Day 11: Relaxing 'n Branson

Did not do a lot today. Started today off getting up and having coffee with dad and grandma on the enclosed porch. Rained pretty hard down here with lighting and thunder. Checked the radar back home and wonder if either of the kids had checked the house cellar with all this rain. Does not seem that either have. Asked them both to check on it and let me know.

Everyone is starting to stir now. Michelle made a pretty good breakfast, scrambled eggs with mushrooms, meat and cheese. Mom made some gravy with biscuits and sausage. After breakfast Michelle loaded up the suburban with Breack, Phoenix, Jason and Ryan to search for a couple of "castles" in the Branson area. It got quite. It was very enjoyable.

Mom finally got up from her mid-morning nap. Mom, Mari and I headed to town to get tickets for the Balbnobbers show for tonight. Got the call from truss company that Home Depot uses. They are delivering the trusses on Monday. Confirmed Home Depot will be delivering the materials for the garage. If all goes well and the weather cooperates we will begin building on Monday. Can't wait to have a garage.

Grabbed an ice cream from from Cold Stone Creamer. Tastee.

Then went to the Stone Hill Winery here in Branson. Took the tour and got to sample 13 different wines. I was feeling pretty good. No, I was not drunk and tipsy. They only give you a couple of ounces to try for each wine. I was liking the sweet wines towards the end of the tasting. Between Mari and I we bought 4 bottles to take home to enjoy. Headed back to to the lodge with mom driving. Relaxed until supper time. Had hamburgers and chips.

Went to the show and really enjoyed it. The show started at 7:40pm and did not finish until 10:10pm. Traffic was a pain to get back onto the strip and back to the cabin.

Got back to the cabin and cleaned up the kitchen a little. Got clothes and stuff packed. Mari and I just need to load the car in the morning and we are heading back to Iowa. Looking forward to home. Been gone almost 2 weeks.

Day 10: Silver Dollar City

Seems everyone is enjoying vacation because again every one slept in this morning. I was up at 7:30 today to find grandma already making coffee. Enjoyed a fresh cup of coffee sitting out on the enclosed porch listening to the birds and the rustling of the leaves in the breeze. Very relaxing. It would be a great area to retire to except all the commercialization. Still, wonder what it would be like here in the winter. Thou, I don't think I would like driving up and down the hill to get to the cabin since it is sooo steep of a incline.

Came back in side to get a fresh cup of coffee and decided to do a little blogging before we get started on today's adventures. While sipping on cup of coffee and kicking back on couch I start a fire in the fire place. Got to love gas fireplaces, just takes a flip of a switch. I would like to put one of these in our house. Ah, every one is starting to stir and get up. I may have to go up to the bed room.

Sounds like mom, dad and grandma will not be going to silver dollar city today. They are going to a show or two in town. Silver Dollar City is a bout a 1 mile from the cabin, thou I think we will end up driving over to there and park. The park does not open till 9:30am and it is ten after 9:00am. I've never been to this theme park thou it can not be to different from others that I have been to before growing up. Mari thinks she is going to get me to go on the roller coaster rides. I think Jason and Ryan are going but they are still asleep. Mari is ready to go so I better quit blogging and get ready. I'll update today's blog later this evening.

Went to Silver Dollar City and spent the whole day there. Really enjoyed it. I even went on a couple of roller coaster rides. Most of everyone tried the water rides. They really got soaked. Well check out the pictures on the side.

Going to bed, long day but enjoyable.

Day 9: Branson Tourist Stuff

Today got up early, before 7am and had coffee and sat out on the screen enclosed deck off the kitchen/dinning area. Dad and grandma joined me. Sat around enjoyed family and a couple cups of coffee. Headed back to room to start getting ready for the day. Mari finally up, she went down to have breakfast and to talk about today's activities. They scheduled a dinner show with the Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede Dinner Attraction for the 8pm showing. We would have to pay and pickup the tickets before noon today. They also decided to do the Titanic museum and Ripley's Believe it or not. By the time everyone ate breakfast, got dressed and ready to go it was 11am. We headed to the first stop to pickup tickets, Dixie Stampede arena. From there we headed to the Titanic museum. Mom & dad headed off to do their own thing.

