Haunting a Cemetery on Halloween

Wednesday October 31, 2012

We awoke in the Stephen A. Forbes State Park CG in southern Illinois. When we came yesterday afternoon a sign on the booth at the entrance to the CG read, “select a site and the ranger will be around to collect”. We did (select sites) and he didn’t (come to collect). After  Wilma and Betty had made breakfast burritos and the ranger had still not appeared we drove out to the park office and there was still no one around to pay, so we departed.

At Barney’s insistence we drove into Kinmundy, IL to contact a funeral home and check on the location of a graveyard to look for some more of his family members. There was no one at the funeral home so Barney called the number on the door and got directions to the Phillips Cemetery. We drove to the cemetery, which Barney stumbled upon by sheer luck, and which took us back almost to Forbes State Park. Betty found several Rubble grave markers and copied the information from them. The Wind was blowing and it was pretty cold in the cemetery but we got the information. It was very nice to get back into the rolling caves. Barney will share the info with the rest of the Rubble clan.

Since we were close to Forbes State Park we went back to see if the ranger had appeared. He had not. We decided that we won’t be surprised to see a bill come in the mail from the Illinois State Parks when we get home. If we don’t see a bill from them the only thing we can do is say “Thank you Illinois”.

After a fuel stop in Salem, IL we drove west on route 50 toward St. Louis, where we had talked about stopping at the Gateway Arch to get a couple of stamps that we don’t have. On the way we decided that we didn’t really want to try to find a place to park the rolling caves, and decided to forgo the stamps for now. Fred and his friend, Garmin found a Steak & Shake near St. Louis where we made a quick stop for a Bronto-burger. We continued west on I-44, where we stopped at a rest area and Betty almost lost a leg to a lady who tried to talk her leg off while Fred and Barney looked at her hubby’s MG Midget and a motor scooter which had 37 miles on it. Both were housed in a trailer that they were pulling to Arizona.

We got to Rolla, MO too late to get a Trail of Tears stamp so we turned south on 63 to the lair of the 3 Musketeers in Houston. We arrived just after sunset and are camped in the driveway and ready for a shower and a couple of down days before we head for out stationary caves.

That’s it for now, more on the rock slab in a couple of days.