thought that there was actually a Welshman back in the 6th century by the name Myrddin who was the basis for the mythic Merlin.  Ken and I are both really in to that kind of literature and so it made perfect sense when we found at that Linda had been a high school English teacher with a particular interest in mythology.

Jim and Linda will soon celebrate 10 years of full-time RVing so its especially interesting to hear their views on different aspects of the lifestyle.  They seem to have a lot in common with us in terms of what they enjoy and how they like to travel.  It’s also surprising to realize the number of mutual friends we share along the road.

Before we knew it, it was 10:00.  How time flies when you are enjoying the evening.

It was a perfect evening for sleeping with the windows open and with the exception of a few trains the campground was very quiet.  (Is there a zoning restriction in the Midwest that campgrounds must be located near train tracks??)

 

There were morning glories to greet us outside the rig Wednesday morning.

 

 

 

 

Ken accuses me of kicking him out of the rig so I can do my 45 minutes of Nordic Track but I know that’s an excuse.  He really doesn’t seem to have much problem extending the dogs walk to an hour or more considering the amount of talking he does along the way.

 

 

In fact, by the time he got back this morning after another nice morning talk with Jim, we missed our normal 10am departure time.

 

 

 

 

 

We said our good-byes about 10:40.  We are so glad we got to spend time with Jim and Linda.  While its nice to meet people at rallies, you don’t get much of the one-on-one time like we had last night with such special folks.   It’s also good to know that we will get to see these them again, at the 2011 RV-Dreams Rally in April if not before. 

It’s becoming very comforting to know that when we make good friends like this and then have to leave saying ‘see ya down the road’, we can expect that we will since so many of our paths seem to intertwine in our RV travels.

And so, as I write this, we are on Highway 24, making our way toward Elkhart on 2-lane highways. 

We’ve already had a good omen that our wonderful September-to-remember will continue today since Ken got to see his all time favorite vehicle, the Oscar Meyer Wiener, on the highway.

Hugs, C