project completed!

We were able to finish up our little beautification project and it turned out looking pretty good if I do say so myself!
Our "area" was the visitors parking lot which is just a long wooden fence. The first thing we did was stain both sides of the fence.

The fence is 70' long and it was a lot of work to get it all done. We wanted to transform both sides of the fence and we found some old metal letters laying in a junk pile and these became our focus for the side seen from the entrance road. The letters were cleaned and painted and I built a couple of flower boxes out of scrap lumber. This is the view you have driving into the park.

The other side of the fence was a bigger challenge. I came up with the idea but Rudee did all the creative work. This is what we came up with.

The kids, sunflower, kite and ballons are all made from cut pieces of plywood and have a 3D look to them.
The whole project came in under the budget provided by the park and we have heard some good comments from the other work campers as well as the owners.

Thursday night we went to the local race track to watch the USAC Sprint cars race. We took our chairs and sat in the infield and had a great time. The track is a 1/2 mile dirt oval and it sure was fun watching the cars skidding through the turns with the drivers fighting for control. They sure were fast!

Memorial Day week end is winding down and we have been really busy the last two days. Saturday morning the cafe was a zoo! We ended up serving 48 meals in the 90 minutes we were open!
Sunday was a little slower but not by much. We are both tired from our long week and are looking forward to the next 2 days off, we need the rest! I'll keep you posted!

time flies!

Wow, this past week time has gotten away from me. Seems like I no more get started with the day and it's over! We did take some time for a bike ride Saturday afternoon. We rode to our old hometown of Lebanon where they were holding a Goldwing motorcycle rally. We arrived too late to participate in the rally events but did get to spend some time with all of our old biking buddies and that was what we were wanting to do anyway.

Here at the KOA things are ramping up for Memorial Day week end. The owner has offered a bonus for taking on an extra project so Rudee and I have been trying our hands at some "beautification", We are spiffing up the visitors parking area. We have been working on it for the last several days on our off hours and are just about finished with it. I will post some before and after photos soon but here is a quick before shot taken on my iphone.

We worked last evening (Wednesday) and were kept busy by arriving campers. The majority of them were here for one night and then moving to Indianapolis to boondock near the track. Seemed like I no more led one camper to their site and Rudee was calling me on the radio telling me to come back to the front for another escort! One of the "extra" things the campground does is pass out fresh baked cookies to our newly arrived campers. Rudee bakes them in an oven in the office and I deliver them to the campsites once they get settled in. The campers really enjoy getting a treat and it's a lot of fun for me to deliver them and, if time allows, I get to chat awhile as well.

We have some more to do on our little project before going into work at noon. Hopefully we can get everything done and can start enjoying our time off again. I'll keep you posted.

I see you!

In between shifts here at the KOA I have been trying to get a few projects done around our little home on wheels. The last couple of days we have been busy installing a rear view camera. We have had a camera on the back of the semi for a couple of years now and I use it to hook on as well as keep an eye on the bike while traveling. The camera works really well and I have wanted to install an additional one on the back of the fifth wheel. The screen that we installed in the dash  of the 5th wheel supports 3 separate cameras and I had already ran the wire for this new camera back to the hitch area of the truck.
I spent quite a while testing mounting locations, by taking off one of the brake lights and a clearance light I thought I could "fish" a wire from the roof of the 5er to the underside through the back cap. Unfortunately there is a board under the cap that runs the entire width of the cap that prevented me from doing this. I could have drilled a hole behind the clearance light into an interior cabinet then down the wall and through the floor but Rudee put the a stop to that idea not wanting me to drill a bunch of holes in her home!
I decided to just take the easy way out and ran the wire for the camera down the back side of the ladder and then drilled a hole into the rear cap at the bottom. We then ran the wire up to the front of the 5er, into the front compartment and under the floor of the overhang and out the hitch area. This not the "cleanest" installation and the wire shows a little on the rear but doesn't look too bad either.

They make wireless cameras but they are limited to the distance they will work. I did research the wireless option and found several others with similar rigs had tried them with disappointing results so I went with the hard wired option.
One big advantage is this new camera even has sound! When Rudee is backing me into a site all she has to do is speak her directions to the camera and I can hear her in the cab. Pretty cool, huh?

The days are passing pretty fast here at work. We start our first of three early shifts today. These shifts usually pass by really quickly and then we are off again to play for our "week end". I'll keep you posted.