We left Moab around noon; waved good bye to our friends and headed for Colorado. It was the end of April but there was still the chance of snow in the mountains. Kevin said there was a chance of flurries for that day; I didn’t pay much attention. We were hoping to make it to Denver in one shot but unfortunately the Eisenhower tunnel shut down due to snow related accidents. Oops. We had to ditch our plan and pulled over in a Walmart in Vail for the night. Both of us had to work that night and the kids were dead tired so it was a good stopping point.
We carried on the next day to Goodland Kansas where we were the only people at the KOA mid week. It was an interesting place…ancient tall swing set from the 70s, no other people, stiff spring breeze. We stayed long enough to do laundry, stock up at WalMart and then headed down the road to our destination: Little Sahara State Park in Oklahoma where we were meeting up with friends.
Little Sahara was neat. Most of Kansas and Oklahoma looked so flat as far as you could see. Little Sahara was just as the name implies and had an impressive 1600 acres of sand dunes. They are open to the public for recreation, especially off roading. We don’t have a 4×4 vehicle but our friends the Kvacik’s do and they were kind enough to take us out to see the dunes. We had a fun weekend hanging out with them and meeting their other friends. There were several kids there and they all had fun playing together.
Releasing our butterflies we grew!
After a fun weekend it was back to business and we had an appointment to have our RV slides adjusted and a few other things looked over at Rolling Retreats in Elk City, OK. Thankfully that went smoothly and was uneventful. After that we hit the road East toward an RV family rally. Unfortunately along the way our 5th wheel hitch developed a large crack and we pulled over urgently and Kevin scrambled to figure it out. After much discussion with the manufacturer and others it was determined the pinbox was ‘drive-able’ but Kevin did not have confidence in it with all the cracks. He decided to replace it ASAP instead of risk it. (He was going to replace it soon anyway but this just sped things up) It delayed us by 3-4 days but we had some buffer time built into our schedule before the rally started anyway.
This rally was the “Fulltime Families Show Biz Rally” in Branson, Missouri. Several of our friends were there and Eloise was excited for the kid events. What did we do? I honestly can’t really remember; it was a whirl wind of events. We swam in the pool, we had a Broadway themed costume party (Eliza and Eloise both went as Belle), Eliza won a giant water gun in a raffle, we went on a hike, we went to an indoor adventure park, and we had a moms night out and a dads night out. We met many new friends and the time went by very fast!
After the main rally ended several families moved over to another RV park across town (us included) where we enjoyed each others company and the kids continued hanging out. Unfortunately it was here that we received the unfortunate news about Kevin’s sisters death and he flew home to be with his family while us girls sent our condolences remotely and held down the fort. Kevin flew back a week later with his other sister Michelle who visited with us for a few days.
Mini golf in 100 degree heat!
To continue our ‘Rally palooza” we moved over to an Xscapers rally for two days in Blue Springs Lake near Kansas City Missouri. It was starting to get hot. Like really steamy and hot. If you didn’t have AC is was miserably hot and humid. We played in our kiddie pool with Auntie Michelle and tried to stay in the shade. Our next rally was the Escapade rally in Sedalia, MO. We parked with the other families as part of the ‘kids-capade” and enjoyed our time. They had a glow stick party, campfires, a talent show, and fireworks. We also celebrated Eloise’s 6th birthday here with all her friends. We stayed for about a week and then on to our final rally of the Season: the FtF Boondockers Anonymous hangout at a casino parking lot in St. Louis.
Camping at a casino parking lot sounds sketchy doesn’t it? It was fine; it was even fun. The hot heat broke just in time since we were camping without hookups. We visited the St. Louis City Museum, the St. Louis Arch, and the St. Louis Zoo (which had free admission). We found the zoo to be crazy crowded on a Sunday and walked across town to enjoy the science museum instead. City Museum was amazing but Eliza was a little too young for it. Eloise and Kevin had a blast; its an indoor ‘playground’ which is really more like giant artsy-industrial climbing structures. We toasted farewell to our friends and parted ways at the Casino. We shall meet again some day!
Rest in Peace Auntie Angela. (Second from the left) You will be missed.