LAST DAY IN CA

A beautiful warm sunny day after a week of dreary, cloudy, rainy, cool weather, so we went off to the golf course. This course is in Sun City, CA about 8 miles away. After hitting a bucket of balls at the driving range we decided we weren't up to a game of golf, so we went to the putting green and had some fun practicing our putts.

We are getting a new home and Godiva lost hers. This cat post was where Godiva spent many hours in our RV, but there is no spot in our new one for it to go. So we found a couple who were very happy to have it for their cat Reggie. We will have to come up with a good place for Godiva to hang out in our new home. Right now see seems a little confused and lost without her post. We took a walk around Wilderness Lake and Iremembered to take my camera for a picture of these birds. They have long beaks and long legs, but I don't know what they are called.

There is a large flock of these ducks (kind? black with white beak) in the park. They are always swimming around in the canals.

As I was taking the pictures all the birds came thinking I had something good for them to eat.

A blue heron was watching over the water.

What a sight when they fly. We see them every day but I still get excited when I see them.

We leave this area tomorrow and head to Vegas just as the weather turned warm. So goodby to California and this area. We have had a very nice stay and look forward to returning another year.

BIG NEWS

On Thursday we got up early and took our motor home to Temecula RV. Larry was feeling a shimmy when he was using the jack brake and Coach Net sent him there to have it diagnosed. We dropped the RV off at 8:00 and then headed to Palm Springs to have our last golf lesson with Jeff Harrison. Jeff was a great teacher and we enjoyed all his help.

Jeff putting out some balls for us to warm up and practice our drives. I need a lot more practice!

After hitting some balls we went out with Jeff to play a game. He taught us golf etiquette, rules and to understand how to play a course. The First Tee is a nice 3 par 9 hole golf course. Larry had some great shots.

OK my turn, let see if I can remember all I was taught.

I hit the ball. Most of them went pretty straight. I actually had one hole in 3 ! Thanks heaven we weren't keeping score.

After golf we had lunch at the Elephant Bar and then I had my hair cut at Penney's while Larry picked up his medicine from the CVS. We had to hurry back to Temecula to get to the RV dealer before they closed at 5. Unfortunately they found that the U joint needed to be replaced and the part they needed they couldn't get till Friday. We couldn't stay in the RV since it was in a stall with its rear jacked up. We feed the cat and gathered some things we needed and headed to Wilderness Lake to stay the night in this cabin. ($47)

It sure wasn't like our motor home.

The old U joint. It wasn't long before we would have been broken down and have had to been towed in. This is the second time we have had this replaced. Luckily our warranty covered it.

Saturday afternoon we went to Riverside to Mike Thompson RV. We had been discussing about getting a new RV, but we only went to look and get a feel if was sensible for us to even think about it. We knew Tiffin was the best RV on the market today. Herb was our salesman and he showed us this RV and it had all we wanted and was "cheaper" then we expected. He was not a pushy salesman but before the evening was over we were the proud owner of this 2011 Phaeton! It has a bath and half, four slides, three TVs inside and one outside, washer and drier, a regular home refrigerator, sleeper sofa, 2 Euro chairs, a built in desk by the table with a draws for the computer and printer. We take possession of it next Monday so many pictures will be posted of it next week.

On Sunday we went back to Mountain Shadow RV park for their church service. The pastor left us half way through his sermon last week so we wanted to hear the rest of it. It was on Revelation and the letters to the seven churches and how each one prophesied the history of the church until today.

After church we went to lunch at Paul and Karla's. What a delicious meal she made and we had a lovely visit. They are an amazing couple and make us always feel so welcome. They are Dutch and were raised in Dutch Indonesia. We learned they had been in a Japanese concentration camp during WW II. It was a fascinating story and one I never knew anything about. Thanks to Paul I have all the music for the dances we learned at the line dance rally last week.

WILDERNESS GOES HOLLYWOOD

Larry and I were able to attend the 14th annual line dance rally at Wilderness Lakes TT from March 14 to March 17. It was very well done, with great teachers, great decorations, and well organized.

Paul Dornstedt in front of the well decorated fireplace in the family center.

Movie posters were hung from the ceiling with all the "star" teachers pictures and names.

Rhonda was the organizer of this rally and she did a terrific job. Mike was the DJ at the family center all day long and also for the evening dances. Thanks to him we had the music to dance to.

Each morning we gathered at the family center for demos of the dances that would be taught that day.

