Leroy's Day Off

Hello,

Yesterday we went to three garage sales even going to one twice as we saw the sign for it from a different direction. Obviously we do not know well the streets of this city. Leroy had hoped to find some good stamp buys at one of them, but he had all of the things this woman had out. She has been collecting for 80 years as she is now 89. She and Leroy might get together to make some trades. She was quite an interesting character.

After garage sales we headed off to Navoo, Illinois, 1840’s home to Joseph Smith and the Latter Day Saints. There we took an hour horse drawn wagon tour of the restored sites. Following that we browsed in the visitor’s center. It was quite interesting. I certainly learned a lot including that Navoo was once the largest city in Illinois. The Latter Day Saints only spent about seven years there as they were discriminated against and left for the west before there was more danger to their body and soul.

It seems likely that many visitors were Mormon judging by the many Utah, Idaho, and Montana license plates on vehicles. All of the sites were free and many of the activities as well. That also seems to be a sign that it was well supported by the Mormons. Most of the workers were Mormon missionaries. I was a bit concerned that there might be some proselytizing, but that did not happen at all. There was enough to see there that we could have spent the entire day, but we are close enough to go back if we like.

We decided to eat lunch at Fort Madison, IA to avoid all the tourists. I thought perhaps we could explore that area a bit, but Leroy was all eager to get home to rest as he had a wedding rehearsal for which he needed to be at church by 4:00.

The bridge over the Mississippi at Fort Madison is quite old. It has a curious shift in position just as you get up over the river. It is a toll bridge and at first we thought that was why there was such a line of cars as we got just close to the curve place. In a bit we became aware that cars were not moving at all. Thinking it might be the bridge opening for river traffic; Leroy got out and looked, but could see nothing. Later we did see some movement so we think that was the cause of the delay as it did not take long once the line started to advance to pay our dollar and move on across the narrow bridge to a shift back to the original latitude at the opposite end of the structure. When we came back we did notice that semis were forbidden to use the bridge as were any vehicles that measured too long. I thought the bridge just was an added attraction to our outing.

Paula