Happy Thanksgiving … Gobble Gobble!

We are busy getting everything ready in order to head south again.

Our summer really went fast which is probably because we were so incredibly busy!  Our plan was to spend our first month this spring at our daughter’s house, living in Maxx in the driveway, catching up with family, grandkids and friend and then spend the rest of the summer travelling around BC.  Well you know what they say about best laid plans:-)  Yup, that wasn’t how it went … other than a few trips to Alberta and a few BC camping trips, for reasons I won’t go into, our whole seven months was spent in the driveway. But all in all that’s not necessarily a bad thing, we were able to spend a lot of time with our grandchildren, hubby and our son-in-law where able to get the basement reno’s done on their house, and probably even more amazing, they haven’t told us to get out of the driveway … and they still invite us in for Sunday dinner every week!  I should explain that we try very hard not to intrude on their lives and to answer the question my daughter and I get asked the most, no we do not go into the house to eat our meals or use the bathroom. We are fully contained in Maxx and live in it like a house. If we go over to our daughter’s place we knock on the door and wait to be invited in and when they come to our house they do the same and I do love it when little people knock on my door and ask “Watcha doing grandma”:-)

As we headed into our last week before we go south we flew to Edmonton for Thanksgiving weekend with our two sons’, wife and soon to be wife, and grandson, unfortunately our daughter and family could not make the trip this year. We have had a fun weekend so far … a trip to the West Edmonton Mall, a visit to the IMAX theater and today a lazy morning which for me involved the one thing I really miss about living in an RV full time … A BUBBLE BATH!

 

Okay maybe there wasn’t a rubber ducky in the tub but thanks to our soon to be daughter-in-law (who knew a bath was on my wish list for the weekend) my bath did include bubbles and a new fluffy oversized bath towel, and thanks to our son, a mimosa … yup I’m a happy lady right now:-) Tonight our oldest son, his wife, and our grandson will join us for Thanksgiving dinner.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone, stay tune for on going updates as we head out for another winter in warmer weather.

Until next time …

Big Valley Jamboree – Sunday

We were treated to another lightning storm early Sunday morning but no major rain. Loading the bulls yesterday morning was done under a heavy mist but it did make the scenery on the farm very beautiful.

Shortly after we headed into the Jamboree site the mist lifted and the sun came out.

Last night we were again treated to a free dinner and ended the evening attending the Miranda Lambert concert.

Miranda Lambert

We had a great time at Big Valley Jamboree, visiting with friends and enjoying our time on the ranch!

Today we are heading home, an eleven hour drive with a meal break, but we have to do it in one day in order to get a few things done at home before we head to Las Vegas where our oldest son is getting married on Friday 🙂

Until next time …

Big Valley Jamboree – Saturday

My access to Internet has been limited over the last few days so today I am posting three blogs … I hope you enjoy reading about our time at Big Valley Jamboree as much as we have enjoyed being here 🙂

Early this morning we had a rainstorm along with a lot of lightning but it stopped in time for us to head to the paddock, load the bulls and head out to deliver them to the Bulls for Breakfast event.

The drive in this morning was pretty but the sky looked a little stormy.

Do you like how I made it sound like I personally loaded the bulls and delivered them to the site? Actually my sole involvement over the last few days has been to take pictures and ride in the passenger seat of the semi … sounds fair to me, I don’t want to get to close to those bulls!

Does this jackrabbit look scared? He should, he ran out into the arena just before they released the bull … not the brightest rabbit but he was smart enough to make scarce just before the gate to the chute opened.

Tonight we are lucky enough to have tickets for dinner in the VIP tent again and then we will attend concerts by the Oakridge Boys, Darius Rucker, and the Zac Brown Band. It should be a great evening!

Until next time …

Big Valley Jamboree – Friday

We started the day off on the ranch watching the bulls being loaded into the semi for their trip to the Jamboree and Bulls for Breakfast. Our friends ranch houses the bulls for the weekend and he transports them back and forth everyday. Now one of the items on my bucket list has always been to ride in a semi so this seemed like a great time to cross this item off 🙂

hmm good morning … whatever you say, you’re the boss 🙂

My semi ride to the Jamboree site

It was really fun watching the bulls being loaded at the ranch and then unloaded at the Jamboree site, and finishing the morning off watching the event, Bulls for Breakfast. There were some great riders and it was very entertaining.

