A-one An-A-Two... Wunnerful, wunnerful!

There is a small golf course and resort in Southern California that was developed by the King of the Bubbly himself, Lawrence Welk. It's called, not surprisingly, Welk Resort and Champagne Village, although its original name was the simpler Lawrence Welk Village. I can't speak to the quality of the golf courses, although I'm sure they are first class, but I can tell you about the museum. Yes, there is a museum dedicated to Lawrence Welk, nestled snuggly in a corner of the lobby of the theater, the theater located just to the side of the musical note fountain, it in turn overseen by a statue of a batonned Mr. Champagne himself.

The museum is free, and the day we stopped by we were the only visitors, although the reservationist was in the same room and she was on the phone selling tickets without a break. The lobby is dedicated to Lawrence Welk and his early life: how he was born in a small, German settlement in South Dakota where his father got him his first musical instrument -- a $400 accordion. He promised his father he would pay for it by working on the family farm until he turned 21, which he did.



He learned to play it on his own, and fulfilled his repayment promise, but stayed not a day more -- on his 21st birthday he left the farm to play in Big Band orchestras, eventually forming his own band. The "Champagne Music" tagline was born during a Pennsylvania tour when a patron said his band sounded "light and bubbly like Champagne."



The museum's centerpiece is this huge crystal champagne glass, said to be "the world's largest." It may at times be bubbly and lit, but it wasn't the day we were there. It quite charmingly sits in front of the theater's refreshment stand.

But the best part of the museum has to be the life-size cut-out of Mr Wunnerful himself, with a vintage TV camera focused on him and a live feed from the camera displayed on a ceiling-mounted TV. How could we not take advantage of THAT photo op?




Lawrence Welk died in 1992 at age 89. The Lawrence Welk Show aired for an amazing 27 years from 1955 to 1982, and can still occasionally be seen on television today.

Thanksgiving At Mitry Lake

Thanksgiving Day Feast at Mitry Lake, just north of Yuma can be summed up as a boondocking adventure with failing batteries, chilly nights, great food, and good friends!

We got here just before total darkness on Tuesday, so we didn't get a chance to look around until Wednesday morning. Coming in as darkness fell, we only knew that the road out of Yuma had become a dirt road, and then got even more narrow, rutted, and rustic, until it emerged through the trees onto a flat gravel area overlooking Lake Mitry -- our new home for a few days.

In the morning we looked around a bit more. The lake could be seen in the distance from our haphazard parking in the dark, but we'd need to move the rig because we'd never get level there. A fire ring had been constructed, but we only had a couple bundles of wood which wouldn't last long. This may be Arizona, but temperatures were set to drop into the 30s. A good fire seemed a must. So we moved the rig a short distance away, and then John tackled the wood problem.

Not so tough a solution -- he ordered a cord of wood to be delivered. He met the truck and guided them into the campsite. The driver was, to say the least, a bit surprised to come through the rutted roads and find a slew of RVs parked everywhere he looked!



Thursday morning: We got up in time to watch Santa arrive on the Macy's parade. Football followed as John made a Yam Casserole for Thanksgiving dinner. It was excellent.



Everyone brought their dishes out at 2 P.M. for a fantastic feast. To paraphrase Nancy E., you get a lot of RVers together who basically live in 400 sq. foot homes, and yet they find enough tables and chairs to serve a dinner for 38 people!



The firepit turned out to be a great idea -- temperatures did get very chilly, but the fire was warm and kept us all outside and socializing long after the cold would have driven us in. We discovered that our coach batteries are not holding a charge as they should, so we have no heat during at night when we can't run the generator. Thursday, the temperature fell to 48 degrees inside! Two quilts on the bed and some cuddling for warmth kept us from being miserable, but getting up for night bathroom breaks was not much fun!



And what would a Boomer get-together be without a group photo? This was taken by Becky Hazen, who kindly emailed it to us all. Thanks, Becky!



More photos of the event can be seem on my Picassa album clicking on the following:

Lake Mitry Boomer's Thanksgiving

Hope you all had a Happy Turkey Day !

Passport Books in Yosemite

Today we made our last trip into Yosemite for this year. One of our goals had to do with the National Park Passport Program. For those that aren't familiar with it, the National Parks all have a "passport stamp" (or cancellation stamp) that shows the date and location, and sometimes includes a graphic. The bigger parks have several stamps, usually one per visitor center. If you want to collect these stamps, you just stamp them into a book that is available in the gift shops. Here's what a stamped page from my book looks like:



John got me interested in getting these stamps -- he had been a collector for years. So I bought the standard sized passport book (above), and have been getting stamps for about 3 years.

But after a while, the book became too small -- there just wasn't enough space for all the stamps. I had already gotten two of the small books, removed their spiral spines, and melded them together with some binder rings. It still wasn't enough, so now I needed to take the next step. I needed to get the larger, passport-on-steroids version that they sell. It features a zippered binder, add-on pages that can be easily slipped in where needed, and it is just plain bigger so it is able to hold many more cancellations.

In other words, I needed to go to the "Big Girl" book. So we headed to the main Visitor Center/Bookstore in Yosemite Valley to get my upgrade.

Yosemite Park is not a lightweight when it comes to our fabulous National Park system. 3.7 million visitors go there each year. John Muir, Galen Clark, Ansel Adams -- all were enthralled with the beauty and elegance of Yosemite landmarks such as El Capitan, Half-dome, Yosemite Falls, and the Giant Sequoias. It is one of the gems of the park system.

So you'd think they would have the large version of the passport book, wouldn't you? Alas, they "don't carry it," only the small version.



Dejected and dismayed, I was forced to leave without my "Big Girl Book." But there are lots of National Parks, and soon I will find the book in one of them -- but then, of course, I'll need to do some more "arts and crafts" to incorporate my little pages into the big book!



Today was a beautiful day in the park, and despite the book fiasco, we had a wonderful time. There was quite a bit of water for October -- the Merced was running full, and Bridalveil and Yosemite Falls (the upper and lower falls can be seen in the photo above) were flowing nicely. They tell us that the best time to see these falls is in the Spring -- maybe next time we'll come then.

A Coarsegold Tarantula

Mid-October to mid-November is tarantula mating season here in the Sierras! Just down the road from the park in Coarsegold, the upcoming Tarantula Festival on Halloween weekend should be a blast!

Just saw my first tranny here at Park of the Sierra -- I let him (or her) walk over my foot, which to him (or her) must have been just a huge, white, annoying speed bump. He (or she) went up and over, then scurried on. I'd like to think he (or she) was contemplating an afternoon's amorous romp, a spring in his (or her) eight-legged steps and a spidery twinkle in his (or her) eye. Have fun, kids!