ALL MOST LIKE GOING HOME-Camp 2

Because of various appointments back in Oklahoma in just two weeks we left Bull Shoals and went over to our home away from home, Branson, Missouri.  I have wrote a lot about Silver Dollar City (SDC) and the Indian Point COE campground in the past.  So I won’t describe the camp ground or park in detail on this post.  If you are interested in previous posts on either location simply click on the hyper links above.

The 2016 observations of changes at Silver Dollar City can be viewed here. 

Generally we camp in either site one or two, but both were previously booked due to both the blue grass festival going on in the park and the Indian Motorcycle Rally that was going on across the road from the COE.  Lucky for us most bikers don’t need a longer campsite so we were able to get site 5.

 I love this 50 amp site and it will be the one we will hope for in the future.  It is 60 ft. long, wide and so easy to back into I didn’t even have to spot Gary as he did so, he parked it perfect the first try.  Even better, for those of you with big rigs and/or a towed.  It has a separate parking spot for that as well.  It is also not far from the marina with its small café.  You can take a short walk to go to a package store across the way for the necessities of life.  The bathroom is nearby and so is the dumpster.  If you want a shower though you will probably want to drive to it.

There are four shower rooms in the shower house on the next area over.  They are large handicapped accessible rooms with all the facilities in that room.  They are unisex rooms.  Because there are only four I highly recommend you take your showers in off peak hours, although there is one other shower house in another section up the hill with four additional shower stalls.

Again these COE sites are water and electric only ($10 per night with the parks pass/$20 without) and what I consider the worst dump station set-up we have come across in all our years of travel as far as easy access.  It is a dual dump station on a narrow paved loop of dead end road that has some pretty good drop offs at various points that could easily do damage to your rig if you are not very cautious.

We have taken our 37 ft. Montana fifth wheel through it twice, it can be done, but it was VERY nerve wrecking to do so.  We’ve decided this trip that we wouldn't dump the trailer there, but take our chances that the next campground we go to will have a better set-up.  It is simply too nail biting with the longer rig to do it.  It wasn’t that easy when we had a 30 ft. one either.  Our first fifth wheel was 28 ft. and it wasn’t too bad. 

Obviously they have not changed the setup for dumping in the 40 years we have been coming here.  

So you can get an idea of some of the drop offs on the curves of the loop I have stepped down from the pavement to the ground with one foot to give you a depth concept.  You can see grooves in the pavement where some were not successful at negotiating the curves.  The hardest place is, of course the entrance/exit.  If another rig is waiting on that road you cannot get out until they move forward. 

The facility itself is pretty average, just bad for trailer under carriages if you make a turn too tight.

If you arrive before the designated check in site and your site is still occupied they well tell you to go up to this loop and park in the center of it until the site is available. Then you have to back out of the center of the loop and then negotiate those curves.  Something to consider if you are like us and tend to generally arrive early.

The day after we arrived we had to go back to Oklahoma for my brother in law’s memorial service.  He had died the Sunday before.  He will be sorely missed. Being at Branson the day before his service was bittersweet.  It brought back memories of him and his wife coming over here with us a few years ago.  We had a wonderful time on that trip. We were celebrating my sister in law being in remission. We were all so happy!

       

                                                Jim Patterson 1950 to 2016

The rain apparently followed us from Arkansas as it rained a good deal more while we were at Branson.  That didn’t deter us though from catching some good shows at SDCand going back to the College of the Ozarks campus for another good meal and to actually tour some of the grounds this time.  Both of these “events” will be highlighted in a separate post of course. 

Our tour of the campus included a great meal again at Dobyn's Restaurant  and Honor Park, the Ralph Foster Museum, Star School, and Lookout Point, The 911 Memorial and the Missouri Viet Nam Veterans Memorial with the adjoining Veterans Grove.

As well our trip to Dogpatch USA.  Not only will I write about it, but we were able to do a fly over with the quadcopter, with permission from the owner on two different days.  If you would like to see what remains of this old amusement park then and now please see my Dogpatch USA post.  

