February 24, 2007 at 9:55 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Saturday is always the big day of the rally, with a couple of really good events on the schedule. This morning we loaded a golf cart with back issues of the magazine, a pile of Airstream Life shirts and hats, and headed to the Flea Market.
The Flea Market is a great chance to buy and sell all kinds of Airstream-related stuff. Mostly people sell old parts, but you’ll also see books, crafts, household goods, electronics, and apparel. It’s also where I usually see all the folks who didn’t happen to cross paths with me during the week.
Someone happened to swing by with a VW Thing this afternoon and it made a nice visual combination with Bill & Wendy’s “Health Chic” Airstream.
In the afternoon the other major event of the day was the Vintage Open House. It’s always a great chance to learn something. Two of the newer members were Nikki and Steve, who have a very nicely redone 1956 Safari with a polished interior. That’s Nikki below with her son Chandler.
Of course Colin Hyde was busy at the Vintage Open House, educating people about vintage trailers and restorations. He has a photo album of restorations he has done that always amazes people. He also has samples of aluminum used in Airstreams over the years, which allows people to compare how the aluminum has changed.
Tonight we are out around the campfire with a crowd telling stories. It’s a nice wrap up to a good rally. Tomorrow we’ll slowly pack up and head home.
February 23, 2007 at 7:12 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Last night when we got back to the motorhome we found Doug Rowbottom and Colin Hyde sitting outside in the dark under our awning, poking away at their laptops and using our open wi-fi signal. Colin came in for a while and ended up staying until 11:30 … and it had already been a long day … so today I slept in until 9.
Susanne Brown and Colin Hyde at the Vintage Club potluck dinner
Colin, poor bald guy, was not sufficiently aggressive with his sunscreen, and after two days at the beach with a baseball cap on, now looks somewhat like a lobster that was boiled with half its head out of the water. He has a good sense of humor about it.
Today was mostly a flurry of social events. Terry & Marie showed up in time to join Brett & I for the Florida Springs Unit lunch out at Linger Lodge. (Linger Lodge is an end-of-the-road fish camp and RV park that has a decent restaurant on the edge of a little river.)
We spent a chunk of the afternoon comparing stories with David & Denese Lee, Bill Reilly (the Health Chic husband), and others who randomly walked by until the all-important Happy Hour period began.
Hunter Hampton in pink
At every major rally I’ve ever attended, there’s always a zillion Happy Hours. They start up all over the field, organized by intra-club, unit, common interests, Internet discussion groups, etc. If you can’t find one to crash, you’re just not trying. We dropped in on Hunter Hampton’s first, which she holds at every rally for members of her Yahoo group, called “Airstream List”. Then we headed off to the Vintage Airstream Club’s potluck, which is large enough to need its own building.
This evening I finally got on a roof to take a few shots of the rally grounds. This picture doesn’t begin to capture the entire field, but you can get an idea. Plenty of rigs. I’ve had a bicycle to provide transportation for me all week but still haven’t had a chance to tour every row.
Tonight I’ll head over to the nightly campfire that Colin & Susanne light in a metal pit by their trailer, but try to get to bed earlier. Tomorrow is the big day, the Flea Market and then Vintage Open House, and those events will keep me very busy.
February 22, 2007 at 10:36 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
A great day at the Florida State Rally! First off, my ear cleared up, which made me feel a lot better. Second, spectacular clear warm weather. Third, 475 Airstreams parked in a field together. It has been a nice day to hang out and share comradery.
Everywhere things were hopping. Above is the Airstream store. The service guys were roaming around fixing things, the new product showcase was filled with cool trailers, and I kept running into people I knew.
There are several vintage tow vehicles pulling Airstreams here. This one is a 1956 Cadillac with a modern 454 engine under the hood. Plenty of vroom (450 hp, 500 ft-lbs torque) and a classy ride to boot.
This afternoon Brett and I presented our seminar called “How to get online while mobile,” to a packed room of abut 85 people. That one always seems popular, especially since we provide a wi-fi hotspot in the room during the seminar. Everyone brings their laptop so they can check their email during the talk. There’s a real desperation among rally attendees to get online, so we’ve left our wi-fi open for people to use if they want. (It’s at the Argosy motorhome #5501.)
We’ve also had the usual revolving door of friends and curious passers-by dropping in, so the rally feels in full swing and everyone seems to be in good spirits. But what’s not to like? It’s Florida, it’s February, and it’s sunny.
Up in Vermont, Emma made a friend at Uno’s when she was at dinner last night. Heather Paine, the waitress, discovered Emma’s interest in snorkeling … and on the spot made her a custom aluminum foil mask complete with breathing straw. Heather has her own company called Dragonfly Gifts of Vermont, which makes candles and gifts. Thanks, Heather!
February 21, 2007 at 8:18 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Last night I flew into Tampa and drove down the highway to Sarasota for the Florida State Rally. Pulled in around 12:30 a.m. local time to a fairground packed full of sleeping Airstreams, all gleaming in the dim moonlight.
I’ve been told that over 400 trailers are here so far, but that’s not the official count yet. All I know is that they are now parking them outside the fence in an overflow area. It’s a big rally. Surprisingly there’s not much vintage participation this year (maybe 20 rigs so far?), but I expect more to arrive tomorrow.
