Escapees

Escapees (SKP) is the name of a club of people who have 'escaped' the conventional lifestyle in favor of adventure by RV. Many people in this club are full-time RVers. We've known it was a group we should belong to, but we didn't get around to joining until just a few months ago. So, when we got notice that there was a Florida chapter meeting for a rally right here by Fort Lauderdale, we wanted to go. It just didn't work out for us to participate in the rally. The rally started on Monday and goes thru Friday, and Jim has office hours Wed-Thu-Fri, so we just went to happy hour on Monday. As it turned out, it was kind of an old home week! Cliff and Marie were the first people we saw ... and they've been parked right across the street from us at Paradise Island all winter. Then there was the hostess .. Sue Spahn. We looked at each other and went thru a kind of 20 questions until we figured out that we knew each other from involvement in computer education here in Fort Lauderdale back in the 80s! It was a fun evening. Escapees are well-known for their happy hour get togethers! We are also planning on going to their national rally - the Escapades - in June (oops, make that May) in Missouri. We should be presenting a few of our seminars there.

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Historic Day

Since we came back from Peace River, I just haven't had much to talk about. We're working on getting a couple seminars scheduled at Thousand Trails, Orlando - so we'll roll the wheels again soon. And, there's an Escapees rally here locally next week - we won't take the RV, but we're going to go check out happy hour! But, mostly we're just like normal landlubbers - working and visiting with family and friends. And, of course, watching the inauguration yesterday ... I never thought I'd see the day. I'm not talking about a day when a black man became president of the United States. I'm talking about the day that millions of Americans were motivated to get out and cheer for something good. I just didn't think we were a people who did that. It warmed my heart and brought tears to my eyes. I came of age in the 60-70s. We gathered occasionally, but only to protest the bad, not to cheer the good. The only 'cool' way to be was cynical and negative - or just not care at all. I thought that was characteristic of being American. I thought that was the intelligent way to be. I think I like this new us. We can get more done when we're moving in the same direction instead of fighting each other. Or maybe I'm just feeling what it's like being on the 'IN' side instead of the 'OUT.' ? To see what the day was like actually being there, check out Elliott Masie's blog. I wrote about Elliott in the past blog post. (I do love blogs!) And, talk about a historic day and a great blog. Go take a look at George's blog for yesterday ... he went flying in an Ultralight over the Mexican beach where he is living in his RV. He shares it with us thru a video. What fun. You GO George!

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Digital TV

Just last week, we made the conversion from analog to digital for watching TV in our motorhome. We are blown away by the difference in quality of the picture. And, we get another channel now too ... ION tv. This is not necessarily a good thing. ION has 3 hours of Boston Legal on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. I got absolutely nothing done last night, just watched TV. For the complete story of our analog to digital conversion, see my weekly article for RV.net: Digital TV for the RV.

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Peace River and Seminars

We woke up to a foggy morning. It brought back more memories. We stayed here the whole winter season in 2006-07 and saw many foggy mornings.

 

And, how I love starting our day with a walk along the river.

We brought Mom along, and she enjoyed her cozy spot in our cab-over bunk. (to learn how I made the dreamy, soft focus effect, see our weekly Picasa tip)  As long as we planned to come over here for a few days, we figured we might as well put on a couple seminars. We announced it in our newsletter that went out about a week ago, and we heard back from a few folks that were staying here at Thousand Trails, saying they were looking forward to attending. 

We also heard back from a reader who is staying at a park just up the road ... Torrey Oaks ... and he suggested we present a seminar there too! So we did. Everything went great. We taught our Picasa seminar at Peace River and at Torrey Oaks, then we taught Google Earth the next day at Peace River. And, after the Google Earth class we met a woman in the audience who said she was actually staying at the Escapees park right around the corner, and she said we should give our seminars there too! hmmm ... with 3 parks to work, I might be able to talk myself into another whole season here?!?  Our students are just the *best* people - don't you agree?! :-) 

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A Weekend at Peace River

These tires gotta roll! So, we scheduled a weekend at Peace River Thousand Trails. We also scheduled a couple of seminars while we're here. It's just as gorgeous as ever:

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