Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Part 2 - Crossroads of America Tearjerker Gathering and Beyond, July 13 - 21, 2011

OK, to continue on, I spent most of Friday afternoon taking camper pictures, then it was time for the Wine and Cheese event.

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

See that yellow T@B in the background. Those folks showed up literally minutes before we descended upon them and set up tables in their "front yard".

As I said before, I had a front row seat for everything as most of those pictures were taken from my site.

Announcements were made, sponsors introduced, and reminders for the various raffles and drawings were announced. As I said earlier something very good came from this gathering, all of the raffles, drawings, and various ways to earn money were all going to be for Inflammatory Breast Cancer. The amount we ended up raising was astounding!!

A few more camper pictures:

This is a Camp-Inn teardrop. Considered to be the cadillac of manufactured teardrops (with a price to match)

Photobucket

This is a Little Guy Silver Shadow. I seriously considered this camper before I found my T@B

Photobucket

This is a homebuilt chuckwagon kitchen. Before I looked at teardrops and T@Bs this was what I had in my head that I wanted to do. I was a tent camper, but it was a lot of work. I wanted a trailer with a kitchen, clothes storage, and other compartmented storage, so all I would have to set up is the tent and an air mattress.

Photobucket

Another Scotty

Photobucket

After the wine and cheese, I settled in for the night with a movie. Oh a note, there is no cable at this campground and was only able to get limited off air signal from my antenna, mostly a few PBS stations. Verizon phone service worked, but T-Mobile was kinda sketchy. I was able to get internet from my work-provided Verizon air card, but NADA on my T-Mobile service on my droid.

The next morning there was a big pancake and sausage breakfast. I overslept and stumbled outside almost at the end of breakfast in my Mickey Mouse pajama bottoms and t-shirt to grab my breakfast carrying my Snarky mug. I was about to grab a couple of regular pancakes from the stack, but was told "Wait, I have to make you a special pancake" Well, in my fuzzy still sleepy state, I could not imagine what that was, then I was presented with the prettiest Mickey Pancake you ever saw!!! I thought that was soooo sweeet.

As I said, I was still sleep addled, so no pictures :-(

After breakfast and having lovely conversations with lots of good folks, I got dressed (in my purple Snarky t-shirt) and went out to get more trailer pictures.

Here are a few more. I'll feature the T@Bs that attended

This is what my T@B looked like before I decorated it:

Photobucket

A big screen room:

Photobucket

These folks work and live in their T@B almost full time. (I found out later, they were on their own bucket list tour)

Photobucket

Some pretty streamers on their awning

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Anyway, on to the story. As I was wandering around, one of the folks asked me if that was a Disney shirt?? Now, I know we are working hard to get the word out, but I was kinda lost as to how she associated Snarky with Disney. She then said, "That's the Disney font" I would recognize it anywhere!! So we had a wonderful conversation about Disney and their family travels there and Fort Wilderness. Cards were handed out, and the conversation also turned to wanting to camp, but didn't want to pull the camper. (This family actually had a popup, not a tiny trailer.) They mentioned renting a camper once they arrived, and I also took the chance to plug Donnie's site. They came by my camper later that afternoon and said that they had already looked over www.makecampingeasy.com

After wandering that afternoon and finally getting pictures of all the small trailers, I went back to the camper to start my crockpot. Tonight was the big potluck!!! And if you think fiends put on a spread, whooooeeeeee, there was some good eatin.

As dinner time rolled closer, folks started arriving. They commandeered picnic tables from the various sites and the food came!!

A few pics!!

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Now for the food

The food table was so long, it was impossible to get it in one shot

Photobucket

Photobucket

If you'll notice on the left of this picture was a beautiful quilt that was raffled off. These folks have some talent

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

To continue on, after the potluck, everybody cleaned up and headed back to the their campers to wash dishes and get ready for MOVIE NIGHT!!

One of the Indiana directors has a movie screen setup and at dark after the potluck generally shows a movie. Now, in Indiana just east of the timezone line, dark is almost 10pm!!!

I didn't actually sit and watch the movie, cause I decided to go ahead and break camp so I could get an early start the next morning, but I could hear it. The Movie was Back to the Future Part I, which I've seen dozens of times, so listening was all the same to me. I got all broke down and hitched up, so all I had to do the next morning is unplug electric and cover the AC vent.

Nighty, night

No comments: