World United States Kentucky Louisville

Danielle and Jay's 2010 Summer Trip

Louisville, KY - The Rally Jul 20, 2010

We changed our itinerary to include another group activity since we’ve been on our own for a while now. So we left Ohio on Tuesday and headed south to Kentucky.

We stayed overnight in the Walmart parking lot in Florence, KY and then took about a 2 hour drive to Louisville from there. “The Rally” which is sponsored by Good Sam Club is at the Kentucky Fair Grounds and will have thousands of people there from all over the country and it’s fun and games for 5 days.

We arrived a day early and things were buzzing already. We were shown to our parking space, settled in by 1pm and then Jay and I decided to ride our bikes over to the registration area, while Duke relaxed in the RV with the air conditioning on.

It was considerably more humid here, so it felt very warm, but the exposition center was very well air conditioned. Everything will be held inside, even the display of all the new motor homes which are available for tours and of course, purchasing.

We registered and immediately put our numbers on. The Rally plays a game called “Meet Your Match”. Over the next few days, we will be looking at everyone else with their numbers on and trying to find someone with the same numbers. On Friday, we can then register with our match for prizes. So we were off to walk around, check out the buildings and look for our match.

Since we’re dry camping, which means we have no amenities except what our RV provides, we decided to go out to dinner to conserve water….yeah, right…. But actually we do need to conserve. We only have the water in our 40 gallon tank which needs to last us for our time here including showers. And we’re also limited to the space in our black and grey tanks, plus our generator for electricity.

I found a great Mexican mom and pop restaurant near Churchill Downs and we were off to find our way around Louisville. After dinner when I looked through the registration materials, I noticed that some refrigerator models of our brand had been recalled. After checking the model numbers and serial numbers it turned out ours was on the list. I called the phone center and was told to immediately shut it off and unplug it, as it could catch on fire without any notice. Now there’s some great news right before bed! My food is melting and getting hot and we can’t even call to find a place to have the repair done until the morning. NOT a good way to start the rally.

After several calls in the morning, none of the qualified RV repair places could get us in for at least 2 weeks. We decided to go into the vendor area of the rally and seek out Norcold, the manufacturer of our refrigerator. As luck would have it, they had techs at the rally to do the repairs and within a couple hours we were good to go. Whew!

We spent the rest of the day having fun visiting the new RV models, visiting vendors and going to a fun seminar about visiting Louisville. They were also offering free air brush tattoos and I got a beautiful butterfly near my ankle. I couldn’t convince Jay to do it, though. Party pooper!

I then hung around for the prize drawing by Good Sam and did manage to win a small prize. Jay and I also got to do a “wheel spin” and I won a great cook book and Jay won an RV maintenance book. So all in all, we were pretty lucky.

We went out to dinner since it was my birthday (okay, well we probably would have gone out any way). Then we went to the entertainment for the evening which was Bob Newhart, the comedian. His show was WONDERFUL and he had us laughing like crazy.

The first thing we did on Friday was attend the pet contest. No, Duke wasn’t entered but we went to watch the animals. They had a contest for which dog could hold a biscuit on its nose the longest. There was also a contest for the happiest dog and the dog whose costume most represented the area. A couple from NJ won that one. One of their dogs had a small saddle on, while the other dog was dressed like a jockey. Perfect for the Kentucky Derby. All in all, the dogs looked great!

We also did some more shopping at the vendors and Jay took our hitch over to the repair center to see if it could be repaired or if we needed a new one. Luckily, it was a relatively inexpensive repair and they also serviced the unit for free. This company, RoadMaster, always treats its customers with the best service.

After lunch we were walking through the RV displays again and guess what? I met my match! We walked over and signed up for the prizes to be given away later and got our tote bags. After all that looking, it was great to see my number…. 1867. Jay never did find his, however, we had several people come up to him and say they saw someone with his number. 1940…. I think they remembered this since it was the year they were born. :)

On Friday the temperature was in the high 90’s with humidity around 89 percent. With the heat index the temperature felt like 105. It was brutal and continued this way throughout the weekend. We noticed our neighbors left when we returned in the afternoon. They had a small trailer with only a small generator that couldn’t run an air conditioner and 3 dogs. When we returned Duke had finished all his water and he was in air conditioning all day. To say it’s uncomfortable is an understatement.

We went to the entertainment on Friday night and it was Tanya Tucker, the country singer. She wasn’t all that good, so we left early and watched some TV.

Saturday was Good Sam Day and we played a type of baseball game using bean bags. As we won, we collected tickets that could then be turned in for prize drawings later in the day. We played a while, but decided to go look at the new RV’s and trailers again instead.

The entertainment that night was a group that sang Neil Diamond songs. The lead singer sounded just like Neil Diamond and the event center was rocking! We really enjoyed this entertainment.

Sunday was casino day. It was so crowded we couldn’t really get to a table. By this time we were exhausted between too much fun at the rally and the heat. So we headed back to the RV in the late afternoon and decided that we should hit the road and get a couple hours on the road heading north where we hoped it would be cooler.

We drove to the same Walmart we stopped at on the way south and spent the night. Luckily, there are some great restaurants in walking distance, so we had dinner and relaxed in a little bit cooler temperatures.

Tomorrow we start our drive further north and what we hope will be cooler temperatures.

The Rally was a lot of fun and so well organized. We had a great time and it was worth the detour south to attend the event. Maybe we’ll go to the one next year in Redmond, OR.