Farewell to Snowbirds

Last night was the parks annual "Farewell to Snowbirds" dinner with over 90 people attending.

After a delicious rib dinner we made 2 giant banana splits in 20 & 10-foot eave troughs. We filled the troughs with quartered bananas followed with Neapolitan ice cream.

We then added fresh strawberries, pineapple, chocolate & butterscotch syrup and topped them off with whipped cream.


Then paper bowls were provided for everyone to help themselves.







.

St. Patrick's Day

There's a man that every Irishman adores
who drove the snakes from Ireland's shores
His memory garners much acclaim
St. Patrick was the fellers name

He drove Ireland's snakes away
At least, that's what some folks say
And when he preached to his Irish flock
He wore a green shamrock on his frock

It states in every history archive
that he was born in the year three eighty five
And finally when his work was done
He died March seventeen four sixty one

So every year on March seventeen
We honor his memory with Irish cuisine
From this moment on, You are forewarned
By eating cabbage that's boiled...& beef that's corned.

And add to that a tater or two
Or maybe a bowl of Irish stew
Top it all off with a pint'o green beer
And you've honored St. Pat for another year.

So raise your cup and shout it right out
"erin go bragh" is what it’s about.
And ‘till next year when we next convene,
You’ll honor the man by wearin’ the green.

Last evening the park sponsored a Saint Patricks day corned beef & cabbage buffet dinner. We had corned beef & cabbage accompanied by boiled carrots & onions all paid for from our breakfast profits and park residents also bought various buffett dishes. Teddy bought a green cake decorated with white frosting topped with green shredded coconut.
I read the above poem to the assemblage. which I had written for the occasion.
After the 'eaten was done we were entertained with a parody of the "Family Fued" TV game show. Gail Bristow from Wetaskiwin, Alberta played the Richard Dawson part. There were two six person Irish "familys", an orange family and a green family, chosen from the park residents. I ended up on the green team.


Hands on your buzzers.











Orange team huddle.






My team won and was presented woth a huge mystery box present.
Which turned out to be a peck of Irish Potatoes.



It was a fun evening and everyone had a good time.

Lenny & Marian Styczynski from Green Bay, WI sure seemed to enjoy it.

1st Annual International Golfball Race

This afternoon we held the 1st Annual International Golfball Race. Each participant furnished his own golfball and paid a 25¢ entrance fee. The contestants lined up at one end of the park on an asphalt road that has a slight downhill slant to it. At the GO they were to roll their balls toward the other end, approximately 100 yards away. Only underhand throws were allowed.
We divided the entrants into six person heats and then had a roll-off of the highest heat finishers. Winner took all the money which amounted to almost ten dollars American. Canadians had to pay their entrance fee in American money. There they go!
Here they come!

Oatman

Today 5 of us (Dan & Pat Martenson from Escanaba,MI and Jan Morse from Bakersfield, CA and ourselves) went on a roadtrip to Oatman, AZ. Oatman, located on old Route 66, is/was an old fronter mining town turned into a tourist trap. One of the attractions are the "wild" burros that come into the town daily and beg for carrots from the tourists.

Here are Teddy and Jan in one of the souvenor shops.









The shops all sell bunches of carrots to feed the burros with.
Here Jan gives away her last carrot.












Pat appears to have lost her way.













This is the hotel where Carole Lombard and Clark Gable are purported to have stayed on their wedding night.



From Oatman we drove over to the AVI Casino in Laughlin, NV for dinner before returning to Lake Havasu.

Clocks & Stanford Fleming

Over one hundred years ago Sir Stanford Fleming proposed a system of imaginary lines that would divide the world into standardized time zones. It was adopted by most of the countries of the world and with some minor tinkering is essentially the system that we use today. The minor tinkering is what we were faced with last night when most of the nation, with some exceptions (Arizona being one), moved their clocks ahead exactly one hour. As fulltime RV travelers the different time zones across the nation often cause us some confusion as to what time it is where "so and so" lives. For instance it is now three hours ahead of us where Teddy's mom lives whereas yesterday it was just two hours.So in order to make life easier I purchased three inexpensive wall clocks from the local Ace Hardware and set them to the three areas that we are the most interested in. Now all it takes is a quick glance at the wall to decide if it's time to call Mom.

