The Specter Family Blog

Matt -- Steph -- Faith -- Mari -- Robby -- Hannah -- Salsa -- and........



Friday, July 3, 2009

Pics part 2 - main post below

In honor of Mari's problem...it just so happened that I managed to take like 3 pics in a row at Coney Island with people with mouths full of food - gross but funny. Enjoy:





And this one doesn't have chewed food, but a classic expression on Hannah's face.


Check in tomorrow night!

Matt

Day 1

A good first day!

Got up at 5:30 and I was literally dancing around the room to some dumb song on Q102 (Steph chooses the radio station) because the day was finally here.

We were PERFECT getting ready. Out the driveway exactly on time, loaded and hooked up with time to spare. The inverter worked like a charm, the battery is fine.

And out we went.

Driving the trailer for that long is not as easy as just driving a car, but it's not TOO bad. A little frustrating at first that you just can't go as fast as you want, but after a while your mind and body adjust and you fall into the groove. Passing slow trucks is a little stressful, it takes a while, but all in all you get used to it.

Stopped for lunch/fuel at a Pilot station in Covington, IN. First time pulling into a gas station with the trailer. Not too bad...had to back out but had plenty of room to do so - I am starting to understand the secrets to backing up with the trailer. Someday I might even be able to back into a space.

Fuel. Yeah. When the Suburban is towing, we can get about 225 or so miles per tank. That's it. It drops FAST.

Lunch on the road is a challenge - basically in the old days it would be a bit of a free-for-all in the RV with the slides in at a rest stop or gas station, everyone kind of jostling each other reaching for various food items. We decided a few days ago that adding the babies to that mix is just too much. So someone stays back in the Chevy and feeds the babies until someone else is done eating, then they take over so the first person can eat. Today it was me feeding the babies. Well worth the mess to not have to drag them in and out.

After lunch, the girls switched over to the RV and it's a good thing too because MARI PUKED!!! All over. If she had been in the Chevy that would have derailed the whole day - in the RV, my mom had a spare set of clothes, she could wipe everything up, bag up the nasty clothes, all without my dad having to stop the car. She's been fine since and all is well we think.

Pulled into the Galesburg East Holiday Best Trav-L-Park at around 3:30 local time. Or was it 2:30? Not sure exactly. Checked in, pulled in with no problem.

This is a very nice RV park. Steph and I have had a little project going, to rank our top 10 favorite RV parks we've stayed at. This one might make 9 or 10 - there's nothing particularly special about it, but it's all the little simple things that make it so nice. Really shaded, simple layout, level sites, clean pool, decent playground...and it probably helps that the temp never got above 80 degrees.

Girls played on the playground, twins crawled on the grass.

Got everyone set up and hooked up and headed out to Coney Island...a local hot dog establishment. Now this was probably not the best location to bring our particular crew. No high chairs, no frills...just really good hot dogs. Steph and mom took one for the team and held the twins while they ate and managed to feed them enough to keep them from screaming. It really was a neat little dive and we would have loved to go with fewer bodies to worry about...but it ended up okay.

Downtown Galesburg has some nice little areas...not all strip mall sprawl like so many places. Carl Sandberg's birthplace, a historic church...and they were having a dwontown street party in one neighborhood...again, with fewer people, on the 2003 trip for example, we totally would have stopped and looked around...but with 8 people stuffed into the Suburban...not this time.

Got back, had a pretty casual evening. Just about all the stuff is put away now. All in all, a really good first day, puke notwithstanding.

Here are a few pics:

Faith swinging, twins watching. Note the nicely maintained pool.


Mari on the big slide:


I love this one - you may have to click on it to get it full size for the real effect. Check out Steph saying a silent prayer for patience:


The girls in front of Coney Island - nice effect with us in the reflection.


Home for the night:


More to come soon!

The Journey Begins

We're up.