Putting in Some Miles

July 25-27; Heading West. As great as it was, from here on out there are no more people to visit, and no sights to see. We just want to find a place to set up camp for about four days. To do that we would need 2-3 good driving days, since we think we want to spend our four day camp in Colorado. That didn't start off too well since we didn't leave Gail and Ray's house until about 5:00 P.M. But we drove a few hours and camped out then had a long driving day yesterday before setting up camp at a very nice KOA on the western border of Iowa. Today we made great time driving across the plains of Nebraska and are spending the night at a campground in western Nebraska outside of Cabella's, a famous outdoor sports store. Tomorrow we will stop in Cheyenne Wyoming which is having their Frontier Days and maybe even go to a Rodeo. Then it's into Colorado, OUR 20TH STATE, tomorrow evening!!!

The American Girl Store and Wrigley Field

July 24-25; Chicago. On Saturday morning, our dear friend and former Tampa neighbor Gail McDermott met us at the house and we all took the train into the city. The girls were spending the afternoon at The American Girl Store and the boys were going to try to see the Cubs game at Wrigley Field. It was a memorable day. Abby (and Kit), Karen, and Gail had a terrific time at The American Girl Store shopping, getting Kit's ear's pierced, and having a fancy lunch. Wesley, Zachary, and I paid way too much money to a scalper on the street to get into the sold out Cubs v. Cardinals game at the historic Wrigley field. It is an awesome place, along the lines of Fenway Park in Boston. It was built in 1914 and it is a beautiful ball park. We had a great time. Of course we thought of Grandpa Merwald since the Cubbies are his team! We all met back at the train station for our ride home, and ended the evening playing games at Aunt Ruth's house. The next morning, we were supposed to leave early, but realized we had left a set of keys in Gail's car. So we then had to drive 45 minutes to Gail and Ray's house in Elgin to get our keys, which turned out to be a great thing to be able to see Ray and spend a few more hours with our dear friends from our Cheval neighborhood. We went out to brunch at their favorite local place and then back to the house briefly. Gail and Ray spoil our kids and always give them gifts. Ray, a collector, gave all three of our kids pocket knives - Abby's and Zack's to be used only under adult supervision of course. It was so good to see them and all the people we love in the Chicago and Michigan area over these past days. And what a rich time with Uncle Denny and Aunt Martha. They are like third grandparents to my kids now and I really felt like family with them. Our kids verbalized their visit with them as a highlight.

The Dunes of Lake Michigan

July 20-23; Warren Dunes State Park at Lake Michigan. Since our trip to the woodcarver delayed our departure from Ohio and made us stay an extra night, we were a day late leaving for Lake Michigan. Since we had family meeting us there on Tuesday, this meant a 6:00 A.M. departure and an eight hour drive on the 20th. I loved taking off in the morning when the kids are still asleep in their beds. So cool! We have a lot of family and friends in both Chicago and Michigan so we picked this park on Lake Michigan sort of between some of them so they could meet us there. It was a fabulous whirlwind of a time. Karen's Aunt Ruth and Uncle Denny arrived at our site about 5 minutes after we got there. After a short visit with them, and after climbing about 1,000 foot dune, we headed over to Karen's Uncle Rob's beach cottage in Bethany Beach for a great dinner. After dinner we had ice cream at "The Well" and then headed down to the beach for a bonfire, swimming, and s'mores. This was our first visit to The Great Lakes and it was awesome swimming in the fresh water. We even swam in the dark and didn't leave until we were forced to by a rain storm at just before midnight!! We didn't get to bed until 1:00 A.M. The next day we woke up only about 10 minutes before Karen's college friend Ginny Heiken and three of her kids arrived knocking on our door from Grand Rapids. We visited with them for a while and the kids got along great running up and down the dunes. We were about to go the beach when one of her daughters started throwing up, so I ended up taking five kids to the beach by myself for a few hours. After the beach we cooked out and had more s'mores, before our dear friends departed. The next day our friends from our church in Tampa came to visit for the day, Jessica Warner and her two boys. Brian couldn't make it. He is heading up a church plant outside of Chicago. We had lunch, climbed dunes, went to the beach, cooked dinner, then went to The Well for ice cream. On Friday morning, a bit exhausted, we packed up and headed towards Chicago for a stop at Aunt Ruth and Uncle Denny's to do some laundry, camper clean up, and relaxed visiting prior to going into the city on Saturday.

