Tag: travel

2025 Roundup – Airstreaming

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This year we did not get the trailer out as much as we wanted to. It’s nice having it safe at home between trips, at least. It hasn’t really needed any work lately, so it just waits patiently for it’s next adventure.

First trip of the year didn’t happen until June! With an Oregon Unit Rally at Riffe Lake, hosted by our friends Janet and Gail, who we have camped with many times. They both have vintage Airstreams as well.

Riffe Lake Group Camp was really nice. It was a big area. They stuck all the vintage on one end, and since I arrived last, I got the furthest out spot. Ok, a little further out than usual!

Are they trying to tell me my black tank smells? Lol, just kidding, I didn’t mind at all. It was nice and quiet over there.

The rest of the party. This was a really nice group camp with a big covered area with tables and even sinks with running water, which was great for mealtime cleanup.

One thing that was new was I got a CPAP this year, and I had to figure out how that was going to work in my trailer.

Luckily there was a convenient plug under the bed that I could run the cord down to, and I had power at every campground I went to this year. If I start boondocking again though, which is how we have mostly used the trailer in the past, I may have to figure out how to power it all night. After my first night I realized the hose was long enough to set the machine on the dinette seat, which let me hide everything behind pillows during the day.

I didn’t take a lot of pics at this rally, but it was a really fun one, and I hear they are doing it again next year.

Our Second Rally was the annual VAC Rally in July at Barton Park in Boring, Oregon. The organizers always do a great job of finding neat spots for us to gather our old trailers, and this was no exception.

The only problem was it was hot, and I don’t have AC, but opening the windows and putting on the awnings actually goes a long way to making it more bearable. I also brought an electric fan, and one of those neck fans. Because it was so hot, we couldn’t bring Navi, so Dave just dropped me and the trailer off at camp, helped with initial setup, and headed home to stay with Navi (camp was only 45 minutes from home). I got pretty hot setting up the trailer, and our friends Val and Mark were camping right across the road from us, so I walked over to say hi, and they saw how hot I was and were immediately were telling me to sit down and gave me some cool water. I didn’t feel bad, but I guess I was pretty red. That’s why it’s nice to have folks looking out for you!

My spot was near the restrooms, which wasn’t bad, except for the spotlights at night:

That sure made it easy to find my way home!

I had lots of friends to visit with at this rally. It was really fun, and in between visiting, I chilled out at my trailer and read a book and relaxed. It’s just so nice to have downtime with nothing to do sometimes, and since Dave had the car, I wasn’t going to rush off exploring too far.

And in the evening of course there was music!

And flags fluttering overhead in the breeze – I definitely want to add some flags for rallys!

Third trip of the year was to Ashland, Oregon to see plays at the Shakespeare Festival. We were back at Emmigrant Lake County Park, where we have stayed many many times before. It’s a very nice park, with a view, and clean, modern facilities.

Tim and Michele went with us and stayed in a hotel in town, but we got together for almost all the plays, and had dinners together, and went cruising around town, checked out a cool art museum on the SOU campus, and hit an estate sale we happened to drive by. What we failed to do was remember to take a single picture of ourselves all together!

We saw a bunch of really good plays. Last year there were a couple plays we did not enjoy so much, and one we left at intermission, so this year was absolutely delightful in comparison.

We had some iffy weather coming and going with strong winds, but the Palisade towed like a champ. I have had some doubts that I picked the right tow vehicle, but on this trip it was solid as a rock and had lots of power, even pulling up big hills. So I am feeling pretty good about that now. They seem to make a nice pair.

Birthday trip to Skamania Lodge

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Dave always comes up with something fun to do on my birthday, even though it’s in early spring and that can mean unpredictable weather. He knocked it out of the park again this year with a trip to Skamania Lodge in Stevenson, WA.

The view from our room was beautiful. One of my goals for this past year was to get better at drawing and painting so I could paint our trips.

The next day we went out for breakfast right across the Bridge of the Gods. The restaurant is right at the Oregon side of the bridge and has an incredible view.

Oregon Trail on the right, going up the hill, near Bingham, OR.

On the way home we stopped at Bonneville Dam. When we were kids we all went there on school trips, and the viewing for the fish ladder was always popular. I think the carpets haven’t changed since the 70s!

We only saw this one fish going by, then getting swept back, then going by again…over and over

We had a good time. It shows you don’t have to go far from home to have a nice time and discover new places.

Cruise to the Bahamas – Grand Turk, Gibbs Cay

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We docked at Grand Turk with a bit of time to kill before our planned activities, so we went down and sat on the beach and enjoyed the sand and unbelievably blue water, and view of the massive ship we’d come in on. Dave went and waded around in the surf.

This is what a tropical vacation is all about, right?

When it was time we gathered up with our fellow passengers and followed our guides down the beach to a big catamaran, for a trip out to a reef to do some snorkeling. Neither of us had tried it before, and ultimately, I chickened out. I’m not a strong swimmer. But Dave has a lot more confidence in his swimming, so he gave it a try.

I enjoyed the view from the boat.

Our next stop was Gibbs Cay, to visit Sting Rays. This was the sketchiest thing we did. The sting rays there are used to getting fed, and they come running when the boat shows up. A guide hops out and grabs one, and then everybody gets to touch it while the guy kind of manhandles it. Obviously it’s fine, or they wouldn’t keep coming back. But it felt a bit sketchy, especially since there were so many people.

