Mid-month update

We've settled in down here at Gulf Shores.  Been out to eat a few times.  Tried the park's new Woodside Restaurant just off Highway 135 as you enter the park from the west.  Having gotten use to longer hikes over the summer, we're trying to keep the time & length of our walks similar to our summer hikes.  Kinda hard to duplicate the elevation change, though!  Donna still rides with the Folks-on-Spokes, Gulf Shores two to three days a week weather permitting.

Been a wet season, so far.  We've had heavy rain, but not the severe weather we've had in previous years.  Hopefully, we'll get lucky and miss most of the coldest stuff, too.

For those who keep track of such things, we did get the ASCO Red Hat II valve replaced with a manual shut-off valve.  The old valve was wired so that closing the stove top shut the gas off to the stove (to keep the stove from lighting should the cover be closed).  It had worn out and shorted itself out so that it was always on and allowing gas to flow no matter whether the stove top was open or not. We now have to close it manually if we want gas flow off when the stove top is down. 

And in a nod to the 21st Century, we had the software in the truck updated as well as a GPS update.  The original software would reboot from time-to-time.  Nothing dangerous, mind you.  But it did it enough to make Bill Gates proud.  Posts on Ford forums had indicated that people did see an improvement with the update, so we went ahead and had it done.  For the GPS: One must now go get it from a Ford dealership, so we had them just update it themselves while the truck was there.

That gets you up to date.  Thanks for stopping by and checking up on us!  We don't post as often when we're down here as we get into a routine and not a lot changes from week-to-week.  We'll get an update out in a couple of weeks, though.  Later, David

Gulf Oak Ridge Trail, Gulf State Park