After an afternoon of visiting, and napping, back at the ranch we headed back to the Jamboree site for a free dinner in the VIP tent and a great concert by Dean Brody.

Dean Brody … great concert!

 The evening ended with a beautiful sunset and a visit around the fire 🙂

Until next time …

Big Valley Jamboree – Thursday

Fortunately we arrived in Camrose, Alberta early on Thursday and we were able to get to the ranch before all the other RV’s arrived. Our friend’s ranch is very close to the Jamboree site, which for us is very lucky … a little more on that later in this blog. We arrived and got set up in the front yard where we where afforded an awesome view, and electricity 🙂

Once we were set up we had a little visit and then headed off to the Jamboree site to watch the bull riding and later that evening we headed back to watch the entertainment. On our trip back to the Jamboree site that evening we realized how lucky we were to get to the ranch early because there was a three to four kilometer line-up of RV’s trying to check in!

RV’s lined up waiting to make the turn onto the road leading to the campground … thank goodness we arrived early enough so that we didn’t get caught in this line-up!

These RV’s are not even close to the entrance to the campground!

And this is where we could have been parked … yup the ranch is a much nicer location … and the company is great! Plus our friends have a parking pass that allows them access to parking right at the entrance to the site; the people in this area have a bit of a walk to the site.

 Until next time …

RV Maintenance Day

We had a short drive from Edmonton to Wetaskwin, Alberta, under an hour, and arrived just after noon. Our plan was to stay at the Wetaskwin Lions Club RV Park but the directions on the web site did not provide enough information to entered the location into our GPS so as we drove into town we were watching for signs. The entrance to Wetaskwin from the north is very pretty and the water tower reminded us of most of the towns in the US that we drove through last winter.

We realized our idea of watching for signs to the RV Park wasn’t working when we ran out of town so we turned around and headed to the WiFi store (McDonalds) to check the web site again. With sort of directions in hand we carried on and quickly saw a sign indicating a right turn would take us to the park (we are both positive there were no signs when we approached from the north). Anyway we made the turn and headed down the road where signs continued to indicate we were on the right path but all of the sudden a signed showed the park was on the left but the only road on the left was a very short, very narrow, quickly ending dirt path, good thing hubby didn’t turn down there! So we carried on and turned left at the next road, which was about .5k from the sign, thinking this must be the way to go, but alas we still could not find the park. At this point we had run back into Alberta 13 so we figured we would head back into Wetaskwin and try one more time to find the park … but wait … shortly after we made the turn the RV park appeared! Now was it worth the hassle you may be thinking? Yes it was, we were able to get a site with 30 amp power which meant we could run the air-conditioning at night, so we were happy campers 🙂

Once we were settled in we took another trip into town to an RV dealer for some items hubby needed to do routine maintenance on our bedroom slide, and then the afternoon was spent giving Maxx the attention he deserved 🙂

Until next time …

Yipee! A New Camera Lens☺

Yesterday hubby bought me a new camera lens. This lens is a 16mm to 300mm, which means I can mainly use one lens rather than switching back and forth between two lenses. This is very exciting because often I would only have one lens with me and of course I would really need the other lens. And as an added bonus we stopped at the West Edmonton Mall to go to the camera store and once we had purchased the lens hubby suggested we walk around the mall … he never does that, but this time he did get off easy as I only made one purchase.

After shopping we met up with our two sons and their fiancés for dinner and noticed a Wal-Mart very close to the restaurant where we were meeting. Since we were a few hours early we thought we might move Maxx to this Wal-Mart and walk to and from dinner, but here is my lesson of the day for you … always check with customer service before assuming you can park in a lot for the night. There were many units set up for the night, one fifth wheel was definitely in for the night with their mat and awning out as well as the generator hooked up behind their unit and two dog pens set up … hmm I’m not sure that is what Wal-Mart had in mind for an overnight stop! Anyway, when we checked with customer service they advised that Wal-Mart had no problem with overnight RV’s but there is a bylaw preventing overnight camping so there was a good chance we would end up with a ticket! So on that note we decided to stay at the Wal-Mart on Stony Plain Road which has signs posted saying parking for 24 hours was permitted (and customer service confirmed this) … don’t assume just because other units are there!