On Thursday everybody was dressed up for St. Patrick Day. Sue is on the right and I enjoyed dancing with her during the week.

Terri Slemmons demonstrating the dance she would be teaching that day.

Sharon Langford showing us It Will and Is Baby's Radio On. She teaches older ladies and gave us some beginner dances to learn. I enjoyed getting dancing and talking with know her.

After seeing the dances for the day some of us (30 to 40) headed to the gazebo for the beginners/easy intermediate dances. ( some were not so easy with up to 64 counts with lots of turns and tags) The floor was concrete and a little hard on the legs for dancing for three hours.

Ken Lubin was the DJ at the gazebo and he did a very nice job.

Karla Dornstedt teaching us Mi Rowsu.

Terri teaching us All Night Long. It didn't take us that long to learn it. (just was starting to feel that way)

We had a very good fried chicken lunch Tuesday afternoon and every morning there was coffee and doughnuts.

Thursday night was the Hollywood Theme Dance finale. We enjoyed an hour of dancing and then we enjoyed some entertainment by some of the teachers and dancers.



"Naomi Judd" showed up and sang to us.

Two of the "Little Rascals" danced and sang to Lollipop. (Frey we could do this)

Wow, even "Marilyn Monroe" entertained us.

Paul dressed as Delila, Marilyn's long lost sister. He sang a song about what he had left from his romance as he produced them out of his blouse.

The show stopper was the zombie dance to Thriller by Noel Castle, Kathy Van Luven and three other dancers that came from Mount Vernon, Washington.

Beauty and the beasties? A whole lot of talent.Here's to all the teachers this week. From left to right Terri Slemmons, Karla Dornstedt, Kathy Van Luven, Paul Dornstedt, Rueben Luna, and Noel Castle.
Dorothy Lubin, Anna Maria Prach, and Sharon Langford. Connie Frey, Gene Morrill, and Lou Ann Schemmel also taught but were not here for the closing.

I really enjoyed learning the dances from so many different teachers. It was fun seeing each ones teaching style. I picked up a few hints on how to help someone learn some of the steps. There was a girl in our group that had never danced before, so they were very patient with her and helped her with the basics. She was catching on pretty fast by the last day.

I don't think I will remember any of the dances, but the step sheets were given to us so I can go back and review them. It was a fun week and I'm glad we had the opportunity to do it. I hope my path will cross again with many of these dancers.

CHANGE OF PLANS

We drove over to Palm Springs last Wednesday. We took a free golf lesson at the First Tee. Then I had my hair colored and highlighted at the beauty school while Larry had a doctor's appointment. We decided to come back to Hemet on route 79, up over the mountain to Idyllwild and down to Hemet. These pictures were taken from one of the overlooks half way up the mountain. Look closely and you may see the switchbacks of the road we traveled.

Idyllwild (5,000 feet) is a lovely little town, unfortunately it was too late for us to spend some time exploring it. We drove over to the Thousand Trail preserve (6,000 feet). We were thinking of coming here to camp next week but the snow and the sign that said chains required quickly changed our minds. The road with all the switchbacks and curves was another good reason not to bring the RV up here. I even felt car sick by the time we reached Hemet.

On Saturday we were scheduled to go to Mountain Lake, an ROD park about 60 miles north west for a week and then back to Indian Waters in Indio.

Friday Larry and I went up to do the line dancing at Wilderness Lake. There is going to be a country line dance rally here all next week, so many of the teachers for that event were in the park and Rhonda was teaching. We saw Paul and Karla Dornstedt, choreographers and line dance teachers. We had met them at Mount Vernon TT,Washington when we came out of Alaska in Sept. 2008. There was a line dance rally there that week and they kindly welcomed us to join them. We never thought our path would cross these dancers again. When they heard we weren't staying for the rally because of having to leave the park (we had been here three weeks so we had to leave) they offered us to stay at the site they own at an RV park in Hemet (11 miles away). So we will be at Mountain Shadows until March 22 and then we will go back to Wilderness Lake before we head to Vegas.

Godiva made herself right at home as soon as we got here.

Karla and Paul own this site at Mountain Shadows. We really appreciate them letting us stay here while they are over at Wilderness Lake.

Saturday night there was a line dance at Wilderness Lake. From the left is Rhonda , Paul, and Karla. We are now going to be doing a lot of dancing all next week for we are part of the Rally.