Chapter 33 Fall Rally

Hahaha! Well, it's time for the monthly posting! We took a break from the activity of setting up of the new tiny home, and headed off to the Chapter 33 ( Okanagan ) Escapee Club Fall Rally.  It was in an area of the province that we have never experienced before, nor driven through.  What a beautiful area!  On the Monday of the long weekend, we drove to Revelstoke and then veered off south towards the Arrow Lake system.  This is a lake that was created by the dams of the Columbia River. Huge. A ferry ride took us from Galena Bay to Shelter Bay in order for us to continue towards our final destination of Burton. Home of one coffee shop and a fantastic municipal RV park, right on the lake.

The Rally was fun, fun, fun with the theme of the Gold Nugget Saloon! We enjoyed heavy appetizers the first night, golf, campfires and music, a bean pot supper, games, crib tournament and a wonderful night out at the local coffee shop/restaurant. Now, we have to get busy as Don and I, along with another couple are hosting the next Rally in the spring. The plan is to perhaps get something together in the Merritt area.

Don appointed himself the campfire organizer and I'm not sure he signed up for that! Anyway, the campfires were excellent and kept us warm on the now cooler evenings. The Rally was attended by about 20 rigs, and not everyone wanted to go home on Friday morning, so 5 rigs, including ourselves spent the night at Blanket Creek Provincial Park.  Trouble! Most of us were too big to fit into the sites, so the staff suggested that we camp altogether in the overflow area. What a great idea! It had a garbage bin, picnic tables, field, campfire ring, right next to the beach and on mostly level pavement. Some of us jumped into the lagoon area, which is created from a diversion of Blanket Creek and then overflows into Arrow Lake. Yep, it was almost as cold as Arrow Lake, which I tried the day before.

In the morning, I made a large fruit salad and we also had some leftover muffins from the Rally. We call it Tailgate Breakfast.

Tomorrow we are off to Merritt, to check out the town for next spring, as we have to be organized before everyone heads off to warmer climates for the winter.

new home!

We'll hope you will forgive the absence of any blog postings, as we have certainly been busy!  First, we had the excavator make our upper driveway bigger and construct a new garden with boulders the size of our car.  Then last week, more gravel and a bob cat levelled the area where the fifth wheel was.

The fifth wheel was moved to a new spot on the upper driveway in anticipation of our new summer abode! Yep, it arrived last Friday, pulled by a huge transport truck with a 'wide load' pickup clearing the way.  One crew to haul it, and put it in it's place in less than an hour! What an operation. Then it was coffee time before the second crew arrived with their task to be finishing the set up, blocking, levelling, hooking up the utilities and skirting the bottom.  All of this was completed by 7 PM that night.  The only thing left for us to do was to move our belongings in and make the bed. Oh, Donald still constructed better stairs the next day as we will not do any decks till next summer. Heck, that is enough work at the lot for one year.

backing down the driveway

almost in place

next crew working

 

Yesterday we met our Escapee Okanagan Chapter RV club group for the monthly breakfast.  Then onto Kelowna to pick up an Ariston washer/dryer unit.  It works great. Yep, today is laundry day. Whoo hoo!!! No more coin laundry till we hit the road again!

swimming in the lake

Our oldest son, daughter in law, and our grandson have arrived here in the Shuswap, to take advantage of about a week of sunshine, hot temperatures and lots of swimming.  That's because our little one LOVES that water.

Our new flower bed is just about finished and we are quite happy with it.  A big change, well it would have to be if you have an excavator involved! 

Tomorrow we are off to a big garage sale at Lee Creek, then to a Motorcycle Museum.  The kids used to have bikes, much to their mothers disapproval!  LOL! Their dog, Cooper, also came along for holidays and is having a great time. No leash, sticks and logs to drag out of the forest, swimming after thrown sticks till he just about passes out, and the best of all a little golden retriever lassie next door!
Oh, he enjoys the pool as well!

No brown bread?

With the sporadic nature of our summer posts to the blog, it's about time to do another! Life has been busy here at the lot, with the excavator building a new driveway, new flower beds and moving car sized rocks all over.  Only Canadians buy ( and not cheaply ) dirt and rocks. Like we don't have enough. Could it be that we are picky about the type? Let me see, dirt from Smith Farm is better than dirt from the Lewis yards.  Lewis rocks are better than the Spooner rocks and gravel. 

Do you remember that when you were pregnant, almost everyone looked pregnant? Or whatever else was happening to you at the time, that is what you would notice with others?  Today we went off to Vernon to the Pantry Restaurant to have a monthly breakfast with our Okanagan Chapter of the Escapee's RV Club.  What do I notice driving around? Signs for quarries, places selling gravel.... must have rocks in my head!  It was a great breakfast with about 20 people showing up at 9:30 am from all over the Okanagan.  However, there was no brown bread for toast as the restaurant had already hosted a group of 80 earlier!!! Speaking of bread, the price of a loaf is about $4 here, so I am back to baking bread. No preservatives, better for you anyway. You just have to restrain yourself from grabbing a slice when it smells so good!

We made a couple of stops on the way home, picking up some perennials, and fresh B.C. fruit: apricots, tomatoes, pickling dills, peaches and blueberries.  The panic was on for the blueberries because our little one ( and his parents and dog, Cooper ) are coming on Thursday!!! Whoo Hoo!!!!
He loves blueberries!!!

We are getting prepared with a kiddie pool, a beach tent for the pool, a new little life jacket and some more goodies. 

The Excavator makes it annual appearance

Whoa, I think we are on the frequent flier ( no, 'digger') list for the Excavating company.  This machine has made an appearance by request at the lot every year for the past 3.  We better be done!  In anticipation of further building structures here, we have widened the upper driveway.  Well, since the machine is here, why not build new flower beds.  Well, since the machine is here, why not build some retaining walls. Well, since the machine is here, why not widen the other driveway. Starting to think we have rocks in our head, as well as buying them to put into the ground.  Who else but Canadians buy rock and dirt?

This is the 'before' picture, even though it was taken in the spring when we returned.  So, not much of the flowers and perennials had grown to any stage.

After we dug up the perennials and before the machine started the BIG DIG.

The start of the dig.  The dump truck is dropping boulders the size of my car.  See those plants next to the excavator treads? Yep, he picked those up with one shovel full and away they went into the side bush.  Ah, they'll live.  Plants seem like they grow on steriods here. hopefully.

How on earth is this ever going to look right?  Of course, the neighbourhood seems friendly because everyone has to drop by and see what the !@#$ you are doing. When he drops the load of rocks it kind of feels like an earthquake, so they all knew.

Donald said to get a picture of this.  When your Iris plants multiply, and they sure do, you have to pull them up and divide them and replant some elsewhere, or at least throw/give some away. This is what we call Extreme Transplanting. No mercy.

Stay tuned. Day 3 pictures tomorrow.