Day 22 Tuesday February 3, 2009

Moving day again; we called a couple of campgrounds and one turned us away because they were full, the other just had a recorded message and said they had plenty of room – come on over! I punched the address into the Garmin and off we went. I had noticed that the AAA campground book said this campground (Diamond J RV Park) was too new to be rated, but what I didn’t notice was that the address given was the owner’s address and was meant as a mail-in address for advance reservations. We were west-bound on Hwy 86 when the Garmin told us to make a U-turn; I couldn’t figure that out because I had not seen any indication of an RV Park. So eventually we turned around and went to the spot that the GPS indicated was our destination. The address matched the address that I had put into the GPS but I couldn’t believe the driveway was meant for RVs. It was narrow, had a gate (open) and made a turn of about 170 degrees before going up a steep hill and out of sight. I had pulled onto the shoulder of the road to check the address and then tried to turn into the driveway but before I got very far the side of the trailer was about to wipe out the mailbox at the edge of the driveway. At this point I suddenly recognized that this was the making of a scene from the Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball Movie “The Long, Long Trailer.” I was backing the trailer out into a four lane highway with moderate traffic and we were located just over the crest of a hill that prevented us from seeing traffic coming at us and they couldn’t see the crazy Polack that was backing onto the highway. After several tries, I was able to get the trailer backed onto the shoulder of the road and headed east again.

I wasn’t finished being stupid yet! I knew I could make that corner if turned from the driving lane rather than the shoulder so after getting turned around we approached the driveway for the second time. This time the mailbox wasn’t a problem but before I got through the gate the side of the trailer was hitting the gate. This time
the gate was not open as far as it could be, but it was stuck in the ground because the gate opened in the direction of the hill. I considered getting out a shovel and digging out enough dirt to get the gate all the way open, but the gate was flexible enough to be pulled out of the way by a willing navigator. While Cathey pulled on the gate I pulled the trailer ahead; I tried to do it slowly but I was moving uphill and I had to give it more gas than I wanted too. The gate missed the most expensive protrusions but did scrape the wheel well edging and an outdoor electrical outlet. When we got to the top of the hill, all there was, was a house with a rather large parking area! So we got turned around and got he heck out of there and headed for an RV Park on the other side of town.


Cathey comments below:

I said nothing, the air in our vehicle was almost devoid of oxygen after I gasped and held my breath, and maintained my silence at great effort, maintaining my restraint. This was no time to joke, or to chastise my very upset husband. I resolved to never bring this up in conversation, not even in an email. It had been a fruitless effort, and a wasted search for the desired campground.. Seven days later, Tony decided to label the whole experience as our “Lucy and Desi” day.