The Rally has Ended, Time to Move On

 
 The rally ended this afternoon.  Our brains are both FULL and we are exhausted.  But… we hate to see the rally end because we know that our friends will all be going home tomorrow morning.  We have enjoyed being around fellow RVers and as tired as we both are; we have learned SO MUCH.  

We came with a very short list of things we were hoping to pick up at the rally.  We expected to find a few additional things—but hoped we would not go crazy.  Here is our summary:

Planned Purchases:  Total: $460

Tire Minder, tire monitoring system:  $400

Digital Tire Pressure gauge:  $28

Silicon baking Pans: $32

Unplanned Purchases:  Total:  $147

Bag sealers (chips, etc.): $5

Collapsible Salad Spinner:  $20

Collapsible Refrigerator Storage Container:  $22

Fire Extinguisher:  $25

Geeks on Tour annual Membership:  $59

Electrical connector cleaner:  $16

We had also expected to eat several meals out.  In the end we only ate out the first evening.   We had planned to spend at least $1,000 between purchases and eating out—and in the end we spent less than $150 on unplanned expenses.  

Each day we had expected to go to 6 hours of seminars.  With my fibromyalgia, I often run out of energy before I run out of daylight.  I went to part of one night of entertainment—but I thought it was below average and so we left early.  I didn’t even try to go the final few evening’s entertainment.  The last day I was only able to go to 2 seminars before I pooped out, however, George was happy to be done for the day, also. 

Some of the seminars that we went to were worthless.  Several of the presenters were so interested in selling their products that they didn’t offer any helpful information—these were much like an in-person infomercial.   We went to different seminars while we were here—mostly because we had different things we were interested in.  George loved the seminars on maintenance and safety.  We each attended a fire safety demonstration that was both scary and helpful.  I went to Technology seminars on everything from Smartphones to Picasa photo editing.  I also attended seminars on organization and on space saving tips.

In the end, we both felt like it was worth our time and our money; and we were glad we had attended.  We would expect if we do another Rally, we will try to attend an Escapee Rally.

But the Rally is over and we are moving on to Emerald Cove in Earp, CA, where we plan to lounge beside the pool for a week or so.