First Week in Elkhart

My dad many years on Christmas morning!
ALWAYS wore those bib overalls

Happy Father's Day to all the father's out there both young and old.  It's pretty easy to become a father, but a 'dad' is something special and I miss and think of mine every day.  I know that he is watching from above and I hope he's proud of what he sees from his two children and their families.

I do want to make a correction to last week's blog.  I wrote about the 800+ truck parking at the Walcot, IA exit and that it was a Pilot station when in fact it is Travel America (TA as referred to by the truckers).  There are two Pilot/Flying J stations also at that intersection but both much smaller than the TA.

As for this past week, we hoped for some nice weather but, of course, we are in 'humid' country now so we have had to adjust our bodies to 99% humidity some days, a little rain a couple of afternoons and/or evenings and some pretty serious thunderstorms one night this past week.

Indiana is well-known for many RV factories (not as many as earlier years since the economic downturn) and we had on our list of 'things to do while here' a couple of RV factory tours to see what's on the market now.  We did a tour of the Newmar factory on Tuesday and learned a lot about that brand.  Friday we did a tour of the Jayco Factory/Entegra Division and again learned even more about their product.  Each manufacturer does things just a bit differently and we have always been interested/concerned about how these big coaches are built since this is our home that has wheels and travels over some roads that aren't always in the best condition.  We also took a drive to Grand Rapids, MI and visited a Newmar dealer that I had read a lot of positive comments about on the web and can say that we would say positive things too now that we've been there.  It amazes us that both of these manufacturers can't build coaches fast enough to have any on display.  Newmar builds 5 a day (up from 3 in the downturn years) and Entegra builds 12 (up from 7).  As fast as they can build them, they are sold to the dealers across the country and most are sold to the consumer by the time they reach the dealer.  In other words, people are buying from pictures, the web, past experience with that brand or word of mouth.  Kind of hard to believe but we'd have to say the economy is doing better in the RV world.  We were able to see a coach or two at the end of each tour but each day it's different depending on what model they're building so you never know what you'll see and those are shipped to a dealer within the next day or two.

It is very obvious here in the Elkhart area that the economy is better.  Since this area is known as the RV capital of the world, there are many many other RV related companies/products made in this area all of which are also doing better and hiring back people who may have been released during the downturn which has the domino effect on restaurants, shopping, etc.  All good news for the area.

Both of the manufacturers we toured hire many Amish folk.  The hours work well with their farming since most start at 5 or 6 a.m. and finish by 1:30 or 2 p.m. giving them time to go home and work in the fields before dark.  The Amish are fabulous wood crafters and we know from past experience they make great cabinets in these RVs.  They prefer to not have their pictures taken, nor did the factory tours allow pictures, so I can't provide you with any but take my word,  it is impressive to watch them go from a bare chassis to a finished 40+ foot motorhome.

Dick took our

motorhome on Friday to a Freightliner service center for a 33 point tune up as they called it.  For those family and friends that are reading this and not familiar with an oil change in a motorhome......Freightliner used 47 quarts of oil so as Dick says, 'a quart low in this world, doesn't mean much'.  Tomorrow we have to be at Haulmark at 6 a.m. (remember I said they start early) and we're hoping our punch list will only take two days to fix but we'll see.

While Dick was at Freightliner, I went to Linda's Camp K-9, where Murphy LOVES to go for day camp.  She is very particular with which dogs she allows to play and/or board, so I took all of his papers to show that he was current with shots, etc.   He 'played' a lot there in 2010 when we were here for so long getting this coach built, so he knew IMMEDIATELY where we were when we got out of the car & as soon as I opened the door, he wanted to go back and play.  Unfortunately, one test was outdated (they missed it in AZ in April) so he couldn't stay and was disappointed to say the least when I put him back in the car.  We got that test on Saturday and should have the results tomorrow so hopefully by Tuesday he can go back and play a couple of times while we're here.

Cute little bus outside Linda's doggie camp

Last evening we had dinner at Antonio's here in Elkhart with some good friends who live in this area.  They were our neighbors in Apple Valley, CA many years ago and we have stayed in touch.  Cheryl is a fabulous quilter so I look forward to seeing what she has been working on lately when we get together again.  Her husband, Craig, just retired this week from the school district and is already talking about applying to be a tour bus driver so I'm guessing the word 'retirement' isn't in his vocabulary just yet.

Today, Father's Day, is a bright sunny morning with some rain predicted for later this afternoon.  In the meantime, we'll take all the sun we can get.

Have a great week ahead everyone!