Amish Country

July 18-20; Visiting the Amish in Ohio. South of Canton, Ohio along Route 39 we visited the towns of Charm (no kidding), and Berlin. The largest population of Amish in the country live in this area. More than Pennsylvania or Indiana. We drove the entire scenic route, then toured the Yoder Family Farm. The tour was great. It included two homes, a schoolhouse, a large barn, and of course a buggy ride. The kids loved it and we learned about about the different orders of Amish, how they live today, and the history of how they arrived to the area. A highlight was the kitchen, where they were cooking and baking, and of course selling some of their goodies. We bought cookies, peanut butter made with marshmellow in it, and bread. Yum! After touring Amish country, in the town of Dover, we toured the former home and a museum housing all the carvings of a man named Warther (Warther knives) who is known as the world's master carver. This side trip was too amazing to have room to write about. This man carved perfectly accurate replicas of each steam locomotive designed in U.S. history using wood, and ivory. Incredible, with moving parts. Each one took about a year. He was offered large sums of money for them but turned it down and died a poor man. He said, "A man doesn't sell his hobby." He was also famous for carving small working pliers out of a small piece of wood just by making cuts in it, and made 750,000 of them in his lifetime, usually for children while he was talking to people. His grandson still works there and carved pliers for the kids. It was incredible.

Walmart Camping

July 17, 2010; somewhere in western Pennsylvania. We were pretty wiped out after our New York driving ordeal so decided not to even try to make it to the next campground. We decided to spend the night in the parking lot of the first Super Walmart we could find (they allow RVs and trucks to park overnite). This Walmart was up high on a ridge and there was a nice strong breeze so we opened the windows before we headed into a quaint little town for dinner. We found a small pizzeria and got a table outside right be a large beautiful fountain. After dinner we headed back to the camper to watch a movie we had rented from The Red Box and then headed off to sleep. The only disadvantage to camping at Walmart in addition to the obvious fact that there are no hook-ups and you have to run your generator all night for power is that it's quite bright unless your RV has total light blocking shades, which ours apparently does not. In the morning, I walked across the shopping center to Panera's to pick up coffee for Karen and me and pasties for the family, and we hit the road.

POLICE ESCORT!!!

July 17, 2010. We were a bit anxious about our departure from New York after our ride in, so we carefully mapped it out. We were to travel north on Route 9W, a route 18 wheelers regularly travel up past West Point to Interstate 84. Unfortunately, we made a wrong connection about a third of the way up, and ended up on Route 6 West. We had considered that route initially since it was a bit shorter, and since we saw trucks on it we thought we were ok. Again unfortunately, after passing through and across Bear Mountain Park we approached a large traffic circle (this was obviously where the 18 wheelers then went a different way) and continued around it to follow the route we were on. But just as I turned off the circle, I spotted the sign! "Palisades Parkway, Passenger Cars only." There was room off the road, so I was able to quickly pull over right away, just prior to where the center divider began. We then sat there for about 45 minutes considering our options. We could have made a u-turn but decided it just wasn't safe. So we ended up calling the State Troopers and also speaking to the Parks Police. They told us that if we drove up to the first exit on the parkway, we would be able to get off and turn around. Just as we pulled back onto the parkway, we heard the siren and horn of a police car pulling us over. Although I've never in my life been so happy to see those lights in my mirror, I wasn't sure where he wanted me to pull over, but it was evident he wanted me to stop so I just stopped right there in the right lane of the parkway. I told him how glad we were to see him and that we had called them. He confirmed that there was an exit ahead, but stated that there was one overpass PRIOR to that exit. He said he was "pretty sure" that we could clear it, but said he would follow us just in case to see what happened!!!??" Holy, Shmoley, Batman!!! Are you kidding? We said many prayers as we passed under at 30mph, with the police car holding back traffic. The nice policeman then followed us as we exited, then held traffic again as we made a turn to get back on the parkway back to the circle and then back on the 9W north up to Interstate 84. Although the New York visit itself had been wonderful, we were never so glad to see a freeway and even the state line into Pennsylvania!!! We'll be sticking to the interstates for a while.