Unfortunately the Thursday before the holiday we watched in horror as shore patrol and emergency team divers looked for the occupant of an apparent boating accident.  I don’t know if they ever found the people either, they had not as of the time we left.  All I know is the boat was found with the motor running going in circles with a tube behind it. The ski rope for the tube was around the prop.  A very sad way to start the holiday weekend.

It rained every day for a part of the day or night, but didn’t discourage the holiday campers.  As you will find in most campgrounds, it was a family atmosphere as tents popped up like mushrooms all over the campground.

When you have mushrooms you sometimes have  unique critters show up.

Of course there were your usual robins, deer, vultures, squirrels (they sure grow them scrawny in Missouri, ours at home are fat little fellows, but then they are always into the bird feed and pet food), and one woodchuck that we saw.  Unfortunately because of the rain we didn’t get any good photos of any of them.

We were able to do a fly over with the quad copter at this campground with the permission of the park attendant. 

The peaceful time at this clean campground went quickly and soon we were headed back to Oklahoma for what we thought would be a short 10 day visit.  Surprise, surprise sproing!  Taylor Ferry South on Ft. Gibson lake had a surprise for us as far as the camper was concerned, post to come in the near future.

Jan who is currently in Oklahoma posting as fast as she can while she has wi-fi.

MY HORSE THREW A SHOE, PART 1

It’s been a good long while since I posted on this blog because basically we’ve not been traveling, although I do still need to finish up my reviews from our Las Vegas trip nearly 18 months ago.  

I’ve been working so hard on my Princess Plan and the posts for that, so most other blogs have been neglected.  I’m working hard to correct that problem now.

Sunday was our 41^st wedding anniversary, so we went over to Branson, MO for an extended weekend to celebrate.  It was definitely a trip to remember, both good and bad.  

Our weather this year has been much of a roller coaster ride so we were very hesitant to make our reservations until the last minute, because I have no love for snowy weather, and especially not in the Ozark Mountains pulling a fifth wheel.  If you want to call me chicken, that’s just fine.  I’ll even make clucking noises for you, because this fat lady has a mortal fear of sliding to her death on icy roads in the mountains.

I finally made our reservations on Monday of last week after much discussion and scouring every version of long range forecasts we could for the area.  All agreed 50-75 degree for Thursday through Sunday, with it cooling off to the 40’s late Sunday afternoon and rain moving in that night.  Since we would be home by Sunday night the forecast was perfect as far as we were concerned.

I made our reservations, against my better judgment, at The Wilderness Campground that is owned and operated by Silver Dollar City.  We have stayed there a few times before, but have been less than pleased with them for various reasons.  More on this in a bit.

Generally we stay at the Corps of Engineers on Table Rock Lakeat Indian Point for $9 per night using our National Parks Pass, the people there are pleasant, the sites are reasonably flat, and they are a clean campground.  I’ve reviewed them before.  Unfortunately they had not opened for the season yet. 

Our second choice is generally Compton Ridge Campground which is directly across the street from The Wilderness.   That was where I first tried to book, only to discover they were closed and had been sold.  They are scheduled to “open soon” according to the signs we saw while there.

I checked various other campgrounds and none would be opened on Thursday, our scheduled arrival date.  A few, at much higher rates and with no Silver Dollar City shuttle would open on Friday, but that would do us no good.

So finally I settled on The Wilderness.  Let me explain to you why I was reluctant to go there.

Our first visit was probably about 10-12 years ago and that trip was great.  We went during the Bluegrass and BBQ festival, we were lucky enough to be in a good, easy accessible site and next to some of the Bluegrass competitors so we got to listen to wonderful bluegrass music all weekend both in the park and at our campsite.

The next year we went back to the Wilderness because we had a good experience there the previous year.  I made our reservations well in advance with the dimensions of our camper and truck correctly listed.  Because Memorial weekend was so busy we knew we needed to reserve early to get a good site.  So we had.

We arrived, luckily, during daylight hours and were given a site that was technically big enough for our camper, but to say it was difficult to get into would be an understatement.  

