This ancient Greek philosopher is known for, among other things, his theory that the universe and everything in it is in constant flux.

That sounds like Jim's and my life, for sure! We pride ourselves on being adaptable to the whims not only of the universe, but also of our own personal making. Sometimes being flexible is stressful but we are usually happy with the choices we make.

Jim and Casey on the golf cart path in our new neighborhood  (4-9-17)

Now we are once again making some major changes in our lifestyle.

This year's journal will be a big departure from the previous ones, with less focus on traveling and many fewer entries. Despite that, the year is more than half over when I'm actually writing this introduction. As you'll soon see, we've been very busy.

BRIEF HISTORY OF THIS WEB JOURNAL 

We started this online journal on our own website back in 2005 to chronicle our 2,200-mile Appalachian Trail Adventure Run/Hike from Georgia to Maine.

Celebrating the finish at Mt. Katahdin in Maine  (9-24-05)

We got so much positive feedback from readers around the world who enjoyed the adventure, information, and photos that I just continued presenting a web journal each year since, although not all of them are completed -- yet. 

For the next few years I focused primarily on the ultra-distance foot races we both ran, our training runs in beautiful places, and our RV travels all over the country.

 
View of Denali from the park road in Denali National Park (August, 2012)

After neither of us could run any more due to knee issues, we mostly stopped attending ultra-distance running events. The journal morphed, with a focus more on our extended RV travels, hiking, and cycling -- still in beautiful places all over North America.  

We enjoyed traveling so much that we sold our house in Virginia in 2014. We weren't homeless, just  house-free.

For the last three years we have been traveling and living full time in our comfortable 36-foot 5th-wheel coach, a 2010 Carriage Cameo, pulled by our 2008 Dodge Ram 2500 diesel pick-up truck and accompanied by our 2002 Honda Odyssey minivan, which came in very handy when we were parked for any length of time. You can see all three vehicles in the next photo:

 
Most of the campsites we've had while full-time RVing have had plenty of room for both the truck and car. 
This was our really long site at Peregrine Pines CG at the USAF Academy in Colorado Springs.  (6-5-16)

We saw even more of North America during those three years when we didn't go back to a house twice a year. We were literally all over the map, visiting places from Florida to Alaska and the Canadian Maritimes to California and many spots in between.

Although we enjoyed being house-free for most of that time, our lifestyle is morphing yet again with our decision to buy another house and suspend our RV travel for a while.

What??!! Yes, indeed. I'll explain the reasons later.

Our new home base (August, 2017)

This year's journal will continue to reflect the changes in our lives. It will still include some travel, lots of photos, and a variety of different topics reflecting the parts of our lives that we want to share with the world. We're not a total "open book." I don't write about everything or everyone in our lives because I want to protect the privacy of our friends and family. There's so little of that in social media today.

Note that this website is pretty much G-rated. I try to avoid controversial topics, although you may occasionally be able to guess our opinions and world views by some comments that slip in.

If that's too boring for you, just enjoy the photos!

TENTATIVE 2017 TOPICS

Although I've gotten seriously behind on updating this web journal in recent years I do try to stay current on each year's topics page. The entries you can read are underlined and have dates on the right.

Ignore the dates. I need them for the URLs for each page. The dates are often meaningless, although some do coincide with an event that occurred that day. Many of the entries in recent years are summaries covering several days, weeks, or even months. They may include some information in the future as well as in the past. For example, this introduction is dated January but was actually written and uploaded in August. I do try to keep entries organized in logical order.

 
Colorful waterfront at St. Mary's, GA  (1-12-17)

Some of the entries following this one will include:

*  a summary of the last three months we spent snow-birding at Eagle Hammock RV Park on  Kings Bay Submarine Base near St. Mary's, GA

*  lots of photos from two hikes at nearby Cumberland Island National Seashore,

Over 100 feral horses live on Cumberland Island; I saw dozens of them  
while hiking the trails and beach in January and March.  (3-22-17)

*  Jim's recovery from partial knee replacement and my cataract and knee surgery,

*  camping at Uchee Creek Campground at Fort Benning in Columbus, GA,

Some of the pull-through sites at Uchee Creek are really long.  (3-27-17)

*  our house hunt and temporary suspension of RV travel,

*  reasons we decided to take a break from full-time and even extended RV travel,

Jim and Casey paddle on Lake Peachtree, Peachtree City, GA  (6-26-17)

*  making our new home "ours" (lots of indoor and outdoor projects),

*  adopting and training a new Lab puppy (oh, my!),

And baby makes three . . . dogs, that is.  Cody (black Lab) is 14+ years old, Casey is 5 now,
and Holly, the new pup, was 8 weeks old when I took this picture. (7-29-17)

"I'm cute, but very high maintenance!"  (Holly at 10 weeks, 8-14-17)

Casey, Jim, and Holly (now 12 weeks) pose in the golf cart at Lake Peachtree.  (8-27-17)

*  and getting to know our new town by walking, cycling, and riding our golf cart on the large network of paved paths and paddling our kayak on its lakes.  

It's been a busy time, finding a new home and getting settled in . . . and that's my only excuse for being so far behind on our website!

I haven't been able to upload most of last year's entries, with tons of gorgeous photos from mountains and canyons out West, and it's near the end of August, 2017 before I'm even posting this year's introduction and topics page. <sigh>

 
Three friendly deer on the cart path just below our house  (5-18-17)

Wide cart bridge across wetlands in the Flat Creek Nature Area (8-28-17)

Stay tuned. Someday I will eventually fill in all the blanks from this and previous years.  

And someday we'll start traveling again. We toyed briefly with the idea of selling our 5th-wheel camper but have decided to just store it until the travel bug bites again. We know it will.

Note: We used to include our e-mail address on this website but took out the link several years ago. We no longer have the "runtrails@aol.com" e-mail address. If you'd like to contact us, the current address is "runtrails.net@gmail.com." There is a link at the bottom of this year's topics page.

Next entry: a summary of our last three months of snow-birding at Eagle Hammock RV Park on Kings Bay Sub Base near St. Mary's, GA

Happy trails,

Sue
"Runtrails & Company" - Sue Norwood, Jim O'Neil, Cody, Casey, and Holly-pup

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© 2017 Sue Norwood and Jim O'Neil