The Big Apple; and THE BIG SCARE

July 15-17; Croton on the Hudson and New York City. After Rhode Island we headed to Westchester County north of New York. We had decided to camp at a county park right on the Hudson River called Croton on the Hudson. To get there we had mapped out our route up north along the river on a route we thought would be fine. All of a sudden as we are driving along, we see a sign just prior to an overpass that says, "11' 1"" Our RV is 12' 6"!!!! Just as I am braking and hitting my flashers, all in a panic, a truck passes us and goes right through! We then realized that the left lane was safe; only the right lane had the low clearance. The overpass was arched. So we moved over to the left lane and made it. Then we saw another one, still very nervous, and almost couldn't get over to the left lane before we finally decided to just stay in the left lane. The whole thing was quite a bit more nerve racking than I can even express here for some reason, and we were more than a bit relieved to reach our destination. I really should write to the NY Dept of Transportation and ask them why their signs don't say, "Right Lane, 10' 1"? It might prevent some accidents, or at least panicked drivers. Once we made it to the park, it was quite nice. On Friday we planned to take the 45 minute train ride to Grand Central Station in the city to see if we could get tickets to a Broadway play, a first for our kids. We waited in line for the discounted same day tickets and got tickets to Mary Poppins. After getting our tickets we had dinner at Carnegie's Deli, famous for it's outrageously large $16 sandwiches. The hot pastrami is incredible, as is the strawberry cheesecake. The play was fantastic - big time Broadway with dancers walking up walls and across the ceiling and Mary Poppins flying out over the audience. Great music; great dancing; and a fabulous cast. We loved it.

Rhode Island

July 10-15; Visiting Rob's Family in RI. My Mom ("Memer" to my kids) laughed when we pulled around the corner of the street I grew up on for my final years at home. We parked "the Beast" in her driveway then spent the afternoon over at my sister Nancy's house swimming and cooking out. On Sunday we headed down to Fishermen's Memorial State Park to set up camp near all the beaches. The first two days were great weather and we spent most of the days at Scarborough Beach and then the evenings at the campsite. My awesome Mom had dinners prepared for each night and drove all the food down to the campsite. We had some awesome times sitting around the campfire, cooking s'mores, singing, and telling old stories. It was great to get to know Andrew's girlfriend Jackie and Amibeth's boyfriend Kevin. On the second night down at the beach, it began to pour rain as we were leaving the beach. We actually served spaghetti and meatballs and salad INSIDE our camper with 13 people and played guitar and charades as well. It was a good night. The next day we drove back to Warwick to spend the day at my sister's house. My brother-in-law Gary treated my to my first civilian haircut as well as a hot towel and lather shave at a high end place called Gents or something like that. I ended up keeping a gotee (spelling?) which Karen kind of likes but not so sure how much longer it will last. And we FINALLY were able to get the oil changed in our RV's generator! HIGHLIGHTS and MEMORIES: Homecooked favorites from Mom; Clamcakes and Chowder at Iggy's; 13 people for dinner and games in the Beast; hanging out with family at my sister's and Mom's houses and at the campsite; sleeping the first and last nights in my old bedroom with my entire family; kids asking on the final night, "Do we have to leave? Can't we just stay here until Colorado?." It was a sweet visit and too short. It get's harder and harder to leave.

Advice: Rookie RV Drivers Should not Arrive at Night

July 8-10, 2010; Mystic, Connecticut. As I said we arrived in Mystic fairly late, around 9:00PM. Normally when you arrive at most campsites they escort you to your site with a golf cart and ensure you can get in ok. When you arrive after 8:00PM, they have an envelope with your name on it taped to the door of the office with a map inside. We actually did quite well. Although we missed the final turn on the way into the campground, we were blessed once again as we approached some building in the middle of nowhere with an unusually large parking lot so we could turn around (normally missing any turn can mean a delay of a half hour or more as you can't just turn around anywhere with one of these things!). Inside the campground, I walked ahead to do a little recon of our site which was fortunately a "pull-through" (as opposed to having to back in) and was on an end by a small road. So it was a piece of cake as we were blessed once again. Although it was late, we ate sandwiches and cuddled up to watch Herbie Fully Loaded before heading to bed at about midnight. Today has been a very relaxing day of hanging around the campsite, playing, swimming, and sitting around the campsite drinking coffee. We slept in til about 9:30, cooked French toast while Karen walked, swam in the pool, played miniature golf, and board games in the camper. Weather is beautiful, about 84 degrees with mixed clouds and sun. Of course we'll build a fire tonight, and this campground also has an outdoor movie showing, which the kids want to go to. Tomorrow, we're off to RI where we'll spend the afternoon at my sister's pool and then sleep one night at my Mom's before heading to Fishermen's Memorial State Park for four nights.

