Arriving at the RV Dreams Rally

We had a lot of prep work to get done before we left for the RV Dreams Rally in Tennessee, and even with a few unexpected complications, we were done and ready to hit the road!

Tom and Nicolas putting the landing gear leg back together (winter coats – still cold on Friday!!)

It was a cool and foggy Michigan morning when we pulled out of the driveway, but the weather kept getting better as we drove south!

In Michigan, the grass is just barely starting to turn a little bit green, and the trees are still bare!

In Ohio, the grass was green and lush, and the diesel prices dropped from $4.10 to $3.89 /gallon.  By noon, the temperature was well into the 70s, and we were shedding our sweatshirts!

Diesel prices weren’t too bad at the Piqua, OH Walmart

Getting into a gas station with the RV attached is always fun!

After a quick fill-up and lunch at the Subway in Walmart (another convenient benefit!), we were back on the road!  It was a beautiful day to travel (even with temperatures approaching 90 degrees!), and as we continued south we saw even more signs of spring – trees budding in northern KY, and eventually even fully blossomed flowering trees in Tennessee.  We had thought we might spend the might in mid-Kentucky, but were making good time, so decided to keep moving.  We eventually got hungry again, and decided to stop for the night at a Walmart shortly after crossing into Tennessee.  We had a quick dinner at McDonald’s (the only thing open within walking distance!), used their free Wi-Fi to check email, and were back in the RV to watch Amazing Race and Celebrity Apprentice (luckily we were able to pull in CBS and NBC with the antenna).

It was a noisy place to spend the night, but the views of the mountains in the distance were great!

We were left with an easy 1-hour drive in the morning, and arrived at he River Plantation RV Park at 10:30 am. 

Comfortably settled into site #200

We quickly set up, and walked over to the pavilion to check on the Rally preparations.  Linda and Howard have everything under control, and it should be a really great experience!  Everything get started tomorrow afternoon, and we’re looking forward to it . . .

FIRST Robotics Competitions

Robots all lined up and ready to face off!

Nicolas has an interest in engineering, so in order to explore the option some more while still in high school, he joined a FIRST Robotics Team (Skyline High School – Team 3322).

Nick is hiding in the back row, & Tom is to the right/behind the guy in red

FIRST is a global organization which introduces high school students to the world of engineering through a series of competitions.  Teams all over the world attended a Kickoff Meeting on January 8th, where the specifications for the 2011 competitions were introduced.  The teams then had 6 weeks to design, fabricate, build, program, and test their robot.

Testing between matches in the pits at Kettering (Nick has the controls)

Tom and Nick, along with the rest of the team, spent 10 –15 hours each of the six weeks working on their robot.  In the end, it looks pretty good – and performs the intended functions, too!

Phase I – Robot is programmed to hang a tube by itself

 

Phase II – The Drive Team tries to hang as many tubes as possible in 2 minutes (Nicolas is the driver in this match)

 

Red-White-Blue logo formations earn bonus points.  Higher pegs are worth more, too.

The team has attended 2 Michigan Regional Competitions so far, and after pretty decent performance at each, they are currently in the running to compete at the Michigan State Competition in early April – we’ll know for sure after the two remaining regional competitions this weekend.

 

Team 3322 hanging tubes & successful minibot run

In the above video, the team’s robot was unsuccessful in Phase I, but performed well in Phase II, and successfully sent their “minibot” up the pole at the end of the match – BIG bonus points for that!  (Nicolas isn’t driving in this match, but he’s there in the driver area.)

I have been surprised at how elaborate and exciting the competitions are – there’s a  lot of action, and lots of noise!  It’s been fun, and we’re all enjoying the experience!

Surviving the blustery winter weather

Like much of the rest of the midwest, we were buried under a foot of snow this past week, but we managed to miss only one day of work – and zero days of school (the beauty of homeschooling!!)

Despite the snow and cold, we’ve been keeping pretty busy.  Both of the boys are playing in a basketball league through the end of March, and Nick’s Robotics Team is 2/3 of the way through their build season, and gearing up for competitions in March and April.

Tom has been researching the electrical set-up for the RV.  We’ve got to replace our batteries, so we’re taking this opportunity to switch over to 6V, and to add in a battery meter to track our amp-hour usage.  We don’t really plan on doing a lot of boondocking, but we might as well have an idea of how much power we consume on a regular basis.  We should be able to get the electrical modifications done in March, so we’re ready to go for the RV-Dreams Rally in April . . . that’s the plan, anyway.

Last month, we all took a day off and visited the North American International Auto Show in Detroit.  The boys are real car buffs, and they thoroughly enjoyed the show!

We saw big trucks,

Bryce likes the F-250 King Ranch . . . not quite big enough for towing, though!

electric trucks,

police cars,

I don’t want to see one of these guys in my rear-view mirror!

smart cars,

Tom had to sit in a Smart car . . . this one is $40K . . .WHY??

maybe it’ll fit in the back of the toy-hauler!!

and LOTS of Mustangs!

 

 

I guess we spent the majority of our time in the Ford display, but there were lots of cool displays to check out.

Anyone need HALF of an Explorer??!!

 

How about an up-close look at the underbody of an F-150 Raptor??!!

 

Then there’s the C-Max that thinks it’s Spiderman . . . I’m not sure what the point was!

We had a great time, and spent several hours checking out all the cars, but as a true-blue Ford family, we kept coming back here to our favorites!

We finished up the day with dinner at a Detroit institution,

Delicious mexican food!

YUM!