Last nights stay at camp Wal-Mart was our cheapest stay yet, as much as I tried I didn’t spend a cent … usually it costs around a $100.00 a night 🙂

On our way to Edmonton from Pigeon Lake we drove through farmland with the canola fields in bloom. The prairie region of Canada is always very scenic but even more so when the fields are in bloom. Hopefully before we leave I will be able to share a picture of the flax fields.

Canola Fields

Today we are headed to Wetaskwin for the night and then tomorrow we will head to Camrose for the Big Valley Jamboree.

Until next time …

Edmonton

We spent last night at the Rainbow Valley Campground in Edmonton. For a large city campground it was very nice at $36.00 a night for a site with 15-amp power (no water or sewer), and a very central location. Once we got set up we spent the afternoon running errands and then headed over to our oldest son and his fiancé’s house for dinner. Hubby and I are so happy that both our sons chose such great women to marry!

We had so much fun last night and we still have some purchase we would like to make in Alberta (where we don’t pay provincial sales tax) so we have decided to stay another night. The unfortunate part to this decision is that there is no room at our RV Park so it’s off to camp Wal-Mart for us tonight.

Until next time …

A Fun … But Wet Weekend☺

We enjoyed our time at Pigeon Lake with our son and his fiancé but the first two days were incredibly wet. Saturday morning saw hubby using my blow dyer to try and dry out his runners, it sure is nice to camp with modern conveniences!

Aside from the rain we all had fun and because of the cooler weather we were able to spend lots of time sitting around the campfire visiting and discussing wedding plans 🙂

When we sat down at the table in our son’s campsite Saturday morning we were greeted by this scene

Hubby and I used the picnic table to put the tarp up the day before and these soldiers where not there so somebody must have put them on the table after we set up the tarp and before the kids arrived. I thought it was ironic that they chose to put it on the table of a military person (our son has just recently left the military after 14 years and two tours in Afghanistan), however my son did remind me that Edmonton is a military town and the campsite is only an hour from Edmonton so the chances were pretty good that the person coming into the site would be military … I guess he has a point, but I still though it was pretty funny 🙂 And the soldiers stayed in position all weekend!

Until next time …

Pigeon Lake Provincial Park, Alberta

We woke up to 50 km an hour winds, heavy rain and branches breaking off the trees surrounding our site:-( This weather is unfortunate because today we are meeting up with our youngest son and his fiancé for a weekend of camping at Pigeon Lake Provincial Park about an hour south of Edmonton. Oh and of course our grand puppy Jack will also be joining us. Jack is a chocolate lab and at a year old he is a big puppy! I am a little worried about hurting our sons feelings since I have a gift for Jack but nothing for our son … do you think he will feel left out, nah I’m sure he will get over it:-)

Do you remember in yesterday’s blog I said I felt sorry for those poor people camping in tents? Well guess what our son will be camping in … yup they are in a tent, so before leaving Red Deer hubby made a stop to pick up a big tarp in the hopes that the wind will die down and we will be able to get it up before the kids arrive.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love my grand puppy, but I also love Maxx and the thought of a big wet dog running around inside Maxx doesn’t appeal very much so I am really praying the rain, or at least the winds, will stop!

On our way out of town we filled up with diesel at $118.9 per litre. If only it were that cheap at home; we paid a $131.9 before we left.

I probably won’t post until next week because I won’t have internet but hopefully I will have some fun stories to tell and some great pictures and that they won’t be of wind torn trees!

And for those of you keeping track … we are back on schedule with our maximum driving times, today’s drive is only an hour and a half … well maybe longer because its hard to keep Maxx on the road in this wind.

Until next time …