Flyin' Low to Wisconsin

 Our journey took us on a whirlwind tour through Nebraska and Iowa, to Wisconsin. Travlin' through all three states one sees a lot of corn growing. It is my understanding that most of the corn grown in Iowa is to feed livestock. 

Most of the stops were overnighters, with the exception of Gothenberg (pronounced Got-ten-berg).

Front Yard

Back Yard

The park was an older park on the lake. 

We headed into town for sightseeing. We hit the big attraction in town... the Sod House Museum. The museum portion itself is really a story of the local life around the area.

The real story is behind the building... a buffalo, Indian, and older home.

You might notice that the two sculptures are made of barbed wire, most of it without barbs.

The sod walls were about 18 inches thick, with a dirt floor.

After our long tour of the Sod House Museum we went to lunch, then visited an original Pony Express station.

The original station was a two story structure, however, when it was moved to its current location they did not construct the lower floor.

The next morning we continued our trek east. A few more nights in Nebraska, and we landed in Iowa.

The road was a rough one at times, which was obvious when we stopped for the night at a Corp of Engineering park. From the outside everything looked good.

Let's take a look inside...

First time this had happened. After this event we decided to close the leaf on the table when traveling.

As a member of "Harvest Host" we have the opportunity to stay at wineries, breweries, alpaca ranches, and if we chose the golf package, golf courses.  This trip we stayed another winery:

 The camping was down at their warehouse, and provided 50A service, good enough to run the air conditioner. From the warehouse it is a gentle uphill walk to the tasting room.

On the way up to the tasting room we met the welcoming committee, providing directions.

The grapevines we walked past were young, but they had grapes on them.

We had a light lunch before doing some wine tasting. The winery encourages responsibility when drinking.

Where could you find yourself on the eye chart?

From the winery we got back on the road and arrived at our new temporary home at Breezy Hill in Fond du Lac. This was year number three at this campground. The campground has a lot to offer to the children. The campground has two fishing ponds, a swimming pond, swimming pool, air pillow, playground, and an arcade. Yes, adults can play too.

Carol and our daughter-in-law took a trip, between rain storms, to the local creamery to look at sunflowers. The flowers were non-seed producing.

The creamery plants this field every year, and the donations from visitors goes to supporting flights to Washington D.C. for veterans. Oh yea, the creamery has great ice cream too.

I mentioned rain a little earlier because it made a major impact for a couple of days. We had the awning out, with a new shade screen we bought for it, took a small beating, even though they were secured down. The wind at times kicked up to speeds close to 70 MPH, steadily blowing around 25 MPH. With those winds our canopy couldn't hang, and one side collapsed in.

We were able to temporarily able to fix it, until it was thrown away. In between the rain squalls we did some sightseeing.

One of the drives we took encompassed the the shores Lake Winnebago... unfortunately most of the shoreline is private, with few roads accessing it. Their were a few beaches, mostly private. We drove all the way around the lake to see a lighthouse in Fond du Lac, which we could have stopped at before we even started the trip.

The lighthouse was built by the unemployed community during the "Great Depression". The plan were donated by an architect in 1932. The 60 foot tall lighthouse built in Lighthouse Park, and was completed in 1933. Visitors can climb to the lookout deck. 

In between the rain we had some nice sunsets.

The second photo was taken after a big rain, at sunset.

With the kids gone and adventures at an end, it was time to prepare for our next leg, which would be our last stop in Wisconsin.

Short Stop in Wyoming

 I bet you all thought I gave up the ghost... not so. The last month has been spent in Wyoming preparing for the annual Escapee RV rally, called Escapade. For those out there not familiar with Escapees, it is an RV club that we are a part of.

The Escapade was held at the Sweetwater Event Complex in: 

If you haven't figured it out... it was held in Rocks Springs Wyoming.

The Sweetwater Event Complex is huge. The facility can entertain BMX, motocross, sprint car races, and horse racing. If you are not into racing, they also entertain the county fair, as well as rodeos... the big rodeo for them is the high school rodeo.

We arrived in Rock Springs 1 July, before we were due to start work, but that didn't last long... we started working on the 2nd.

The campground was setup like mini-corrals the RVs would park in.

Here was the view from our mini-corral:

As you can see, there weren't many RVs there when we first arrived. 

Arriving early provided us an opportunity to settle in, then enjoy the fireworks an the 4th of July.

One of the events we watched was the 4-H livestock show,

Some of the cattle and pigs were on the auction block. The black cow above was named "Hamburger", the brown is "Ben".

As part of the volunteer staff Carol and I were quite busy, Carol working in the office, I was running around outside getting things ready, with a fist full of other volunteers. Carol was responsible for the table center pieces and stage decorations, announcements, and the all important seat reserving. 

The wagon was simply a cardboard box, cloth, and ingenuity.

Enough bottles of beer, you to can create a centerpiece for a table too.

As you can see, the theme was cowboy/western. This theme flowed to the photo booth. The structure of the booth is just plywood that we change to match the theme of the Escapade event. This year we chose to make it look like a covered wagon settlers would have taken across the plains.

The folks at the complex were very friendly, and allowed us to use whatever we needed lying around on the property. The lantern is ours from our trailer, the pail is from the Escapee office, and the wheels and hay were items laying around the grounds.

My responsibilities were to to ensure that the sponsor banners were properly displayed, overseeing that meeting rooms were setup for action, and general coordination. For those that may not know me well, I am uncomfortable with height, but will go up to accomplish a given task. I am not a fan of scissor lifts, I feel like I am on a board atop a toothpick when they are extended... and one of the banners required that I almost take it to the max... I completed my mission.  Putting up the stage lighting was another story. I could not get myself to take the lift to its max height to hang the lighting and run the power cords... almost 30 feet in the air.

The idea of Escapade is to bring fellow RVers together to celebrate, educate, and fellowship. The four days are marked with seminars, entertainment, and social gatherings.

Before attendees arrived.

After attendees arrived.

The main meeting tent was general assembly, as well as most nights evening entertainment. Entertainment ranged from a comedian magician to a talent show comprised of talent from the attendees.

Carol and I with the comedian magician.

This was a contemporary country music band that played songs they wrote as well as some of the older country music. 

On a couple of occasions we had entertainment out on the midway, where food trucks were available, serving anything from kettle corn to seafood to beer.

One of the daily food trucks was a wood fired pizza. Since Carol and I don't eat much bread anymore, she asked them if they could make a pizza without the crust...

She supplied the pan, they supplied the pan pizza without the crust. They recognized us because of our pan which was brought back so many times.

Escapade was fun... then came breakdown... it always seems to breakdown faster than it went up.

While we were at Escapade this year we had our brakes changed out from standard drum style to disc brakes. While the drum brakes stopped the trailer fine, disc brakes provide a higher level of comfort with the weight of our trailer.

Kinda looks like we parked our trailer in the ghetto of Los Angeles, and they took everything, and left us on blocks. Its ok, they put the tires back on.

Escapade came to an end and we headed out for Wisconsin, via Nebraska, and Iowa.