The Titanic was enjoyable and educational. The downside was they did not allow any cameras and wanted you to turn off your mobile phone because they would supposedly interfere with the audio equipment. Basically you get to hear about the history of the Titanic being built, live accounts of the sinking of the ship from survivors and finding the titanic. They even have a pool of water that was 26 degrees with a timer to see how long you can keep a finger or hand submerged. This was the temperature of the water when the Titanic actually sunk. I tried keeping my hand submerged twice, the first time for a minute and then second time 1 minute 15 seconds. Mari only lasted a 15 seconds. Ryan lasted a about 30 seconds. They even provide souvenir portraits with your picture superimposed on the Titanic staircase, boiler room, and the bridge. Mari had me buy a set. Jason also bought a set with us himself, Ryan and me in it.

After the Titanic we had a quick bit to eat at McDonalds. Yea, I know what your thinking but we wanted to save a few dollars eating a inexpensive lunch. We then headed over to Ripley's Believe it or not. Again, all interesting. Lots of interesting and neat things.

From here it was about 4:40pm we headed back to the cabin for a quick break and to get mom, dad and grandma. Then off to the Dixie Stampede. Again, NO photography or video recording. We had to show up at the Dixie Stampede by 6:45pm to get to the pre-show entertainment. We sat above the stage in the Carriage Room. The entertainer was funny. After the 45-minute act we headed off to our seats in the main arena. The menu consisted the following, hot home-made biscuit served with original creamy vegetable soup, then tender whole rotisserie chicken, hickory smoked barbecue pork loin with herb-basted potato and buttery corn on the cob, then finally for desert it was a flaky apple pastry. The meal was served throughout the show.  The show was great and the food was excellent. I differently recommend this show, it is well worth the money. From here everyone headed back to the lodge. Sounds like we will be splitting up the groups. Ryan, Mari and I heading to Silver Dollar City. Michelle, Breack and Phoenix heading off to do their own thing. Jason was still up in the air. Mom, dad and grandma doing something, they didn't know what yet.

So off to bed. Sounds like the gate opens at 9:30am and Mari will want to get there early.

Day 8: Branson

I slept in again on vacation today. I finally got up before 8am this morning. The beds here at the inn are so comfortable. Mari and I each get our own. What am I going to do when we get back to home and have to share a bed with Mari and the dogs, Lizzie and Patches? Mari was not stirring yet so I got dressed and headed down for breakfast. I worked on the computer updating the vacation blog. Mari finally made it down and had some breakfast. What to do today? Mari called mom and she said no one was yet stirring. So we may not see the rest of the family until sometime this afternoon. Knowing Michelle she may want to take a detour to check out a few things on the way up. She calls it, "Making Memories". I have to agree and just smile. Well, got to go for now. Mari and I have to find something to do. This is going to be sooo hard here in Branson.

We made a few phone calls and found out that we could get into cabin today. We packed our stuff and headed to the cabin we will be staying at till Saturday. We got checked out of the Honeysuckle Inn. It was a very nice place to stay and I would recommend it to anyone coming to the area. If you book through expedia.com you can get a third night free. The rooms are clean and updated. The staff is friendly. The only issue is the sporadic wireless internet connection from our room. And all the chocolate or oatmeal-raisin cookies you want to eat. As long as you walk up to the lobby.  We got checked out and headed to the cabin.

We were told that the cabin we would be staying at was 235.  I was driving and Mari found cabin "235". The door locks use a combination code. So we tried the code that was provided and found that it did not work. Mari gave Eddie a call with the Table Rock Lodges LLC. We tried a couple of different combination. We finally got into the lodge. I have put a few pictures of the lodge on the today's photo album. After unpacking and starting some laundry we decided to head back into town to get lunch.

On the way to lunch, Mari received a phone call from the temp agency, Palmer Group, that provides temporary employees to Wells Fargo. She found out that she and about another 100 people were getting laid off from the section of Wells Fargo. But they will transfer her to another section of Wells Fargo when she gets back to different section of Wells Fargo.

We ended up going to Mel's Hard Luck Diner for lunch. The diner’s servers, hosts, cooks, and cashiers are also professional singers, song writers, and musicians. They offer you a great dining experience seasoned with a song! Waitress sings opera. She did a fantastic job. I had a burger and fries and Mari had chicken salad sandwich with fries.