This is a quiet, relaxing rally, and I really like the mellowness of it. Soft sandy grass underfoot, sunshine above, comfortable temperatures in the 70s, and not much on the schedule. Well, technically there is, but I’d rather sit in Brett’s motorhome with the windows open and the awnings out, feeling the warm breeze and sipping a cold tea. Once in a while I put the laptop away and rode around the grounds on a bicycle to meet up with people.
With that technique, I missed the Opening Ceremonies and a lot of vendor seminars today. Ah well, I’ve seen them all before. I’m here to reconnect with people: friends, Airstream personnel, potential advertisers, and future interviewees. That’s best done at a relaxed pace, dropping in on Happy Hours and sidling by vendor booths.
I have another reason for laying low today, too. Despite not having a cold, I had some trouble on the airplane (equalization again) and now have a left ear full of fluid. It is clearing on its own but in the meantime I can’t hear much on that side. That made it a good day to park myself and do some work. I am going to have to restrict my flying in the future, which will make the Airstream (and occasionally Amtrak) more important as my primary modes of travel.
Emma is still having the time of her life up in Vermont: Disney On Ice, sledding on a Hammerhead sled, skating, and visiting friends. I’m glad she’s getting winter activities … and I’m glad I’m not! It’s a good deal for both of us for the moment and I’m sure we’ll be happy to re-connect next week. PS: Eleanor, I miss you too!
February 20, 2007 at 3:44 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Here I am with a two-hour layover in Las Vegas. There’s free wi-fi here so I was able to check my email and get this picture from Emma’s morning.
Quite a contrast to sitting in the desert. I’m glad she’s having fun with her grandparents.
February 19, 2007 at 9:43 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
I mentioned I was left with the tough job of cleaning up and putting things away …
OK, so cleaning up isn’t that hard. But Eleanor left me with a pile of perishable food and orders to consume it all before I go — or die trying. That included a large bag of lettuce, two quarts of milk (skim and 2%), a loaf of bread, cold cuts, a pineapple empenada, a bag of grapes, four single-serving cottage cheese cups, a package of large tortillas, and a half pint of heavy cream.
Combining everything into the classic bachelor meal wasn’t appealing. Well, maybe with peanut butter, but I didn’t try it. So each day I have eaten a seemingly random mish-mash of whatever appeared it was going to mold first. Reminds me of college days.
I wasn’t fast enough for the tortillas. They turned to something resembling blue cheese in the past few days, and even I wouldn’t eat them. Besides, something microscopic was obviously eating them already.
It has been an interesting challenge to come up with ways to use up food when I have no known cooking skills. Combine the cream with the skim milk (isn’t that just like whole milk then?) and add some chocolate syrup — voila! A way to drink a quart of milk in one day! And I’ve discovered that cottage cheese can be a side dish to almost any meal. (I’ve eaten so much dairy in the past few days that I may get a kidney stone from the calcium.) And there were other clever solutions that I probably should spare you.
People were reporting in today from all corners of the Airstream world. Brett says the Florida State Rally is getting underway. Colin Hyde and his family pulled into the rally today. Bert Gildart called from Tampa and says we’ll see him and Janie out west in a few weeks. Rich C says he’s going to stay here in Tucson another week, but I wonder if I’ll see him when I get back from Florida.
Dr. C emailed from his hideaway 50 miles south of here, and threatened to come up for a visit tomorrow before I catch the plane. Mike Young IM’d me about his plans with Rosemary to move to Phoenix. Leigh & Brian emailed that they would like to have joined us in Mexico but have prior commitments. I also heard from Mike & Terri Church, authors of the Mexico book I bought a few weeks ago. We’re going to start carrying their great RV travel books in our store in a few weeks.
And so on … I love keeping in contact with all my friends and acquaintances.
Tomorrow I need to do the final things to make the trailer ready for vacancy. Since we are on a monthly rental in the park, we pay for our electricity separately. So I’ll unplug the trailer and let it stay charged on solar power. I’ll set the furnace at 45 degrees just to ensure that the holding tanks won’t freeze in the event of an exceptionally cold night, check the propane, toss out anything perishable that I didn’t manage to eat, crack a vent slightly, and lock up. Not much to it.
There may not be a blog entry on Tuesday because I’ll be flying until late. The blog will pick up again on Wednesday from the Florida State Rally.
February 18, 2007 at 9:51 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Down I-19 from Tucson you’ll find the town of Green Valley, a peaceful and sprawling development area that seems to be a mecca for retirees. As peaceful as it is now, it was once the site of weapons of unimaginable destruction — two Titan Missile silos buried in the hills.
These were two of 54 Titans deployed across the US. Holding 9-megaton warheads, always armed and ready to launch, they were the core of the United States’ cold war-era strategic deterrent. With the proper authorization, they could be launched within 30 seconds of the turn of two keys. They were the tools of Mutually Assured Destruction.
Blast door #6
All the Titan silos are gone, stripped of their parts, de-commissioned, and blasted shut forever. Except this one. For $8.50 you can take a guided tour of this “dinosaur of the ICBM fleet”, right down into the silo and into the control room, which is exactly as it was. The guide even demonstrates the procedure required to launch the missiles, which is really chilling when you think about it.
There is much more about the tour than I can tell here. The 8-foot thick walls, proof against blasts and electromagnetic pulses; the rooms suspended on giant springs; the incredibly finicky rocket fuels that required massive air conditioning in the Arizona desert; the strict rules against being alone anywhere near the command center. It’s a fascinating place.
I’ve published about 11 photos on Flickr from the museum.
This evening yielded yet another spectacular desert sunset. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of seeing them.
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