City Driving 101; Off-Road Driving 101

July 8, 2010; Drive an RV through Manhattan - are you kidding me? Since we were now driving the most direct route, or intending the quickest route to RI, we foolishly decided to risk going straight through New York City on Route 95, over the George Washington Bridge. Well, not only did we hit major traffic for two hours inching through northern New Jersey into and through New York City, but also: (1) New York drivers don't really care how big you are or how long you've had your turn signal on so this requires really looking ahead and being ready for each move; (2) It costs about $40 in tolls with an RV towing a car; and (3) It doubles as Off-Road Driving 101 because the roads are so bad!!! It's a minor miracle this house on wheels is still in one piece and our car is still attached. By the way, I don't think we saw one fellow RV in all of New York City. I wonder why?

ONE DAY - SEVEN STATES!!!

July 8, 2010; Our Longest Drive. Yes, you read correctly - seven states. To do this, depart northern Virginia on Interstate 81 North and take it all the way to 78 East; then take Route 95 North. The 81 heads through West Virginia, then a small section of Maryland and up into Pennsylvania. Upon heading east in PA, we drove to New Jersey, then north on the 95 through New York City and into Connecticut. That's seven states in one day. With a hard date of the 10th to arrive in RI to camp near the beach there and see my family, we had planned to stop and camp in Pennsylvania, but then decided to get a little closer. Unfortunately, we couldn't find a convenient place with an opening, and actually ended up camping only an hour from my Mom's and sister's places (Warwick, RI) in a KOA outside of Mystic, Connecticut. We didn't want to drive straight in because it was late and because we actually had planned a day in there of a camping and no-drive day, so we are here in Mystic for two nights.

Blue Ridge Parkway with an RV? Close call...

Another Blessing through a fellow RVer... One of the highlights of our trip was to be traveling along the Blue Ridge Parkway from Asheville, NC up to northern Virginia. It is well know as one of the most beautiful drives in the country, and we had planned to drive it and camp along the way for multiple days. Since we were so far behind schedule due to our RV swap, we were not going to be able to drive the whole thing, but still planned on doing some of it. I had googled "RVing the Blue Ridge Parkway" and read stories about folks doing it, so figured it was ok. What I didn't catch was that those articles were written by folks with a Class C RV which is not as high and what should have googled was height restrictions on the Blue Ridge. Anyways, as I said we were blessed by intervention through a new friend, who literally laughed when we told him we were going to drive some of the Parkway!!! He then informed us of the reality that a 12' 6" RV could not pass through many places on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Maybe some other day in a different vehicle....

Through the Battlefields of Northern Virginia

July 7-8; Shenandoah KOA - Northern Virginia. We headed north out of North Carolina on Interstate 81. To get to the 81 we actually had to head back into Tennessee for a bit then into Virginia. On the night of the 7th we stayed in an absolutely beautiful KOA in northern Virginia. Very wooded with absolutely huge sites, lots of trees, and large rock fire pits. We camped on the outer edge of the campgrounds and from our campfire and picnic table could see no other campers, so it really felt we were camping alone in the middle of the woods - probably a bit too much so for one member of our family (Karen!) who was a bit nervous as it grew pitch black with the exception of the light from our campfire. We liked this place so much that we considered staying another day but decided we needed to make up a little more ground to get to Rhode Island in time for our reserved site at the state park up there.

The Asheville "Almost Emergency"

Rob pinned to RV as Karen goes for Help... Almost forgot our Asheville departure excitement. We were up unhooking a little early to try to get on the road before the kids woke up. We were bringing in the awning, which is not an electric one on our model. We forgot to hold the cloth string handle, and as the awning quickly rolled up towards the RV, Rob decided to try to stop it so it wouldn't slam into the RV and wake up the kids. Unfortunately, with his fingers wrapped around the brace that would in about 0.4 seconds slam into the RV, HE FAILED!!! We were both calm, although I was in quite a bit of pain. Karen tried everything to pull back the awning, but we were both forgetting one small step of releasing a particular latch. Just as I was about to tell her to get a claw hammer and break the awning brace to release me, we saw a neighbor and I told Karen to go ask him for help. Fortunately an experienced RVer, he recognized our missing step and was able to pull it back. I was very blessed to have no serious injury, only some pain, soreness, and minor swelling. After a bit of ice, we were on our way. I won't be putting my hand between our RV and the awning again any time soon.

