Tag Archives: Rose Parade

Rose Parade Vacation Days 6, 7 & 8

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Day 6.

The Rose Parade is over, we are at Desert Hot Springs staying at Sam’s Family Spa and RV Resort.  THere are numerous other RV resorts here but most of them are over 55 (we aren’t there yet) so we have not investigated them fully yet.  That is OK.  Sam’s is nice, a bit pricey but you do get access to their hot pools.

We slept in as good as we could and hit the hot pools early in the day.  After days of cold weather it was so wonderful to have every body part warm!  I didn’t want to get out but knew I would be a prune soon.  That afternoon we went into the Palm Springs area and  did some bills!  How exciting.  I get paid once a month and it was time to do the bills whether at home or not.  This was good practice for the future on the road.  I have every bill but one setup to pay electronically.

After camping out at a Panera to do the bills we heading to watch a movie.  We saw the last Hobbit movie (thankfully) in 3D and IMAX!  Normally I don’t care for 3D movies as the director tries to overemphasize the 3D effects.  However, this movie did not do so much of that it just used it as an added effect not the only one.

Back to the trailer where we had hookups and could heat it to our desire.

Day 7.

Even though we saw a movie yesterday, we did it again today!  This was our portion of the vacation to relax and unwind.  The WBCCI part was fun and very loosely scheduled but there still was a schedule.  Here we didn’t have one, which was nice.

We went to see Unbroken.  This is the movie that was based upon the life of Louis Zamparini, grand marshal of the parade.  It was a good movie and very inspiring.  When you feel like you are having a bad day, watch this movie.

We had a late lunch, shopped around a bit and then went back to see another movie!  This time we saw Wild.  It was a movie about a woman that went through a lot in her life and decided to hike the Pacific Crest Trail.  We thought the movie would be another inspiring movie but it wasn’t quite what we thought.  They could have told the same story without some of the more graphic elements.  However it was rated R but was disappointing in that respect.

Day 8.

Last day.  Time to go home.  But not before spending some more time in the hot pools.  Had to get one more in before we left.

We went home via an alternate route, that we have done before.  Hiway 62 through Yucca Valley, then hiway 242 toward Victorville.  However I did a slight change.  I stayed on 242 at Lucerne Valley which turned north toward Barstow.  Normally we head on hiway 18 through Victorville.  This way we would not have to fight going through the Victorville area and I see that as a plus.

Hiway 242 had a slight hill in the middle of it but nothing bad.  HOWEVER, on the downhill portion I found something interesting.  On many roads you will see elevation signs at every thousand feet and normally at the summit.  This road had those but it had one more.  On the northbound downhill portion coming into Barstow there was an elevation sign.  It read “Elevation 3305”.  This sign was NOT at the summit and I found that to be a rather odd elevation to report.  I have google’d it but cannot find anything about it.  I have sent an email to CalTrans.

We got lunch in Barstow and pushed on.

Roxie got to drive the rig again on her favorite route:

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She even pulled it into the rest area along the way.  Here she is in action:

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We got home in the dark, put the trailer away and settled back into our home lives.

Click here for my Rose Parade pictures I put into Flickr.

Also our friend George sent the kissy picture to me.  Note, don’t take a flash picture of a reflective jacket!:

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Rose Parade Rally Day 4 and 5

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Day 4 – New Year’s Eve

It is interesting how a day that has all the characteristics of any other day is treated differently just because of its’ location on the calendar.  December 31 is such a day.  It has a lot of hoopla because it is the last day of the year.  But how does it really differ from say, June 6?  Sorry, just waxing philosophically.

This AM breakfast started out with biscuits and gravy.  Roxie and I did not do too much this day except for a bit of shopping across the street (there was a mall of sorts).  We knew that most activities were going to happen in the evening.  She even tried to take a nap before I woke her up securing the awning.  A few of the airstreamers were playing a bean bag tossing game:

Bag Toss

That evening a meal was provided.  Then the decision was made as to what timezone we should celebrate the New Year in?  I think the Central Time Zone was decided upon.  That way everyone could be in their trailers shortly after 10pm.  We didn’t make it that long.  Wow!  We are getting old.  It was also pretty cold.

We hung around the group under the tent while the vast majority decided to start dancing.  Below is a short video clip of some of the festivities.  In the foreground, albeit dark, is Tom Smithson.  He was the DJ for the music, using his iPad.  He also was enjoying YMCA:

 

This was a very fun group!

We had heard that there are a lot of people camping out on Colorado Blvd to get good seats.  Luckily we weren’t some of them.  However Brad and Karen (from Georgia) got some shots on their blog: www.travelwiththeslowskys.com  Go check out their blog.

Day 5 – Happy New Year!

We got up around 7am and it was COLD!  We knew that and bundled up appropriately.  It is nice that the parade starts around 8am and we were very close.  We walked down there around 7:45 and got to our bleacher seats.  A recap about that cold:

Low 30’s to start.
Aluminum bleachers.
Highest row of seats, farthest of ground with nothing below.
In the shade of a large building.

The perfect storm for cold.  I normally can tolerate the cold pretty well but it was cold even by my standards.  Here is a view of some of the other airstreamers in our section:

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Before the parade I also took a panoramic shot of my view:

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I did take many shots of the Rose Parade itself.  I will put those somewhere else and post a link later.  The B2 flew over to start the parade but I missed that shot.  That’s OK.  I have seen it before…  I will post one parade shot here.  The tribute to Louis Zamperini.  Louis was the Grand Marshal of the parade.  He was the subject of the movie Unbroken but unfortunately he died in July at 97 years.  They brought out a riderless horse with the boots backwards in the stirrups:

LZ tribute

 

His family followed in a vehicle.

Hey!  Did I mention it was cold?:

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The parade was enjoyable but would have been more fun if it was warmer.  My rear, toes and fingers were very cold.  I couldn’t take my pictures with gloves on.

At the end Roxie and I did the selfie!

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I was thankful to be able to put on my gloves and walk back.  Get some blood flowing.

We came back to the trailer and decided to head back to Lucky Boy burgers for lunch.  We drove this time.  There was a bit of traffic but we were south of the parade route and I210.  After another nice lunch we went back to the trailer and got it all setup for travel.  Next stop Desert Hot Springs.

We got the DHS about 4pm, setup the trailer and settled in for the night.  It was sure nice to take a long hot shower!  We declined on getting in the hot pools that evening as we were just too tired from all the Rose Parade stuff!