My husband is a good driver, and he can generally park our camper with little to no effort, but not in this spot.  Before it was over we had my husband, an employee of the campground and two truck drivers all trying to get our rig into the site, while I spotted the trees and yelled stop using our walkie talkies when crunch time was near.  It took 45 minutes and a lot of tension to squeeze the trailer in because of the trees surrounding the entrance to the parking spot, the sheer drop offs on all sides and the narrowness of the road.  

The employee later told us that generally much smaller trailers were put in that spot and everyone had trouble getting in it.

Once we got it in there we had a horrible time getting out of that site when it was time to leave.  Walkie talkies (this was before we started using hands free cell phones for this project) were essential and it took a lot of forward and backward to get out without dropping the trailer off one of the drop offs or clipping the trees.  

Our next few trips we went to Compton Ridge and the Corps because we refused to get in that situation again.

Our last visit there was again during the Bluegrass and BBQ annual festival.  I made our reservations early in the year because the corps, and Compton were already booked.  I was very clear about the size of our camper again and requested a pull through site to avoid similar problems.  I was given a confirmation number, a pull through site number and was guaranteed that site was ours. We verified it all again before we left home, including taking our confirmation print out with us.

We again arrived in the daylight hours to discover we had NO PLACE to camp.  They had booked us, according to them, for the following YEAR at that time, despite what my confirmation email said.  Furthermore, they had no sites available and chastised me for waiting so late to try and get a site—I had booked MONTHS early. 

I demanded they find me a place to camp because I had already purchased my tickets for the festival and had driven over four hours to get there. The situation was their fault and therefore they needed to fix it.  Of course they had nothing, not even a cabin they were willing to let us stay in for a campsite price, but said they would try to find us a place to camp somewhere else.  The place they came up with was nearly an hour away, back toward home.  I was livid.

I insisted they call non-sister campgrounds and find us a campsite locally because they after all had ran the charge through for me to camp that weekend there and then had given our campsite away, when we arrived well before deadline. The fault was entirely theirs.

They finally found us a place nearby at Tall Pines, and it was an easy to park in site, we were pleased with Tall Pines, the little we were there.  

When I asked for my deposit back they informed me I was cancelling my reservation less than five days before I was to arrive and therefore was not entitled to a refund of any sort.  I was truly angry by that time.  I reminded them that they had my reservation for the FOLLOWING year, not this year and therefore, was entitled to a full refund IMMEDIATELY.  By then a crowd had formed of people waiting to check in and they decided quickly a refund was in order.

Based on this past history when I made our reservations I insisted not only on a confirmation number, but for her to read me exactly what site AND what YEAR the reservation showed.  I then insisted on an email confirmation.  Which I verified all the info on when I received the email.  This I printed out, just in case.

I also made certain of the campsite size.  I was told 40 x 19 which would be a bit short for our 30 ft rig plus the dually, but we knew we could make that work.  I also verified it was an easy in, easy out site.  I was guaranteed it was.  I warned the woman I had bad experiences with their sites before and that we would not even attempt one that was too short or had sheer drop offs with trees when we got there.  

She assured me this site was PERFECT for us.  She said that if it wasn’t to let them know immediately and they would arrange a different site for us, but to arrive early as we could to allow for a better choice because it was the first weekend for Silver Dollar City 2014 and they were filling up quickly.  All of this was included in the confirmation email I received, printed and took with me.  Good thing I did.

So we did just that.  Oh the site was maybe 40 x 19, but it was 19 long and 40 wide, and the area you had to pull into to park… you guessed it a drop off.  Not only was the site less than half the length I needed, and I had stressed what our size was, that length had a retaining wall on the side our slides would have to come out on (and I had told her where our slides were), and a picnic table was taking up part of that 19 foot length.

We went immediately back to the office, where the woman (a different one than I had booked with) informed me that we WOULD fit in that site and they were full up and we’d absolutely have to park there.  

Then she took one look at my face, as I handed her the confirmation email and changed her tune immediately.  She grumbled the whole time she was looking through her site book and kept suggesting short campsites and us parking elsewhere.  I told her no, that we had booked for a set size site and I would NOT be treated this way by them AGAIN.  

