Free 75 minute Picasa Seminar Webcast

8/10/10: The FMCA.com website is currently experiencing technical difficulties. We know they are working very hard to resolve the issues in time for the webcasts, but if the link does not work for you at the given time, here is an alternate link:
<Alternate Link to View the Webcast>

 

We're going to be busy this week - giving 8 seminars at the FMCA Convention.  See our schedule on our website.  If you're going to be at the rally, we hope to see you at all of them!!  One of the seminars is a hands-on class, 'Know your Laptop' - it costs $60, and you need to register beforehand because we limit it to 20 people.  Registration is at our table in the Info Center starting at 7am :-( on Wednesday.  Last time we did this, we were sold out by 7:45.

 

What we want everyone to know about is that the Picasa seminar on Wednesday afternoon will be Webcast, so *everyone* can see it!

Free 75 minute Picasa Seminar Webcast

Wed Aug 11, 3:15 Pacific Time

This will not be recorded, so the only way to view it is to log in at the designated time.

2. Picasa: Wednesday, Aug. 11 3:15 to 4:30 p.m. Pacific time 4:15 to 5:30 p.m. Mountain time 5:15 to 6:30 p.m. Central time 6:15 to 7:30 p.m. Eastern time

If you watch it, leave a comment here on how it went!

Cold?!

It's been so hot everywhere this summer, we're really surprised to wake up to cold!  49 degrees two mornings in a row.  We're in Bend, Oregon at the Thousand Trails, Sunriver.  Here's the park and our site:

Thousand Trail, Sunriver, Oregon

Our Site

OK, I'm warm now!  Hot Tub at Thousand Trails, Sunriver

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Where the heck are we?

It’s amazing where you get to if you just keep driving!  This kind of travel is very unusual for us, but, as with anything unusual, it’s fun once in a while.  The map above is from our Streets & Trips plan.  #6 was the hot springs in Wyoming (last post), 7 was a Utah State park on the shores of the Great Salt Lake, 8 was any old park that had a vacancy in Boise, and right now we’re at #9 in Eastern Oregon.

We’re only staying one night at stops 7, 8 and 9.  We’ll be at number 10 (Thousand Trails – Sun River) for 2 or 3 nights before moving to the fairground in Redmond for the FMCA Convention.  We’ve crossed two time zones.

The countryside we’ve been traveling thru makes me feel so small and insignificant.  The wide open spaces and huge mountains are majestic and powerful.  I feel that all is right with the world when I’m in the mountains.  Nothing can harm them, and I am privileged to view them.

Wasatch Range to the East of our campsite.

Great Salt Lake to the West of our campsite.

Our campsite at Willard Bay State Park, Utah.

 

High Desert – Eastern Oregon

While we were at the hot springs for 2 nights, we published another of our ‘Gabbing with the Geeks’ videos:

Saratoga, Wyoming – Hot Springs

Thank you Microsoft Streets & Trips and the data files from Discovery Owners!  We used the pushpin set to look for hot springs and found a delightful little town at 7,000 feet in Wyoming – just 20 miles off Highway 80.  And the hot springs is … Hot!

Here’s that portion of our map.  Every little red marker represents a hot springs, then we use Streets ‘Find Nearby Places’ to find an RV park.  The number 6 represents our night’s stop: Deer Haven RV Park.

The *free* ‘Hobo Pool’ at Saratoga Hot Springs.  The water is minimum 108 degrees! 

And here’s where it flows into the stream outside the walls.

The hot water is held in by the piles of rocks and/or sandbags, but it mixes with the cold water from the stream to provide whatever temperature you want.  AAAAaaaahhhhhhhhh

And, the air temperature overnight is in the low 60s.  We visited the hot springs twice, once at night, once in morning.  Just delightful.

And, to top it off, there’s a fish hatchery just a couple miles away.  Back in my 30s, I made a point to visit fish hatcheries – I found that they were almost always in beautiful wilderness areas and had friendly staff more than happy to show you around.  When Jim and I started our current journey, we were thwarted in our efforts to visit Fish Hatcheries and gave up.  But, this hatchery has revived my interest in seeking them out.  Check out this view:

Jim is taking video here.  Once we get it edited, we’ll add it to this post.

Then, back at the campground, after watching the deer walk thru camp and the bald eagles fly overhead, we sat behind our rig on the banks of the North Platte river and watched the sunset.  OMG

Believe it or not, we actually were working most of the time we were here (the park has Wi-Fi – no Verizon data here.)  When you get to stay in the midst of such beauty, all you need is an hour or two break to be able to enjoy it.  I love my job!

We’re on our way to Redmond, Oregon where we’ll be presenting 8 seminars at the FMCA Convention.  Anyone can attend our Picasa seminar because they’ll be doing a live Webcast of it – mark your calendars for August 11.  Click here for times and details.

Colorado Hiking

I don’t think you’re allowed to spend time with Diane and Andy without some adventurous, physical activity! I remember meeting them in our RVs in Montana in 2004 – whitewater rafting was not on my agenda, but they were very convincing!  See the blog post.  Thanks guys, for getting us geeks away from our computers and out of doors to see the mountains!  Diane originally planned a 7 mile hike for us, but this train had other ideas.  It was stopped, blocking the road, *just* before our trailhead.  Others had already been waiting a half hour, and there had been no word of when the train might fix its problem.  So, we turned around in search of another hike.

Serendipity strikes again!  I can’t imagine a more perfect trail for our day.  A little higher elevation – about 9,600 ft – but a shorter, gorgeous trail.  3 miles thru wildflower strewn granite, pine forests, and aspen groves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not only was the trail a loop trail, but the road we took to get there made a loop back with a stop at Panorama Point where you can see the core of the Rocky Mountains, the Continental Divide.