After lunch we browsed through a couple stories and headed over to Bass Pro shop to browse to see what they had. Afterward we went to Walmart and picked up a few souvenirs for the kids. We figured that everyone would be showing up shortly at the cabin. So, we headed back to the cabin.

We waited a while. Mom, dad, Ryan and grandma showed up. Helped them unload their expedition. We were sitting around and dad asked what cabin we were in and I could not remember if it was 235 or something else. I walked back out to the front of the cabin and realized that we are in 253. We are supposed to be in 235. Mari made a phone call to Eddie and he told use that we are okay and that he would make the change on his end. Mari even admitted that she had a senior moment and got the numbers mixed up. While clearing up that problem Michelle called to find out where the lodge was. Gave her the information. Mari started grilling pork chops for a late supper.

Michelle finally got here and they all ate supper.  With everyone getting in late we stayed in and just relaxed. Rearing up for the next couple of days. So good night.

Day 7: Branson Exploring

Ah, wake up to start of a great day. We got to sleep in till 8am this morning since we arrived so early this morning or so late depending on if you are an optimist or pessimist. Went down and had the complementary continental breakfast. Discussed what we were going to do while at breakfast. I worked on yesterday’s blog and got caught up and Mari took a nap. The only issue I have had here at the inn was the sporadic connection to the internet. Once I got my blog typed up I ended up copying to my blackberry and sending it via email. When I had finished I looked outside and seen the cloud cover that was unique and snapped a picture or two.

So, Mari headed out and checked out the sites Branson had to offer. We first traveled the strip G-76 to see what was available and what we should do first. So many things and places to go we ended up just checking out the area. We drove along Fall Creek Road and ended up going to the Table Rock dam and the fish hatchery. While exploring it would sprinkle and rain. The fish hatchery raises brown and rainbow trout. I did not realize that the trout would get so big but they do. Mari bought some fish food and we spent 15 – 20 minutes feeding the fish. After finishing we headed back to the vehicle and did some more exploring. We decided to go towards Silver Dollar City and to find the cabin we would be staying at once the rest of the family gets to Branson.

We found the cabins, The Lodges at Table Rock Lake. Nice cabins. The only issue was that some of the cabins are literally on a side of a hill. The grade going down you made sure that brakes don’t fail and shift all the way down to first. Then on the way back up the hill you are literally looking straight up into the sky. I can’t wait to check out the inside of one of these cabins. From here we headed back into town to have lunch. We headed to a restaurant that Mike Morris recommended. He couldn’t remember the name of the restaurant but knew the general area, so we hoped it was the one. The name of dinner is Odee’s Restaurant. They serve great BBQ dishes. Mari had a sampler platter and I settled for the pulled pork sandwich.

After lunch we went over to Ride the Ducks. This is the ride that was shown on Undercover Boss. No, we did not have the tour guide that was on the show. Our guide was Captain Science, a retired science teacher.  This is a great tour of the area with comedy and humor being incorporated. You also get a free souvenir with the ride, a duck quacker. The ride takes you through Branson and into Table Rock Lake. We both really enjoyed the ride.

After the ducky ride we went back to the inn and got on the laptops to check out shows and prices for the next couple of days. Since the internet was sporadic from the room we went down to the main office and setup camp. I grabbed a complementary cup(s) of coffee and a chocolate chip cookie and Mari had some hot tea. Not too many combo packages or discounts available WOW, prices of shows and entertainment are not cheap here, so plan on spending some money. Mari worked on a few post cards to send out to family. After wards we headed to a post office to mail the cards and some more site seeing.

On the way back to the inn we made a stop by the Dixie Stampede and the Titantic Museum to ask some questions. After wards we went to SubWay to split a six-inch sandwich and save some money. Then right next door there was the Cold Stone Creamer. Yum, Mari had cheese cake ice cream mixed in some reeses peanut butter cup. I had the Chocolate German Cake, the mixed the ingredients right in front of you. This was great.