After harassing the sting ray there was time to chill out on the beach or back on the boat.

The boat was surrounded by so many sting rays looking for a handout. It was pretty cool.

Back in our room we had a great view of the pier to see if any late comers were going to be dashing to try and catch the ship before it left, but everyone got back in time.

I can not get over the color of the water here!

The ship headed back to FL, with a day at sea to relax. We got in lots of wandering, lots of eating, and a fancy dinner on the last night in the steakhouse. Oh, and the towel roommates kept appearing.

Dave took a class to learn how to tie them, and did this Princess Leia thing 😀

I thought this big plaque was cool comparing the size of the original Mardi Gras with the current one. When someone says ‘cruise’, I still think of The Love Boat. That first Mardi Gras was probably Love Boat sized.

We were getting pretty travel worn by the time we got back to FL. One more day spent at Animal Kingdom

It was pretty cool. The Avatar rides were cool, the safari ride was fun, and the Everest ride were my favorites.

The only thing we didn’t see in Florida was an alligator. I expected them to be everywhere! Maybe next time. The Uber driver even saw one on his way to pick us up, and when we said we hadn’t seen one yet he looped around to see if we could spot that one, but it had already gone back into hiding.

And that was the end of our DisneyWorld, Rocketship, tropical cruise vacation!

Cruise to the Bahamas – Nassau, Amber Cove

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Port Canaveral

Arriving to Port Canaveral, we only got a tiny peek at the ship we were going to be getting on. It was too big to see up close, we would have to wait until we docked along the way to really step back and appreciate how big this floating city was. So first, we had to get through customs.

It felt like quite a cattle call. Our passports were a few years old, and Dave, who always looks different depending on what plays he is in, looked really different! So we had new pics taken, and got scanned in, and although we had to have our paperwork with us all the time, we never had to show them to anyone again for the entire cruise, even coming back in – it was all facial recognition and scanning our cruise card.

We had to cool our jets for a little bit while we waited to get our room. That gave us plenty of time to go to the safety briefing, and start checking the place out. Being from the NW, we found shady spots whenever we could.

Our room was a cozy little thing, but no problem for us, who are comfortable in the Caravel for most of our travelling.

We could watch where the ship was going from bed 😀

And a private balcony, which was my favorite part. I sat out there reading and watching the flying fish sailing away from the bow of our ship. So cool!

Some of the meals were in buffets, some were in fast food type take-aways, and some were fancy sit-down meals. It was fun to try all the different places.

Nassau

The next day we got to Nassau, and finally got to get off and get a good look at the ship:

Holy smokes that thing is BIG!!!

We stopped at a museum right at the dock, neat museum, but very small.

Walked up to see the courthouse.

Took what felt like a very questionable ride on a carriage.

But overall we found Nassau to be kind of depressing. The area around the dock seemed to be very poor, and the people were all engaged in trying to scoop up cruise visitors to buy their questionable wares. It was super busy and crowded, and as we walked back to the docs we saw why – there were now several giant cruise ships here!

We went back to our ship and went and enjoyed the nearly empty pools and chit chatted with the other passengers who had chosen to skip Nassau. By afternoon we were on our way again.

As each day went by our cabin felt smaller, as we had to share it with towel animals:

They were too cute to unfold!

Amber Cove

We had booked an excursion for Amber Cove (Dominican Republic) to a dolphin experience. We tried to do a little research to ensure it was a place that took good care of their animals, and it actually looked pretty good.

I wore a cute swimsuit I bought just for the occasion, one I could feel comfortable walking around in public in all day, because we were going to get in the water and visit a dolphin!

It was a great day! Interacting with the dolphins was really cool. It was neat watching the trainers interact with them. We saw a lot of exotic birds in big aviaries. Watched a couple other demonstrations with seals and dolphins. And the whole time it was a warm tropical rainstorm. Crazy day. We were exhausted by the time we got back to the docks and onto our ship, which was really feeling like home by then.

I think we had a day of rest before the next stop. I got a lot of reading down relaxing on the balcony or down by the pool. We found the adult quiet area at the bow of the ship. Perfect!

Spring trailer trip

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We started off spring by breaking the trailer out of hibernation well before Memorial Day for a change.

Everything was ready to go, except for a very tiny leak at the new water hammer prevention device. The good news was that the device worked very well.

We headed out to Cape Disappointment. You are guaranteed a good time with a name like that!

We got a nice spot in the campground, but it was very narrow, and we could barely set up the dog yard. All the space was behind the trailer.

Barclay, stealing stuff

Dave had a talk to him about his behavior, and how we expect better of him now that he’s 11.

Navi was a good girl, as always.

No complaints, it was a very pretty weekend. We hiked up to a WWII defense installation and saw the bunker and where the cannons were mounted. Looks like a goldfish pond now.

We had lunch in town at our favorite diner – located in a caboose! We explored a bit and stopped at the grocery store. I waited in the car with the dogs and I felt a bump – someone had backed into the side of the Flex with an old pickup truck! Before I realized what happened they drove off! How annoying!

We had two lovely days and then it was time to head home.

When we got home the trailer was rewarded with its Spring Bath

I hope we get it out more often this summer!