Wwoofing It: Hey Y'all!

Hi Everyone,

Yes, I made it to Kentucky alive. It was a rough 3 day drive, doing about 12 hours per day. I slept in my truck's spacious backseat in the parking lot of various Walmart's across America, and it was very comfortable. It was also easy because I could just hop up in the morning, use Walmart's bathroom to freshen up and brush my teeth, then get back on the road again. I thought I would end up in KY on Friday afternoon, but I didnt know to factor in the time changes- I had about 3- so I ended up getting here late Friday night, around 9pm. I also accidentally stopped in Indianapolis, and intentionally stopped in Lexington. The first 2 days I drove for about 12 hours each day, and stopped only to use restrooms and get gas. I stopped in Wall, South Dakota because there is a famous drugstore there and I wanted to see it. I walked around for less than an hour, and left again. This drugstore is famous because it is one of the original in the USA and it is the biggest continuous drugstore. Every store connects, so you can walk through to each other one. They sold a ton of Native American things, and some cowboy boots, but since I just got a beautiful pair of new ones, I didnt need any more. I thought it was a peculiar town, but not enough to hang around for a long time. It was just nice to stretch my legs. I made it from Montana into the far East end of Sioux Falls, South Dakota on the first day. I even stopped in Sturgis, South Dakota and that was a really cool little town. Even though the biker rally isnt until August, the biker bars are open all year round. They were really cool, and the town is very small and old as well. I really liked it there. I also tried to go see Mt. Rushmore in Keystone, South Dakota, but the weather decided to hail, snow, lightning, rain and thunder just above the mountain so there was no way I could get to the top to see the monument. Everywhere else in the entire state was sunny and hot, but just above the mountain there was a huge storm that almost made me hydroplane off the road, so I had to turn around and keep going. I was bummed by that because I will probably not ever go back to S.D. so I wont see Mt. Rushmore. So that first day I went through Montana, Wyoming, and South Dakota. Then the next day I went through Iowa, Nebraska and stopped in Champaign, Illinois for the evening. I stopped in Omaha, Nebraska because I have always wanted to go there, and it was an incredible town! The downtown area was just like downtown LA, which I didnt expect because it is in the middle of corn fields, but the buildings are beautiful old ones that are slowly falling apart, mixed in with brand new buildings. That was a very nice city, and I would visit again. I also stopped at the 'world's largest truck stop' in Iowa. Apparently this place has been all over travel specials on TV, so I stopped in and looked around. There were more tourists than truckers, but it was an enormous place. They have a spa and gym for the truckers, a store with anything one could ever think they would need while on the road- things like TVs, DVDs, anything you can think of, as well as 4 different restaurants just inside the truck stop. And there was enough room around back to park hundreds and hundreds of big rigs, and all the spots were full. It was very crowded in there, so I just looked around and got back on the road. I passed through Peoria, Illinois and realized I have a few old speech teammates that are now on the speech and debate team at Bradley University in Peoria, so I tried to call them to see if they wanted to meet up, but they didnt respond so I kept driving. That would have been a nice surprise for them though, considering I just saw them at New Years and I hadnt planned on leaving then. So I kept driving because my goal was to stop in Champaign, because I had already researched their 24 hour Walmart, and I left my mom an itinerary of where I was staying with contact info of that store, so I wanted to stick to that plan. There were quite a few other car campers in that parking lot, and I slept just fine that night. The next morning I set out again, and this time drove through Indiana and most of KY to get here. I wanted to stop at this old medical museum in Indiana, but my GPS ended up taking me to Indianapolis instead. I didnt realize it until I was in the middle of the city, and it was so overwhelming and crowded that I parked somewhere not realizing it was valet only. So I already parked which meant I had to pay no matter how long I stayed, so I decided to walk around a bit since I was already there. This city was so overcrowded and loud that I was really freaked out. All the buildings are skyscrapers and there are cars and taxis everywhere and so many people walking around. I asked some guy at an ATM if there was some sort of celebration because of all the people, and he just said 'Yeah, this is a normal Friday." So I was definitely surprised that downtown Indianapolis could party so hard on a Friday afternoon. All the men and boys wore suits and all the women were over 6 feet tall. Maybe its something in the water, but it was a strange place to end up. I walked around for a little bit, then tried to find the medical museum and where it was is now just a large field so I deduced that it was no longer open. That bummed me out, so I ended up back on the road so I could get to Lexington in time to see everything. I ended up sitting in traffic on some random highway for over an hour in Indiana, then the traffic jammed from the Indiana border into Louisville, KY so I ended up sitting in traffic there for over an hour, which set me 2 hours back, plus the 2 time changes, which set me 2 more hours back. I didnt even have time to tour Louisville, except for what I saw sitting on the bridge, but it looked like a really cool place to me. I really wanted to go to Churchill Downs, the stadium where the KY Derby is held, but I was pressed for time because I didnt want to drive after dark, so I just kept driving. I did make it into Lexington however, and cruised around downtown for a while. I talked to a girl and she laughed and told me I was a long way from home, and this place is 100% different than California. She was nice, but could tell I looked out of place. Lexington is cool, but I like Louisville better I think.