THE MOUNTAINS

July 5-7; Asheville, North Carolina. From Tennessee we took another "not so direct route" and headed over east and south a bit towards Asheville, NC. We wanted to visit the Smokey Mountain National Forest, and also the town of Cherokee and the Cherokee Indian Reservation. My great grandmother was a full blooded eastern Cherokee. The drive through the mountains in the national park was quite beautiful, and also quite an inauguration to driving since it is all up and down with sharp curves and narrow lanes. I was actually happy to see a freeway again, just to rest my hands and get a bit of blood back to my knuckles. After passing through the national forest we first entered the town of Cherokee, which reminded me of a mini-Las Vegas in the country. Very crowded on the holiday weekend but very interesting with lots to see. Then it was on to the reservation where we toured an authentic replica of an eastern Cherokee village from the mid-1800's - with demonstration of all their crafts and weapon making, their structures, clothing, etc. - all instructed from current members of the tribe. The kids enjoyed it too, and no one fussed or cried the entire time!!! Finally, we made it to a beautiful campground just outside of Asheville where Karen's cousin Dave Gibson and his wife Brenda and their four children met us at our campsite for s'mores and good times catching up around the campfire. The next day we jumped in the car and headed for some swimming in nature at Looking Glass Falls and The Sliding Rock in the Pisgah National Forest. The Sliding Rock is literally a long slide over natural rock into a 10 foot deep spring of ice cold water. You slide on your bottom on smooth rock. The falls are about 100 feet high and it was awesome to swim up to and under them. That night we did some fishing at the lake and Wesley and Zack both caught catfish, although neither was the biggest catch of their lives. After a late dinner, we were off to sleep before spending one more night in Asheville and then heading north.

Knoxville, Tennessee

July 4-5, 2010. Sweetwater, Tennessee. Tonight we are just south of Knoxville, Tennessee at a wonderful little KOA campground. I've never stayed at a KOA before and if they are all as nice as this one I'm hooked. It's beautiful and clean. The kids played on this huge tennis court sized jumpy thing; we took our dog Lucy to run in this little dog park they have; then we all swam in the pool. After that, it was back to "The Beast" to cook out. We finally camped somewhere with a fire pit (every night the kids have been asking for a fire!) so we got some wood and of course s'mores ingredients and had a great campfire, with Karen playing the guitar and everything. Off to bed now before heading to Asheville, North Carolina tomorrow!

Catching Up with Family

July 2-4, 2010. Family Visits. From St. Augustine we headed north for our longest day on the road, something like nine hours. We headed up to Locust Grove, Georgia, just south of Atlanta to stop and visit my cousin, who also happens to be my Godmother. All of her children and grandchildren live within a two mile radius, and they were all there to greet us. We felt like Young Life kids getting off the bus at camp, with the whole crowd greeting us and taking pictures as we got off our "bus." They have a pool and a trampoline so the kids had a blast with the grandkids. And the adults had a wonderful time catching up and getting to know each other. I hadn't seem a couple of them in ten years or more. They are all Christians and just a wonderful family.......... The next morning we headed to Oxford, Alabama just a couple of hours away to visit my grandfather and my Uncle Mike. The highlight there was our very own fireworks show in the front yard last night. It was great to see them, and always a bit sad because our visits are so far and few between.

On the Beach in St. Augustine

June 30 - July 2, 2010. Two nights in the oldest city in America. Happy Birthday, Karen! We got an early start out of Jupiter before the kids were even awake. Yes, it took me only two days to give up my previous decision to travel strictly with everyone buckled up for at least a while. Karen and I closed down the RV, unhooked, and even closed the slides as the kids slept and pulled out of there with all three sound asleep. Can't do that with a travel trailer!! We headed north. When the kids woke up hungry, we pulled over to a rest area and fixed a little breakfast right here in the RV. Same thing for lunch. In between, although we all stay buckled much of the time, the kids played board games at the dining table, watched movies lying in their bunks, and even went to the bathroom all while driving. Yes, we made the right decision after all of that. That night we pulled into an awesome RV park right on the beach. As soon as we plugged in, we put on our suits and walked about 200 yards to the beach and spent an hour or so swimming in the Atlantic. Then we came back and cooked burgers and ate outside (with no mosquitos!). It's an awesome place and it was my favorite evening since the cruise. Nancy (my sister) - you would love it here!!! This morning we woke up on Karen's birthday; I cooked bacon, eggs, and toast; then we headed into town for some sightseeing in America's oldest city, starting with the fort built in the late 1600's by the Spanish, which was later held by the British during the American revolution. We walked the streets, had lunch at The Cuban, then headed back to the camp for some more fun on the beach followed by birthday cake to celebrate Karen's day. This is a place we could definitely stay a few more days, but we are way behind schedule, so we are hitting the road first thing in the morning and will finally leave the state of Florida.