So back on the main strip heading back to the inn I decided it would be fun to play a game of golf tonight. There are so many course here in Branson you could play a different course every day for a week. I stopped at one we spotted earlier. I pulled into the Professors Hacker’s Lost Treasure Golf course. This is a miniature golf course if you have not figured it out yet. Mari was doing pretty good for the first nine holes and was +6 over par and I was +7 over. The last night Mari seemed to have gotten exhausted or just tired. She did not do to good. Mari ended with +15 and I ended with +10 over a 42 par. As we were leaving the miniature golf course next door was the seated sling shoot ride. Mari and I watched some kids go on it. Nope, no way I just can’t see myself riding something like that, especially for $50 a person. We are both tired and came back to the inn.

Day 6: Murfreesboro AR to Hot Springs AR to Branson MO

I got up this morning and Mari was still sleeping. So, went down to mom and dad's room to find out what was going on this morning and to see if dad had plans to go back to the Diamond Crater to do some more prospecting. Mom and dad were just stirring, Ryan was snoring away and grandma was already up and at the main building for breakfast. Dad decided that he had enough playing in the dirt and wanted to go on to the next city. So, I went up to the main building and had some coffee and toast with grandma.
After breakfast went back to the room and started packing to get ready for the next stage of our road trip. Michelle and her crew came into town from their cabin and were waiting down at mom and dad's rooms. Mari and I got the car packed and pulled down to mom and dad's room. In the short time that Michelle had gotten there Phoenix decided to go for a walk after waiting for his mother (Michelle) to go to the Dollar General there in town. Well Phoenix got tired of waiting for his mom and headed off by himself. Michelle got into her suburban and headed off towards the main road to the Dollar General to find him. She did find him about a half mile or so. We all headed out towards Hot Springs. Before heading out of town, mom informed me that she got a call that family member had died yesterday afternoon. His name was William Marion McKinney and lived at Good Samaritan Nursing Home with his wife Della (my cousin). The news was a depressing. Since we out of state my thoughts and prayers are for her in her time of need.

Not much of a drive from Murfreesboro to Hot Springs, at least we did not make any stops. Mari and I got into Hot Springs about 12:30. Check in at the Knights Inn was not till 3pm. So, we headed out to get gas for the vehicles and to find some lunch. Got the gas, and had lunch at Ci Ci's Pizza. Not bad. From there we went to Walmart. Mari needed to get a prescription filled. By the time we got there the pharmacy was closing for lunch. They got her information and said they would fill it after their lunch break. What to do while waiting for a half-hour, SHOP! We shopped at Walmart. Ha Ha

We went to the Knights Inn. My parents and Michelle had their rooms already. Michelle had two rooms. So, we checked out the rooms that she was going to share. We checked out one room and it was heavy with the odor of cigarette smoke. Talked to the clerk and he switched the room to a second floor room. Well the air conditioner did not work there. Mari called the front desk and the clerk came up and agreed and changed the room to a room next door. The AC worked a little better but not great but we decided it was better. The temperature here in Hot Springs was 96 degrees with the heat index over 100 degrees. This was frickin miserable. I have no idea why anyone would want to live this far south.

Mari went swimming and so I looked up some stuff to do on the computer. There is a Duck Tour of the area combined with Wax Museum, Miniature Golf and Winery tour for a combo price of $28. Since it was hot I thought this would be fun to do in the morning when it would be cooler. I went down to mom's room to get a game plan. Michelle was supposed to come down too. Got tired of waiting and headed back to our room and took a nap. Mari returned to the room after swimming and sun bathing. She took a nap as well. While napping the rest of the group decided to go do the Duck Tour tonight.
I decided that I wanted to head out to Branson and enjoy what they have to offer. So, I told Mari to load up the car and we headed out. We made reservations while enroute to Branson. We booked the hotel through Expedia.com. We compared prices first through AAA, which they did not have the best rate. The destination that I plugged into the GPS took us through the mountains which were very curvy and hilly. We left Hot Springs about 8:30 pm and got into Branson at 12:45.
Today we had traveled a total of 286 miles.

Sent from my U.S. Cellular BlackBerry® smartphone

Day 5: Murfreesboro

What a long day it has been today. First, Mari gotten ill over night from eating late and her acid reflux. So, we did not get very good sleep. I got up and went to have breakfast at the front office. Grandma was already there eating some toast and having coffee. It turned to out to be a little disappointing what was available. Let me give you the low down. White or wheat bread, plain or blueberry bagels, couple varieties of dry cereal with milk and some processed fruit cups and oh yea coffee. Yum. I guess that is the difference between continental breakfast and complementary.  After breakfast checked to see if dad and Ryan were ready to go to the diamond crater to search for our fortunes. Not quite yet, so headed back to the room to drink coffee and check on Mari. She was doing better.