So I still had to drive 1.5 hours from Lexington to Liberty, where I will be staying for the next month. By the time I made it to what I thought was the last road to take me to the new place, it was after 8pm. I still thought I would make it before dark, but I didnt know that the last road to this house was miles and miles long up a mountain, so I didnt reach the house until around 9:15pm. I found the house fine, but it is in the Appalachian mountains, so all the roads are narrow and winding. The drive through KY was the most beautiful one I have ever been on, and I can easily say this state is the most gorgeous state I have ever seen. The green here is a different shade of green that we will never see in California. Everything is emerald green and bright lime green. There are trees and rivers, and vines growing up trees, and moss hanging off everything, and everywhere you look there are bright green pastures, wild turkeys, horses, cows and off in the distance is an old abandoned barn with trees and vines growing through it. This state is so beautiful, it feels like you are in a tropical paradise. All you can hear is the chirping of crickets, bullfrogs and the occasional cow.

I finally pulled up to Bobbett's house, and it was so gorgeous that I couldnt even believe that I get to stay here and live on this property for a month. I feel like I am living in a jungle/forest paradise. Bobbett is very nice, and her retired parents live here as well. The house is a very old, large farm house. Her parents have their own suite on their own side of the house, so they only share a kitchen. Bobbett has a bedroom and bathroom upstairs on one end of the house, and I have the huge bedroom on the other side of 2nd story of the house. My windows overlook the pool and forest on one side, and the cherry trees and blackberry bushes and peach orchard on the other side. Bobbett, and her parents Barbara and Walter, are extremely kind and generous. They had all the foods that I like to eat all ready for me, and made me feel at home instantly. Bobbett is extremely knowledgeable in organic gardening and she has already taught me so much! I am so excited to get my garden started when I get home. The day after I got here, Saturday, it was sunny and hot so we had plenty of time to garden and learn. First we hoed and weeded the bean patch and garlic patches. Then we dug up all the weeds around the electric fence so that the weeds wouldnt short out the fence if they grew into it, then we dug up a bunch of raspberry bushes because they had a disease called 'orange rust' that cannot be removed and will kill her entire crop if she leaves it. Those bushes had thorns and we had to sterilize everything we touched after handling them because the orange dust is contagious to all other crops, and she could wipe out everything she grows if we werent careful. Then we had to go and dump all those bushes over a cliff on her friends property so the spores wouldnt blow back over her crops. Then we went to the lumberyard down the road and loaded up barrels of sawdust because that can be used for mulch as well as compost material. Then we were done for the day! Just a few hours of work that wasnt really work, and we got to relax for the rest of the day. This morning I was invited to church with Barbara and Walter, so I went because I was hoping to see some sort of show. I know the southern churches get really into their prayers and singing and I thought I would get to see some good stuff. But it was only about 15 people in total, and most of them were elderly white folks, so there was no singing and shouting like I hoped. But it was cool, and I wanted to show an interest in their activities. Then Bobbett and I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning out one of her barns where she cans all her produce. Bobbett's friend from down the road called her after that to see if I had made it here that Friday night, and to tell her about a problem she had been having with a goat that just had a baby. The mother goat was rejecting her kid, and since I happen to know a thing or two about goats and kids now, I offered to show them a few ways to fix that problem. So we went down the road to the other side of the pasture and met that family. The parents were raised Amish, but they are not Amish now. They are just very plain and still adopt most Amish beliefs. They do not have TV, but they do have a phone and a truck. They home school their 5 children and live off their land. They were incredibly nice and polite people, and they were very interesting to talk to. I explained to them about the goat situation and how to force her to accept her kid, and I actually got the mom to let her kid suck on her right away, so they were really impressed by that. They were very grateful for the advice, as they are brand new to raising goats and dont really know what they are doing. They are just winging things for now, so I showed them what to do in different situations and now they should feel more comfortable around the newborn kids and their moms. They were so nice, and I really enjoyed visiting with them and observing the way they live so plain. It really is a lot of work to live that way, and I have a ton of respect for them for living so pure and simple. They will be better people for it, and their children will be raised much better that way. That took up most of the afternoon, but we didnt have anything else to do so we just went home after that. We then went inside and she showed me how to 'bump up' plants from one pot to another. Her plants were not growing anymore because their pots were too small, so we put them in bigger pots with more dirt so they have more room to establish a bigger root system. She has been explaining all kinds of organic means of gardening, and I really am learning a lot. I feel like this might be harder than the work I did in Montana, only because working with animals comes naturally to me and makes sense, but these gardening tricks are difficult to understand at first. So this will take a lot more time to understand for me. After we bumped up the plants, we made dinner, ate all together, and then I went into the jacuzzi for a bit. After that Bobbett and I hung out in the entertainment room, and then I went upstairs, where I am now. I know Bobbett doesnt want to overwork me, but we just relax and do a bit of gardening, and she ends up teaching me so much in such a short amount of time. She also has a ton of cats, so I am learning more about them as well. I am not a fan of cats, but as a vet I will have to handle them, so I might as well learn about them while I can.

It is going to rain for the next few days, and we cannot garden when it rains, so Bobbett is going to show me around town and teach me how to make bread from scratch. Then we are going to make some jams from fruit she grew and she is going to show me how to can using the water-bath method. I am very excited about the canning process, and hopefully we can make a delicious cherry pie.

So as you can tell, my life is incredibly hard and stressful here, with all the work we do ;).

I am actually still pretty tired from driving and all the time changes. I dont know what time or day it is most of the time. I can already tell I am falling in love with this place and dont want to leave. It really is amazing here, and I would consider living out here someday. You guys should look into it for retirement. It is a paradise out here.

I have pictures, and I will take more as I get them

Love and miss you all,

Sam