Wisconsin Mixer

Yesterday we attended the annual "Wisconsin Mixer" get togather for Wisconsin Snowbirds down here in Lake Havasu. It was held at the local Eagles Club. There were between 300 and 400 folks there. Hard to believe that there are that many Wisconsinites down here. Makes me wonder, "Who's minding the store". Had a big lunch and raffles with donated gifts from local merchants.

Home again, Home again, Jiggity Jig.

Our four day weekend at the Fountain of Youth SPA has woefully come to an end.
After one more trip to the pools we hooked up and left for Lake Havasu at about noon.

Dan & Pat had followed us on the way down so I told Dan to take the lead and we followed them on the way back. ;-)

We arrived back here at Havasu Falls around 5 pm, just in time to go over to the clubhouse for Monday night "Pegs & Jokers".

Dates

Spent the morning bathing in the mineral pools.

Then in the afternoon we drove about 30 miles north of here to Thermal, CA to visit the Oasis Date Gardens where we were able to sample all of the many different varieties of dates and were treated with a free "Date Shake".
Then performing perfectly in our tourist roll we dutifully bought several pounds of dates from the gift shop. In Traverse City, Michigan they call the tourists "Fudgies" because they buy fudge at the local fudge shops so I suppose that we are "Dateies" here because we bought dates.









The date palms are very tall...















...with the dates growing in clusters near the top.





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Lounging in the mineral spas

This morning went to the Rec hall for the park’s Saturday breakfast. $4.00 ea. for coffee, orange juice, pancakes, eggs fried or scrambled, and ham.


















Spent the rest of the day mostly lounging around the pool/spa area going in and out of the various hot mineral spas and napping.

I tried to be very careful to not spend too much time in one of the "Fountain of Youth" pools as I didn't want my age to regress to less than 62 for fear of losing my Social Security benefits.

Later in the afternoon Teddy took some long walks exploring the area.
After dinner we joined Pat & Dan at their trailer and played Whist.

Mud Pots

This morning Dan, Pat, Teddy & I explored the park and it is in truth, a small town with over 2000 winter residents. There is a small store, a health center, beauty shop, massage room, laundry, tennis, bocce & horseshoe courts, a café, library and game rooms. It is a very large park with 800 full hook-up sites and 200 dry campsites. We are told that there are over 2000 winter residents dwindling to about 200 in the summer. This is also a geothermal area and there are two artesian mineral water steam rooms, two whirlpool tubs, a hot mineral water spa, three therapeutic mineral water jet pools and two large swimming pools.
After spending some time in the spas we had lunch and spent the afternoon touring the area in our truck. We drove about 10 miles to the south end of the Sea to observe some of the bird life.




At this point my GPS was reading minus 240 feet.









... we continued on to an area where there are these geothermal mud pots.


From there we drove through “Slab City” an area where many people dry camp on an old abandoned military post.


Tomorrow morning there is a breakfast in the “Rec Hall”.

Fountain of Youth SPA

This morning we hooked up the Cardinal for a 4 day weekend at The Fountain of Youth SPA on the eastern shore of Southern California’s Salton Sea about 10 miles north of Niland, CA. I found it while surfing the net looking at RV parks, it looked inviting and to cinch the deal there was a web coupon for a free fourth night with a three day paid stay. Our friends, Dan & Pat Martenson from Escanaba, MI are accompanying us with their trailer.The road through the Orocopia Mountains NE of Mecca, CA twisted and turned through this awesome canyon called "The Box Canyon". As we approached Mecca the altimeter reading on our GPS began to drop and by the time we reached Mecca it was reading over 200 feet below sea level.Turning south at Mecca on hwy 111 we were now traversing an agricultural area of dates, artichokes and grapes Teddy snapped this picture of a vineyard through the truck window.We soon caught sight of the Salton Sea for the first time and although we had read that it was the largest lake in California, we were still surprised at it’s vastness. According to a brochure that we picked up, it has a surface area of about 360 square miles. The Sea is a major stop on the Pacific Flyway and supports one of the most diverse bird populations in the United States. More than 350 species frequent the Sea and up to four million birds may be found on the Sea at any one time. It also supports a productive sport fishery.
We finally arrived here at The Fountain of Youth SPA around 4:30 pm PDT and are now settled in for a four day stay. We will leave Monday for our return to Lake Havasu City. Till then we’ve got some exploring to do.