Forest City, IA

We arrived at the Winnebago factory in Forest City, IA around one o’clock following a nice leisurely drive up from Clear Lake. The drive took us through rolling farm country, and as we are approaching harvest time we were treated to beautiful scenery and moderate temperatures. Lots of folks beat us to the service center and the spaces in front were all taken. We were able to find a space at the visitor center on a slight hill overlooking the service area lot.

We are packed in pretty tight here, so only have slides out on one side of the coach. 

We were sure to dump all waste and stock up on water in Clear Lake because we knew that we would only have electrical hook ups here at the factory.

Once settled in we walked Nia a bit and then settled din to watch America’s Cup racing. The weather cooperated and race one for the day was a very close one. Oracle Team USA managed to hold off the New Zealand boat to win by twenty seconds. They won the second race by a slightly better margin. They now need to win four races to take the cup. The bad news is the Kiwis only need to win one more and the cup heads down under.

The Night The Music Died

Morning dawned fresh and clear and was such a wonderful change from the humid heat of Florida. By early morning the heater was coming on about every ten minutes, and since it is below the bedroom it was waking me up frequently. It had good reason to be coming on since it got down to 39 overnight!

We went in to the town of Clear Lake to the farmer’s market and a walk down Main St. While small, unlike in the Orlando area, this market had farmers and their produce. We went in search of corn on the cob, but came away with peach habanero jelly! I would say, “COOL”, but the lady that canned it says the opposite.

Barbara found a wonderful antique store on Main St. and picked up some cute wooden boxes. Main St. runs right down to the lake where there is a nice park and band shell. Clear Lake is really a wonderful little town, but while peaceful now, it is very busy during the summer.

My main interest in coming here was to visit the Surf Ballroom, which the older folks will know as the site of the last concert of Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and The Big Bopper. After the show they departed in an aircraft that crashed a few miles from the airport. The ballroom eventually fell into disrepair, but was restored in 1998. It has been a successful venue for top acts ever since.

The lobby area walls are filled with autographed photos of the people that have played there. Every rock, country, and big band group that you can think of has played here. It is a real historical place. The Green Room of the stage where the acts would wait their turn to take the stage bears the signatures of all the acts since the renovation. Pretty interesting. I was impressed at the size of the facility. 

There is a large dance floor and seating for hundreds at tables on three sides of the ballroom. Sorry the picture of the ballroom is a bit blurred, but the phone camera can only capture so much.

You can visit the site of the crash. We drove out into the corn and soybean fields and parked along side the road near the trailhead that leads to the site. At some point the farmer evidently became tired of people wandering through his bean fields and fenced in a path to the site. Someone has marked the trailhead with a large pair of Buddy Holly’s trademark black rimmed glasses. It is about a half-mile walk through the soybean field to the site, which is marked by some small steel sculptured memorials. It looks like many people that visit leave little memorial items, but they evidently are not cleaned out very often so things do look a bit shabby.

We returned to the campground to watch the Virginia Tech game, but found we did not get ESPNU. Rather than go out again we decided to just relax in the wonderful clear air. Our next event was to watch America’s Cup racing, but it was delayed and eventually cancelled due to unfavorable wind. New Zealand only needs one more win to rap this up, so we will tune in again tomorrow to see what unfolds.

Tomorrow we will be in Forest City at the Winnebago factory for service starting Monday.

Clear Lake, IA

It was much cooler when we awoke this morning in Amana. It turns out there was some damage in the park last night when that storm came through. All we suffered was a lens blown off of one of the rear marker lights. Duct tape to the rescue.

There is not much to report today. We drove up to Clear lake, IA and got settled in at the Oakwood RV Park in time to watch today’s America’s Cup races. 

The AC72 catamarans are something to watch. They are extremely fast when they are up on foils, but the first race of the day was in very light winds and they could not finish the race in the allotted forty minutes. A good thing for the US team who were 1200 meters behind when the race was called. One win by the Kiwis and they take the cup home to New Zealand. The second race of the day was more successful, not only because there was more wind, but because Oracle Team USA won.

Once the races were over we got the grill out and fixed smoked brats that we picked up in Amana yesterday. Ahh, life is certainly good.

Tomorrow we will explore Clear Lake. I think I earlier referred to the Crystal Ballroom as the place Buddy Holly played his last concert. But I had that wrong. It is called the Surf Ballroom. Pictures tomorrow.

Amana Colonies, Iowa Day Two

Barbara and I really enjoy getting away from the built up metropolitan areas and out into the country. Frankly, the people are much nicer and life’s pace is, well, livable. The scenery is gorgeous, too.