Suddenly she came up with a 50ft site, and suggested I walk down and see if it was empty(why she didn’t know if it was empty or not I have no idea) and if it would work for us.  It was and would, but it was no 50 ft either.  Our fifth wheel is a 30 ft, and we drive a one ton dually to pull it.  Once we were parked (which was easy access) all the way back in the lot we had to angle our truck up under the tongue of the fiver to fit inside the campsite boundaries.  Someone needs to re-measure all their sites for certain.  My truck is definitely not any 20 ft long.

While the campsite is clean, however, this third time of basically poor service on their part will make us hesitant to go back there ever again.  Especially at $34 per night, less a 10% discount for being annual passholders.

We were just a few sites from the office, yet our wi-fi was spotty at best.  If you are going that way and decide you want to chance them so you can use the free Silver Dollar City shuttle if your rig is 30ft site 154 will hold it.

As for them being full up, not in their wildest dreams.  We kept watching for rigs coming in all three nights we were there and over half the campground  was empty.

Oh and we drove by the previous campsite later that weekend.  They had someone parked in there.  The smallest pop-up camper I’ve ever seen and it completely filled the site. That was campsite 90.

About their shuttle.  Currently it is running at 9 am, noon, 3 pm and 6 pm only.  You better be there for it at those times because he loads who is there when he arrives and then leaves, they do not wait around.  It is, however, a clean kneeling bus that has the drive on lift system for wheel chairs and reserved seats for strollers.

Our overall review of this campsite based on this trip and our previous experiences is a C.

Prior to the trip we had major repairs done to the truck, that included replacing the water pump and hoses because we had been getting “low coolant” warning lights on our dash.

As dh backed into site 154 the “low coolant” light came on again.  Not good 400+ miles from home pulling a trailer.  We kept a close eye on the temperature gauge all the way home I can guarantee you.  The truck went back to the shop first thing Monday morning!

So that started our weekend off on a bit of a sour note, but once we were camped the real fun began.

Stay tuned for part 2.

Jan who refused to let The Wilderness ruin her anniversary trip in OK

CUTTING BACK ON LIFE’S LITTLE EXPENSES

April 23, 2010


As many of you already know I am a huge fan of Dave Ramsey. While I am, what Dave calls, a math nerd I can see the logic in his system and truly feel that we will be totally debt free in six years or less, even with our current state of income.

That being said it needs to also stated that sometimes that means giving a whole new meaning to Dave’s statement of living on“rice and beans, beans and rice.” When people make that much desired phone call to Dave’s radio talk show to shout ‘WE’RE DEBT FREE!” he often asks them what was the hardest thing for them about getting debt free.

For many it’s giving up vacations, or a favorite vehicle or something similar. Up until recently I would have said it was not being able to run into the grocery store and just shop to my heart’s content. This last three weeks have changed my feelings on the hard to give up however. Now I would have to say it is not using the internet any time I please.

We aren’t sure exactly what is going on that suddenly we went from having plenty room on our 5G broadband card with Sprint to constantly worrying about every time we turn the internet on , but we are finding ourselves going over the 5 g limit with amazing speed on our Sprint card. This month Gary realized we were down to one G just one week into the month. That was nearly 3 weeks ago and life without my immediate access to the internet has been very frustrating and eye opening.

Before the sudden spike in our usage we did our mystery shops, read email, played Farm Town, Farmville, Barn Buddy and Country Life (cj’s farm) on facebook and NEVER went over. Now things have changed. Again I’m not sure why. But the internet is MANDATORY for mystery shopping so everything other than mystery shops and even most of that needs to be done another way, other than the air card. Even Sean, our son, has found that while job hunting at home he went hugely over this month to the tune of $125 extra on his monthly bill—and the month isn’t over yet! How he used over 7 G by himself when he’s been out doing yard work we’ve not figured out yet. Luckily his card is separate from ours.

To figure out what was happening we started monitoring everything VERY closely and what we found was surprising. None of were the least bit surprised the facebook games and streaming videos were mb eaters. So we cut them out on the computer, but still our 1 g started going down quickly. More cuts needed made and fast!