Our Mosquito Nightmare in the Everglades

June 28-29, 2010. Collier State Park, The Everglades. Since we lost a week, we had to forego our trip to the keys, but decided to head down to the top of the Everglades, something the kids had wanted to see. Although we knew it would be buggy, we had no idea what we were in for that first night. What were we thinking? Couldn't we see the writing on the wall when we checked into the state park and the ranger told us we had our pick of spots since THERE WAS ONLY ONE OTHER OCCUPANT IN THE ENTIRE PARK? Apparently not. We pulled in and parked The Beast and set up camp. As evening approached, the mosquitos were relentless. We thought we'd be safe in The Beast but somehow they got in by the dozens. Karen and I survived but the mosquitos, otherwise known as the Florida State Bird, really like young kids' blood and they suffered many many bites. Needless to say, we cancelled our second night in the Everglades! Before we left, however, on the morning of the 29th we made it all worth it, as we had a private guide take us through about 200 acres on an air boat. The ride was a blast, at various speeds and even some doughnuts thrown in. But the highlight was our fortunate luck coming head on with a huge alligator (about 10-11 feet). We stopped the boat and FED THE ALLIGATOR MARSHMELLOWS! Got amazing pictures. And our crazy guide, trying to thrill us for a bigger tip I suppose, actually bends over and touches the alligator numerous times, showing us his ears and stuff. I'm thinking and saying, "Ok, that's good Captain Gary. I don't really want to have to drive this thing back after putting a tourniquet on your arm; and I don't know how to get back anyways...!!!!" Thus far, this was the highlight of our trip. After that, we checked out of our mosquito infested campground and headed east across Alligator Alley as it's called towards the east coast of Florida and bedded down for the night in a cozy little campground in a town called Jupiter.

The Beast

June 27, 2010. On the Road - finally. After receiving instruction on our new RV and moving from our travel trailer over to the RV on Saturday, we were finally ready to get on the road on Sunday. Somehow last minute tasks like laundry and getting some food and learning to hook up the car took longer than we had thought and it was after 2:00 before we knew it. We were anxious to hit the road, however, so decided to just drive down to Sarasota, just an hour or so away. Just as we were ready to pull out, however, huge thunder storms and torrential rains began. I was a bit nervous about my first drive being in storms and rain, and we almost chickened out, but eventually decided to go for it. So, at about 3:00, nine days late, we pulled out of Lazydays in a new Winnebego Sightseer (now named "The Beast" by our family), with a 2007 Honda CRV in tow. It was the right decision! This thing is a house on wheels! Anyways, the rains continued and it was a little hairy but we made it to Sarasota and spent our first night in The Beast at a nice little RV park not too far off the 75.

A Week at Lazydays...

June 18-27, 2010. A Week at Lazydays...our RV Exchange Adventure. The original plan was to depart with our new travel trailer the day we returned from the cruise. To make a long story short here, we realized we had made a huge mistake. First, we had given up our original vision of "RVing" across the country, where the drive itself is half the fun. But secondly, I hated pulling such a huge trailer (35 feet) so much that we decided to trade in a two week old travel trailer for an RV. The next few days were spent finalizing that decision, finding an RV that would work for us, working financing issues, and trading in our SUV for a small car which we could tow with the RV. That little process took eight days! We made the most of it during that process, camping at the Lazydays campground for free. Although our journey was delayed, our experiences we had envisioned began as best we were able in the midst of our business. We swam in the pool; cooked full meals in our camper; played board games; had Bible studies; and watched movies. One night, the thunder and lightning was so bad Karen and I were a bit nervous, and we all watched a movie lying on the floor in the center of the trailer away from the windows! Cozy, but a relief when that storm was over. Our amazing salesman Dave also got us a complimentary two day pass to "The Crown Club," which is a nice club exclusive to those who spend $300,000 or more on an RV (not us of course). They serve complimentary breakfast, lunch, and an afternoon Happy Hour. Finally, we also now had a Yakama roof rack which we couldn't use but had no time to sell of course. This gave us a good excuse to call our good friends back in Tampa, the Voth family and ask them if they would like it. When they came to pick it up, we had a nice visit with them at the campground, the second half of which was also during a thunder storm. So all eleven of us were hanging out in our travel trailer. We really enjoyed seeing them all. We were exhausted from our business ordeal and a bit homesick... Thanks Jeff and Molly!