Week 12 - Salt Lake City, Utah High School Basketball Coaches Association Clinic (Escape from Utah) - 11-05-2006

Hello Friends and Family,

After a week in Laughlin, we couldn't get enough. We left our paid-for Riverside RV Park and went about one mile. We parked on a bluff overlooking The Palms Hotel and Casino. Pete had terrific Verizon signal and wasn't willing to move on. We stayed until late in the evening and then drove to North Las Vegas to spend the night at, guess where?, Walmart.

The next day we drove almost 400 miles to Springville UT. The RV Park was nice, but is was very cold with no where for Ellen to walk to. We stayed two days while Pete organized his PowerPoint presentation for the upcoming basketball clinic. We moved on to Taylorsville UT (suburb of Salt Lake City) and stayed for two days, again preparing for the clinic. With the promise of presenting USA GameTracker to 300 basketball coaches, this might be the best stop of the trip.

The day of the clinic it started raining and the turnout for the clinic was dismal. It turns out that the best part of the week was the awesome clouds and weather. Normally Pete likes to drive only 150 miles per day. But as soon as this clinic was over, Pete drove 577 miles in two days to get to Lake Havasu AZ. We did stop on Sunday to go the church at Southland Bible Church in Washington UT (north of St. George). The message was terrific. Pastor Tim Miles talked about how as a Christian you may get hurt but God will not let you get harmed. The ultimate message is that you may die (actually we all will), but you are not harmed by going to heaven. We applied the thought to the basketball clinic. While a puny turnout hurt us (we did not sell any GameTrackers), it did not harm us. We are hearthly, having a great time and know that it IS the best program available. We just need to wait on the Lord.

This is I-15 between St. George and the Nevada border.

Salt Lake Community College, site of the basketball clinic

Here are a few of the dozens of great pictures that Ellen took of Utah's fun-to-look-at and great-to-leave weather.

Parasailors along the I-15 freeway

An accident slowed our escape!

So long Utah, hello Lake Havasu! And so long till next week,

Love Pete and Ellen

Motorhome Q&A: Isn't the diesel terribly expensive? Answer: Isn't everything terribly expensive? Once in California we had to pay $3.39 a gallon. Yesterday we paid $2.45. Our budget projection was $4.00/gallon at 7 mpg. We are getting over 8 mpg and our average per gallon is well below $3.00. So we are very pleased. In addition, while asking about fuel costs is the first question most ask, it pales compared to campground, RV parks, food, activities, insurance, DMV license and buying the MH. And when you compare traveling in a MH versus hotels, gas and FOOD, it is always cheaper unless you drive hundreds of miles everyday.

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Love, Pete and Ellen

Photos from Nov 2006