We both trimmed the number of emails we were receiving daily by going “no mail” on most of our yahoogroups. These first three steps slowed the downward spiral, but with three weeks to go it wasn’t going to be enough. Especially not when the majority of the jobs we had required mega photo uploads.

Next went leaving webpages open in the background. All those flashing designs, music and such are mb eaters as well. Even the rolling total of my mypoints tool bar was now considered costly. Weatherbug bit the dust as well. We now checked it twice a day. Once with breakfast and once before retiring for the evening. The rest of the time it is disabled.

Our news side bars were trimmed, as well as the automatic opening to webpages when we first started internet explorer. Updates were taken off of automatic and placed on manual. MORE needed to go, the usage was still too high.

We then started watching how many mb were used when a webpage loads. Some companies we work for require a four webpage load to get logged in. Each webpage is numerous kbs that add up to mb quickly. MORE needed to go. We put direct links to the log in screen for our main employers websites on our icon screens. We now only check for new jobs twice a day instead of repeatedly throughout the day.

What emails we answered get trimmed of every excess thing in them. Friends and family were told to not sent cutesy photos and definitely not videos any more. Links were great(we’d view them at a later time when we had room on the card to use the space), but attachments were no longer welcome.

We started reading as many work related emails as possible on Gary’s phone.

The usage slowed down finally, but there was now less than half a gig and we had 40+ of those big photo shops to deal with.

HELLO MCDONALD’S, Panera, Burger King, Taco Bell and anywhere else we can get free wi-fi! We have worked out a system that while Gary is doing his shops, I am at a place that offers free wi-fi for our use and while I’m shopping he’s reporting. It’s really made for some VERY long days. We have gotten spoiled to me entering jobs as we fly down the highway, which means only Gary needs to use it at the camper.

We have found some very negative things out. While McDonald’s is now offering their wi-fi for free it is iffy at best and they seem to have either done completely away with all electrical outlets OR the outlets don’t work. That’s so TACKY McDonald’s. Yes, your corporate headquarters will be receiving a letter from me about it. Yes, you have lost numerous sales over it this last three weeks, and you will continue to lose them as I take my single item purchase to another establishment that does offer not only free wi-fi, but also the ability to plug in our laptops. Panera is the big winner in this game.

On the other hand KUDOS to Branson, MO where on their Country Music Blvd (or whatever that street is named) they have if4e which equals free wi-fi for everyone. We have found wonderful connections at numerous places all up and down that main street.

Another thing we have learned is you can google (or search engine of your choice) the words “free wi-fi” along with the city and state you are in and find various places to get the service for free.

For the last 2.5 weeks we have uploaded all we can at these free locations. We also download anything we need/want there whenever possible. It’s four more days until our next month rollover and our5 g starts again

After all the long hours I have spent in fast food joints or the front seat of the truck in their parking lots I can guarantee you we will be still very much the tightwad with our usage once we are back up to 5 g. Sean says he won’t be using his again for quite awhile with that whopping bill he now has to pay.

So if you email me, be aware that I download my emails while at a free wi-fi place, then read them when I don’t have wi-fi, type the replies and queue them to send the next time I’m at free wi-fi. So it might take a day or two for you to hear back from me.

As for my farms and critters on facebook. I’m getting pretty good at working my way around with those too. I plant 3 day or longer crops, put as much as I can on auto pilot and only play when I’m at a free wi-fi location and AFTER all my work is done. I can still use neighbors on all my games and I do gift well when I get to play. So those of you that aren’t already my neighbor feel free to put in a neighbor request. LOL!

Jan who admits she’s hooked on the facebook games in and away from OK

WORLDFEST, SILVER DOLLAR CITY, BRANSON, MISSOURI

April 14-20, 2010


From Arkansas we traveled to Branson, MO to do numerous shops in the area and to maybe get a little R&R while there. Worldfest was going on at Silver Dollar City and we had agreed if we did a certain amount of jobs we would go ahead and purchase annual passes for SDC to use throughout the year.

Once again Gary’s age was a benefit for us. His senior pass was lower than mine by a few dollars. Some may say it’s not very Total Money Makeover to purchase and amusement park annual pass, but I disagree.