Many of the early immigrants to this country were fleeing persecution for their chosen way of life or religion. The founders of the Amana Colonies here in Iowa were such people. The Insperationalists left Germany in the mid-1800s and formed a communal culture that grew to six villages. They lived in large communal homes housing 30-40 people and ate in communal dining houses. All of the property surrounding the homes was put in to service as gardens to grow the food that would sustain them through the year. They were farmers and craftsmen that pooled resources. This way of life continued until 1932 when, following the death of the groups leader, the resources and assets were distributed among the member families and they developed a more capitalist economy. The homes and many of the crafts are proudly displayed in museums and shops. Tourism and artisan products augment the agrarian economy. There are plenty of artists, craft shops, and antique shops in the villages. Oh, let’s not forget appliances! Whirlpool’s Amana division is based here.

Fun Rube Goldberg like sculptures. The windmill powers...

...This sawyer. A video would have been better, but he saws the log.

Barber took a little extra off, but we are having fun.

Honey, I shrank my husband.

The two major restaurants in Amana echo the German heritage of the region, and Barbara and I had a great German beer and sauerbraten for lunch. I about lost my head when I told the waitress we were happily done and she strode off. I looked across the table and noted that we were definitely not BOTH happy. Barbara had her eyes on chocolate cream pie. I quickly called the waitress back.

Early in the evening we were bemoaning Oracle USA’s standing in the America’s Cup racing in San Francisco when I noted a weather warning on the iPhone. (Thank you WeatherBug) I looked at the radar and noticed a wall of weather approaching from the west and suggested that we pull in the slides that expand the volume of the motor home and make it a more comfortable abode.  The motor home is more stable and better sealed against the weather with the slides in. Good thing we did. 

A gust front hit us with substantial force and rocked us around a good deal. It brought a torrent of rain. The local airport reported winds of 50 miles an hour, but it was impressive what ever the official reading was.

Tomorrow we are off to Clear Lake, Iowa

Amana Colonies, Iowa

OK, those of you that have been paying attention are correct. I am late. Normally I get this blog going as soon as we leave, but alas, this is the third night on the road. I have even been sneaky enough to not set off the SPOT locator in hopes of avoiding detection.

I spent most of Sunday afternoon trying to get the Dish Network service up and running. We went with Dish over DirecTV because they offered a pay-as-you-go plan allowing us to not pay for the several months each year that we do not use the service. Sounded good in theory, but in practice it has been a pain in the gluteus maximus. It has been a royal pain to get the service restarted each time, and in this case it was made worse by the failure of the two year old receiver. The customer service representative on the phone (in the DR as it turns out) said all I had to do was UPS the defective unit to them and they would send a replacement. Hello! I am leaving in the morning for six weeks! OH, well maybe we can get a technician out to you. “Just sit in the motor home from noon to five and he should show up”. An hour later the dispatcher for the local techs called me to confirm the appointment and get a feel for the problem. He said, “no way that he could help with that, they do not do motor homes”. I should “try one of the equipment retailers”. Shortening the story a bit, I went to the local Camping World and bought a new receiver and after two more hours on the phone with the Dish people I had the system working. Now to get local channels on the road I must call them and have them change my service location each time I stop at a new location. This requires at least thirty minutes of hold time and conversation trying to explain what I am doing to the customer service people that are not familiar with the plan. They do home stuff after all, not RVs.

Why do I go through all of this? Simple: DWTS.

Monday we loaded up the last minute stuff like food, and the dog, and were on the road by 1100. 

We timed our departure to be sure not to miss the love-bug season. 

This time I prepared a bit and RainX’d the windshield, so when we arrived at dusk in Jackson, GA (just in time for the peak mosquito period) the hundreds of bug bodies came off with minimal effort with a bucket of suds and a long handled brush.

With cleaning out of the way I cranked up the sat dish. After all the trouble the day before, we now did not have local channels because trees blocked our view of the satellites. Luckily, I was able to get over-the-air reception just as the show started. Ahhh, she-who-must-be-obeyed was happy.

Not much to report for Tuesday. We stopped in Marion, IL and despite calling in our new address the Dish people messed it up and we did not have local channels available. Luckily, the campground had cable, so I got us hooked up. Reception was not great, but as it turned out the new season of the show we were after does not start until next week.