Finally they were ready. So we loaded up (dad, Ryan, grandma, and me) in dad's expedition and headed off to the Crater of Diamonds State Park. Michelle, Breack, Phoenix and Jason were already out at the crater and brought some equipment from the cabin they were staying at. We got out to there about 8:30. The price to dig through some dirt was $7.00 for the day. You could rent equipment if you did not bring anything. Equipment ranged from a screen for $2.50 all the way up to $11.00 for the advanced diamond hunting kit. Deposit also was $5 to $60 depending on what you rent. Once you pay your admission and got your diamond hunting kit you head off to the field that get turned (aka plowed) once a month. Check out the virtual tour. The following stars on the overhead picture indicates were we all set up camp for the morning.

I guess people have dreams of striking it rich by digging and find a big old diamond. Ha, well that may occur occasionally but I really doubt that it happens that way. While out her digging, shifting and picking through the dirt it got hot and humid. By noon it was in the low nineties with a heat index in the low 100's. I dug a hole about 3' long by 2' wide and 3' deep. Really did not look very hard. Just looked for fresh soil for dad and Ryan to shift through. Grandma and Jason left the crater and decided that this just was not their cup of tea. Dad broken down and ended up working from his lawn chair doing dry shift and also put up an umbrella to keep the sun off his head and neck. Michelle did the wet shifting with Jason and Ryan trying their had at it as well. Breack dug a different hole and did some dry shifting and hauled a couple buckets of soil for Michelle to do some shifting. While Breack and Michelle were looking for their fortune, Phoenix enjoyed playing in the water park right next to the entrance to the field.

About 13:30 everyone just about had enough and decided to head back to town lunch and rest. Mom and grandma had went to the grocery store and got some stuff for cold cut sandwiches and chips. That was really good instead of eating out. Mari was feeling better and had been out by the pool relaxing and soaking up the sun.

After lunch I decided to join Mari in the swimming pool. I enjoyed that. The water was warm and the pool only had a couple of others. After swimming for an hour I went back to the room to get cleaned up and to get out of the sun. Mom, dad and Michelle went up town to check out some antique stores but returned empty handed.

After a short rest Mari and I headed out to have supper. No else seemed interested right now (17:00) so we went to the only fast food joint in this small town, Sonic. We grabbed our food and headed to Lake Greeson which is only about 5 miles outside of town. We enjoyed the area. It reminded us of Black Hills, SD and Yellowstone Park, MT. Nice park. Would have enjoyed staying at a cabin around the area and done some trout fishing.

After finishing supper Mari and I headed back to town a different route we came up on using the GPS. What an adventure. It took us down a gravel road that was windy and bumpy. It was and adventure. I kept reminding Mari of all the horror movies where a couple takes a wrong turn and end up being killed by a scary crazy family out in the back woods. She just laughed...nervously. As you can tell we made it back to town, though Mari's car (explorer) needs to be washed.

We headed back to the hotel to show who ever was interest the pictures from our short excursion. While talking to mom and Michelle they mentioned that it did not sound like anyone wanted to go back out to the Diamond Crater tomorrow. They also mentioned that the reservations they made in Hot Springs were for June 7th thru 9th at the Knights Inn in Hot Springs, AR. So, there were no reservations or any placed lined up for tomorrow night. They said they went through Expedia.com back in January/February and when they tried switching the dates they were getting the run around. So, Mari tried calling the Knights Inn. They did have some rooms available but could not make the changes since Expedia was used. So, I called Expedia and talked to Steph and she made the changes. The only problem was that they had to charge a little extra or just call it a service charge for late notice and penalty. This actually allows us to get to Branson, MO a day earlier and enjoy the large cabin for a extra day.

I checked with dad to see if he planned on going back out the the crater and he did think he was interested but would let me know in the morning. So, we have to be out of the hotel by 11am. Will see what happens in the morning. So good night.