First of all Dave Ramsey says to include some blow money in your zero based budget. We choose to put ours for the last few months into these tickets. For less than the price of two one day admission tickets we will be able to visit as much as we like throughout the year. Considering how much we like the Blue Grass and BBQ festival in May, the Harvest Festival in October and the Old Time Christmas during the holidays that money was well spent as long as we can tie days of profitable mystery shopping to them.

Second the annual passes also get you discounts on meals, and other parks around the nation. Because of the way we travel we are hoping to take advantage of the other parks part this year. We’ll see. It all depends on the work. The meals part is not that big a deal with us since we tend to take in food from our camper at any amusement park we visit. In the days we went in this trip we purchased one BBQ sandwich and split it. We had taken our refillable Silver Dollar City mugs in full of a beverage from the camper, but by the time we had that sandwich we purchased refills as well. The total meal for two with the refills and the annual pass discount came to slightly over $6 for the dinner. We sat and watched a good show as we ate. Not often you can do a dinner show for $6 bucks for two now is it.

Third this was a pleasant way to get exercise. Some of you may go HUH? Others, those of you who have been to Silver Dollar City are nodding in agreement. Everything in SDC is up a steep hill both ways no matter where you go or what you do while there. You definitely get your walking in there.

If you have never been to SDC it is not your major thrill ride type park. It’s a slow paced enjoyable family theme park, where the staff is not afraid to say “God bless you” and who salute the American veterans and mean it. There are arts and crafts abound, good clean kid fun, great shows and of course rides.

The rides tend to be country theme based. The giant barn swing is just that a huge swing that sways you back and forth higher and higher. Much like the Viking ship rides at the fair. There is a water rapid ride or two, roller coasters, slow moving boat rides and much more. If you want your true thrill ride you would want to get the dual park pass and go to their other theme park that conveniently opens just as Silver Dollar City closes for the evening.

Once the park is closed there is a free music show each night in Echo Hollow that is included in the price of your ticket. It lasts nearly two hours and is generally fairly good. It is sponsored by GAC network.

Worldfest is one of the several festivals they have at the park each year. It has entertainers from all over the world performing for a few weeks each spring. While all the shows were good we really enjoyed the Firey Fiddles, the Footprints-t Trinidad Stilt Walkers (and very good musicians and limbo dancers) and the Irish harp player. All the shows, about 9 or 10 are included in your ticket. There are other shows and demonstrations spread throughout the park as well.

This time we took advantage of Gary’s national parks senior pass to camp for $9.50 per night at Indian Point Corps of Engineers just two miles past Silver Dollar City on Table Rock Lake.

We’ve camped at this campground on and off our entire married life. It has definitely changed over the years. When we first started going there it was mainly a few picnic tables and a water spigot here and there, with a single bath house that had solar showers.

It is now more than 100 paved semi-level campsites, with two dump stations and several restrooms with flush toilets. We still only located one shower house, but it’s been greatly remodeled from when we first started coming there 35 years ago.

To my knowledge none of the campsites there have sewer hook-ups. Some have just water and others have water and electric. Our site had both, it would normally rent at $19.00 per night. The campground is clean and well maintained. It also has a HUGE marina area.

If you want to camp there during major festival times at the city you better make your reservations now. There is a fee to make a reservation with the corps of engineers campground and it is non-refundable. They have a cancelation policy you can read about online at recreation.gov

Because we need a large enough space for a 30 ft travel trailer and we have plans to be back there in about four weeks we made our reservation for that week we want to be there during the kids blue grass competition. Which just happens to be Memorial weekend. Even this early we had to change our arrival date from Saturday the weekend before to Sunday. We also had to take a site that is BARELY big enough for our camper. There was nothing else available for the amount of time we wanted and the dates we wanted. We also had to pre-pay. OUCH!

Whether you stay at the corps of engineers campground or any of the other numerous ones (Compton Ridge and the Wilderness give discounts to annual passholders) you will want to make your reservations soon because they all fill up fast. We have gone in the past and managed to find a site at the last minute, but it’s been due to sheer luck.