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Spring Escapade, 2006 |
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April 24, 2006: We began our trip to Chico a bit after noon on Sunday. Gwen had an early morning shift at the resort but I had nearly everything ready to go. Only one thing left to do, dump all three holding tanks since we had no sewer connection at our waterfront site. After waiting in line at the dump station, I pulled into my turn, lined up the outlet pipe with the reception trough and for the first time ever had a problem. I pulled the sewer valve first as always but this time nothing happened. The valve is now open with nothing coming out. I knew how to solve the problem but that requires water which I did not have. Nothing worked to get the sewage flowing so I pulled the grey water tank valves and emptied both grey water tanks. This wasn't going to slow down our fun so off we went toward Chico on Highway 97 to Weed.
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| It took 4-1/2 hours to reach Chico from the resort. We drove steady with only one rest area stop on the way. I made the 250+ mile trip on one tank of fuel, then filled up on Chico at $3.09 per gallon. |
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This is the first time I've seen this price tag on one tank of fuel. We arrived a bit after 5 pm so registration was closed. We were the last trailer to be parked for the evening. However, we were the first in line to get registered on Monday morning.
The entertainment on Sunday night was the Starlite Express from Bear River High School in Grass Valley, California. This was a fun and talented group appreciated by several thousand Escapees. |
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April 25, 2006: Today was a day for attending several RV Seminars such as the LED (light emitting diode) RV lighting seminar where I learned I could exchange my 38 heat producing light bulbs that cost me $1.50 each with LED light bulbs producing very little heat and using little power. They only cost $35 EACH. Let's see, $35 times 38 is ???? |
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| The entertainment for the evening was Willie (the puppet) and Company. Willie's friend is Peggy Miller who has performed nationally. Willie was entertaining and seemed to know much about the trials of an RV traveler. Gwen is about to visit one of the three "ROWS" below where there is a representative of all the Escapee chapters located nationally. We joined the Rogue Valley Chapter 37. They will be having a rally at Howard Prairie Lake Resort in August, we promised to help with the fun and reservations. |
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| April 26, 2006: I couldn't believe I was doing this but, yes, I played BINGO last night and won twice. We still just broke even with what it cost to play. This was probably the most boring game and I soon remembered why I hadn't played since I was five. Then Gwen went to the bathroom and I had to cover her six boards as well as my own six. Man, was I glad to see her return. |
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After attending a writing seminar today, Gwen returned (far left) to purchase a writing instruction CD and a book of women's RV tales edited by Alice Zyetz . This is one of the many vendors at the rally. There are outdoor vendors selling from their RV's and indoor vendors with booths. |
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| April 27, 2006: Gwen attended a BOF called Penwheelers. A BOF is a group with similar interests (birds of a feather). In this case, the Penwheelers are writers who generally write of their experiences while in an RV. There were |
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about 14 writers attending this meeting. Our assignment was to write a ten minute story using the keyword, "swimming pool". Gwen is looking forward to participating in the group.
Scott is the door prize host and announcer. Each evening he would entertain for about 15 minutes before announcing the door prizes with horrible blonde jokes. His jokes finally got better with "You might be an Escapee if ..." jokes. Those were funny only because we could all see ourselves in many of the comparisons. All the folks below are hoping to hear their names called for one of the fabulous door prizes. Gwen and I won a bottle of Protect-All's Quick and Easy Wash because I was sitting behind one of the main winners. |
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| This last day of the escapade was very warm for us. The lower temperature is inside the trailer while the upper temperature is outside. We were told we did not have the voltage to run our air conditioning so we did not turn it on. We are asked to vacate the Silver Dollar Fairgrounds by noon tomorrow so we should easily be on the road again before the heat attacks again. |
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April 28, 2006: During the escapade, many of the ladies made and sold hand crafted items. One of the most popular events was the "Show and Sell" craft day where a large room was set up for ladies and many men displayed their crafts for sale.
One of the seminars I attended featured Bud Carr, SKP #3 (our number is 91592) and the current member number has reached 95000. Bud is Vice President of the organization and son-in-law of Joe and Kay Peterson, the founders of Escapees. |
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| Of course, one of the fun things to do at the show is to shop. This booth makes badges and of course, everyone must have a badge. They always had a long line of Escapees ordering badges. Apparently they worked all night to get all badges ready because they were always available the next day. |
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I have stories to tell of the purchases we made and how these items were installed but that will wait until after our return to Howard Prairie.
Annie did her best to cope with the heat. She doesn't realize we are headed back to Howard Prairie where the high temperature is equal to the Chico LOW temperature. We won't see the Chico April high temperature until mid-July. |
| This last photo from the Escapade I took because I thought it was so funny. Of course those of us with satellite Internet all fought like crazy to get our DW6000 modems because they were better and faster. However, last fall the DW7000 was issued and upgrading to the DW7000 made the DW6000 obsolete with no place to make use of the DW6000. Apparently this is a SW6000 modem which was discarded next to a dumpster at the Escapade. The user was probably thinking that someone might find a use for it if they noticed it sitting next to the dumpster rather than inside the dumpster. I watched it for about ten minutes. A few Escapees picked it up and looked at it but no one walked off with it. |
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