Nice day to cross the big muddy

Tonight everything is working fine, but we are not interested in TV. Besides, Barbara has Golden Retriever Rescue tasks to perform and I have this blog to keep me entertained. Thank you for putting up with my rant. If you are an RV’r contemplating the pay-as-you-go Dish plan I would offer this advice. If you are a seasonal user spending a season at one location, and then going home, it is probably a good system. If you are going to do multiple trips to differing locales during the year you might be better served with just paying for the fulltime service. You will still need to call in for address changes to get local channels, but I do not think that is any different than DircTV. Just put up with it until they reinstate Distant Network Services, which allows either west or east coast network reception, so you get the network shows.

This was our third long driving day. We got settled in at Amana Colonies RV Park in Amana, IA. It is a nice big facility and it is a good time of year to be here. There are about thirty RVs with space for over four hundred. There is plenty of elbowroom. The park is in a farming valley and is surrounded by cornfields.

While I was grilling burgers I was being serenaded by Canadian Geese flying overhead, and cows somewhere in the distance. The large field that makes up the park is also home to hundreds of cute ground squirrels. Their burrows make for a serious trip hazard, so I have to be careful. But, it is better than Prairie Dogs.

Speaking of dogs, Nia is still a bit unsure of things while moving, but perks up when we set up camp.

Nia and her buddy Flea

We are going to spend two nights here and use tomorrow to check out this historical area despite the 90% rain forecast. Then it is off to Clear Lake, IA.

Ocala National Forest, FL

Sunday was our July trail ride with the Orlando Jeep Club. This morning we met at the Kangaroo gas station in Altoona, FL. This is about an hour and fifteen minutes north of our home. We had packed all the gear the night before so all we had to do was roll out of bed earlier than normal, groggily finish a cup of coffee, and get the dog fed and walked.

We got there a few minutes ahead of the meeting time so that we could get some gas and get parked. Jeeps just kept coming and pretty soon we were parked two deep along the north side of the parking lot. When it was all said and done we had well over forty jeeps for the ride.

Before driver meetings we have a vehicle inspection to ensure that everyone has the required gear. Each vehicle must have a CB radio, fire extinguisher, first-aid kit, a tow strap, and front and rear tow points for being recovered in the event of getting stuck or breaking down. That is the minimum. Most carry more, such as tools, special recovery gear, air sources for filling tires, and over-sized jacks.

The inspections took a good while since there were so many jeeps. While the inspections were underway raffle tickets were being sold. Once each quarter we have a pretty nice raffle during the monthly ride. High-end stuff is usually raffled off, so a bunch of tickets get sold.

At the end of the driver meeting everyone’s attention was focused on the trail director as he announced the winners of two Extreme Hi-Lift jacks. Many of you are not acquainted with these, but they are heavy-duty jacks for lifting the tall jeeps when changing a tire. They have many other uses, which makes them pretty popular, but can be dangerous to use. You have to be careful when using them. Anyway, one of today’s winners is a first time new member! How lucky can you get?

We broke up into two groups to ride different parts of the forest. Our group was about thirty minutes into the ride when we had to negotiate some fallen logs. Since the group was so big this took a little while. As we stopped to let the stragglers catch up I heard a loud PSSST!

The jeep two vehicles behind us had a tire sidewall give out, most likely from being damaged by one of the logs. Guess who it was?

Yep, the lady with the brand new jack! Her husband got to put it to use right away. He got to try out his new compressor rig for airing up tires, too, but in this case it was for powering an air wrench. It turned out that since he had not prefilled the air tank it was taking too long to get enough air to be of use, so a CO2 tank was brought over to speed things up. 

Pretty quick we had the spare mounted and the group started to head out. “Not so fast”, we heard from the rear. Turns out our unlucky driver was double hexed. He had run that compressor from the battery without the engine running, and the battery was now dead. A quick jump and we were ready to get under way. 

All the jeeps met up at Blue Sink, a terrific swimming hole way in the outback of the National Forest.

We enjoyed a picnic lunch before heading home. It was a good day. One of the things I really like about these rides is that I get a chance to learn a great deal about jeeps and off-roading. So far, thankfully, I am learning by assisting others out of predicaments rather than having my own breakdowns. Life is good!

Lake Meadow Naturals, Ocoee, FL

This being retired is great! Having time during the week to visit around the local area has uncovered yet another little gem. In this case the small farm of Lake Meadows Naturals. Hidden away just north of Ocoee, FL, the farm has a small retail store that features fresh farm goods such as eggs (chicken, duck & quail), honey, cheese and a selection of meats.

Chickens for eggs and, well, chicken

The eggs can’t get much fresher since you can go gather your own if you wish. A knowledgeable employee accompanies you to be sure you do not unnecessarily disturb the ladies at work. It is a great experience for kids.

 

Bees for honey

Barbara makes friends wherever she goes

I recommend stopping by. You can check them out at www.lakemeadownaturals.com.