Hello from Evergreen, CO

Hello from Evergreen, CO

Tuesday morning October 6, 2009 (Third travelogue of this trip)

Sunday we drove a bit over 400 miles and ended up in Springfield, CO. Our day did not start well. When we travel on these trips, we carry quite a bit of luggage that contains Pat's Stampin' Up! Supplies for her classes and I have to take a lot of files. Saturday night I loaded several bags in the truck so that I would have an easier time on Sunday. Well, it rained during the night and it was pouring rain when I got up. I thought I had re-sealed the topper so that it would not leak, but I checked as soon as I got up and found quite a bit of water leaking in. I made a quick trip to Wal Mart and got a box of trash bags to put each piece in.

Then I started to load the last of the luggage and the cart decided to take off. It overturned and dumped my backpack in a large puddle. That bag had not one, but both of my computers in it! The backpack was pretty soaked, so I did not fire up either computer until they had at least 24 hours to dry out (I don't think they got all that wet, but we did not want to take a chance).

We tried to make it to a town that had a Holiday Inn so that we could have a good room. We needed to be settled in in time to watch the NHRA races. We finally had to settle for Springfield which only had three motels and all of them were straight out of the '50s! I was very discouraged about the room which had two standard size beds and two straight chairs. It turned out to be an acceptable room that seemed clean. The worst part was the races were rained out and the telecast was mostly clips from previous races.

Yesterday our trip was not too bad. We started out in fog, but it cleared up and the rest was nice weather. We arrived home mid-afternoon.

The service truck did pretty darn good on the last three trips. It is not a great highway truck, but it performed fine (except for the 10 MPG). I had added cruise control and that really helped with the longer drives. We put right at 4,000 miles on the truck in the last three trips. From now on, it will make the trips being pulled behind the bus.

We stayed in Shawnee for several extra days so that I could make a presentation to the Prevost Owners Group. They had a rally with about 60 beautiful and expensive coaches based on Prevost bus chassis. Many were probably sold new for close to $1 million dollars. I had a good group and can only hope that will translate to sales in the future. I felt kind of honored, as they only have vendor presentations by invitation.

Now, let's go back and pick up a few items from our stay in Oklahoma.

When we first drove around Shawnee, we saw several horse sculptures that were painted in very artistic patterns. I have attached a picture of one that was at the Sonic Drive-Inn. It turns out that the city established a program as an art project that helped to build civic pride, and benefited local charities. It was a part of their centennial celebration (http://www.shawneeok.org/HorseInTheCity/default.asp). Pat had heard that there were thirty horses in the project.

BTW, I heard from a good friend who noted that I must have found some sort of time machine, as I had us departing Goddard KS on 10/21 which has not occurred yet {grin}. I have corrected a couple of those dates. That is just proof that you should not write these blogs when you are wiped out.

In the last post I talked about our tour of the Oklahoma City Memorial. I only wish that I could find words to describe how moving the memorial and museum are. I have posted some pictures of the memorial.

This finishes up this travelogue. We do not plan to travel until we have the bus on the road. I plan to devote the next several weeks to getting it running again. Assuming that everything goes well, we are looking at two options. The first is to head to Florida for a large Bus Rally and a racing components trade show that I thoroughly enjoy. We would depart Evergreen in late November. The bus rally is ends on New Year's day. However, we need to be on the west coast in early January. That is a ton of miles and probably does not make economic sense. If we just head to the west coast, we will leave right after Christmas.

I will try to make at least one post in the interim to let folks know how the bus project is going.

That is all for now.

One of the decorated horses in Shawnee.

A map of the area around the bombing

The same area showing the memorial

The Memorial Reflecting Pool

The Reflective Pool in the foreground
and the Field of Empty Chairs in the background

Close up of the Field of Chairs
(the bases are illuminated at night)

Hello from Shawnee, OK

Hello from Shawnee, OK

Saturday evening October 3, 2009 (Second travelogue of this trip)

I simply can't believe it has been so long since I posted the first travelogue of this trip. Lots has happened since then.

We left Goddard, KS on Monday 9/21. We are staying at the Holiday Inn Express (map). If you look closely at the map (zoom in) you will see a big building just to the west and that is a huge Wal Mart. That makes it very handy to do quick shopping (just like when we are in the bus).

Tuesday we started setting up for a regional FMCA rally at the fairgrounds. The actual show was Thursday through Saturday. We did just OK in sales, but had lots of good leads. If any of those come to fruition, our sales will increase significantly. Part of the issue is that the sales tax here is 8.5% and that really gets folks attention on large dollar sales. Several folks said that they would order on the Internet and pay shipping. I did two seminars that were reasonably well attended and Pat did two craft classes. Her first one was full, but the second one was at 8:00 in the morning and that was too early for some of the ladies. It was about half full.

Monday (9/28) we drove to Tinker Air Force Base (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinker_Air_Force_Base). It is a huge (9 square miles) aircraft maintenance facility and has over 26,000 military and civilian employees. There we met up with some good friends who were staying in the “Fam Camp” (map) Many military bases have campgrounds that are available to active or retired military. This campground was very well laid out and would look like a good commercial campground. The campers are charged a nominal fee (about $12 at this location for full hookups). That fee is about 30-50% what you would pay for a commercial campground. In addition, they have full use of the facilities including the base exchange which is like a fully stocked Wal Mart. The prices are lower than public stores and they do not have to pay taxes. Our friends barbecued steak and we had a great time.

Getting onto the base was a real challenge. We had to travel around the outside of the base to a check station where we had to show our identification, truck registration, and proof of insurance. We then had to drive back to the gate close to the Fam Camp and undergo a full vehicle search (hood open, all utility doors open, etc). At least we felt secure.

Tuesday I worked in the room and took Pat to a close-by casino. This whole area is basically Indian reservation.

Wednesday we went back to Tinker and toured the base with our friends. From there, we went to nearby Oklahoma City and toured the Oklahoma City National Memorial and museum (http://www.oklahomacitynationalmemorial.org). This is located at the site of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. This was the terrible bombing that killed 168 innocent people including 11 children in a day care center in the building. The remains of the building have been cleared and a beautiful reflection pool and “Field of Empty Chairs” that honor those killed. There are 168 chairs arranged by the location and floor where the people were at the time of the blast. The children who were killed are marked with smaller chairs. I will post some pictures on the next blog (too tired tonight).

The museum was very well done and extremely emotional. It included a recording made at a Water Board meeting in a building adjacent to the bombed building. By the time we left the museum we were emotionally drained.

We returned to Tinker and had another cookout.

I will continue our Oklahoma stay in our next blog.

Tomorrow we will head home. It is about 700 miles. We will probably take two days to get home, but we are wiped out and may take three days.

That is all for now.