No T R A C K E R S P R I N T S July 2015 TRACKER WEBSITE: www.gstrackers.org The newsletter is available on the website FMCA CHAPTER Volume 9, Issue 7 UPCOMING RALLIES JULY IS DARK! AUGUST IS DARK! 8 th Anniversary Rally 18 20 September 2015 River Run RV Resort, Bakersfield Hosts: Bill & Nancy Kitt-Carnes WE D LOVE TO HEAR YOUR IDEAS FOR A RALLY; CALL Bob & Debbie Golk 661-822-0920 2015 OFFICERS President Nancy Carnes 661-718-2868 Vice President Evelyn Sweeney 760-241-7985 Secretary Linda Weaver Treasurer Carol Pontolillo Nat l Director Fred Wells Alt.Nat l. Director Tom Williams Rally Masters Bob & Debbie Golk Web Master - Marty Robertson Sunshine Evelyn Sweeney Newsletter Editor - Debbie Golk Membership- Diane & Marty Robertson Volunteer Coordinator Buck Youngblood Club Historian Dee Williams & Nanette Caldwell Greetings Fellow Trackers Beautiful Lone Pine at an elevation of 3727 ft. showed no mercy this June. The weather was hot but Trackers remained cool under the noon day sun one way or another. Despite the surprisingly warm temperatures and various set-backs including keys locked in a vehicle with an outdoor temperature of 107 degrees, lost car keys (but were they REALLY lost? I think not!), stolen coleslaw by none other than the folks from Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and a Tracker (close to my heart) with a fever of 103 degrees, we made lemonade out of lemons. Here are the details of the coleslaw caper. Joanne and Pat had prepared coleslaw for the Saturday night Sloppy Joe dinner. When Fred went to the large walk-in refrigerator, he discovered that the coleslaw was gone! It turned out that the DWP group, heading for Mammoth, stopped for a catered lunch at Boulder Creek and, of course, coleslaw was on their menu. When a park worker went into the huge refrigerator she spotted a large bowl of coleslaw and assumed it was for DWP. The group apparently enjoyed the slaw immensely! The RV Park did replace the missing slaw with its own version. So no hard feelings but I m sorry Joanne and Pat had to work so hard for another group to enjoy their special recipe. We had a business meeting Saturday morning and the minutes can be found later in this newsletter. We covered a number of issues so please take some time to read the information. The biggest change is the cancelling of our August rally. The weather was so hot in Lone Pine; we couldn t imagine things being much better in Acton in August.
PAGE 2 President s Message (Con t) Also, since there is no clubhouse available, we would be eating in an outdoor 3-sided pavilion which may be rough going for some of us. As of now, we will be dark in July and August and try to find some cooler venues for future summer rallies. In a nutshell other topics covered included ideas for the Indio 2016 Parade and we voted on a motorcycle theme for Call of the Wild. Dee Williams stepped up and volunteered to be our new historian and Nanette will help with organizing the albums. Thank you, Dee. Also, thank you, again, Gloria for all your years as our chapter historian. Thank you, Debbie, for taking such comprehensive minutes at our business meeting. Great news: Evelyn and Leo were at our June rally and she will complete her term as chapter vice-president. Thank you, Evelyn. It was great seeing you and Leo this weekend. Some breaking news! I m happy to report that Debbie and Bob Golk have volunteered to take over as Rally Masters for the remainder of 2015. If you have ideas for possible venues, please send the names of the parks to the Golks so they can begin to develop a list of destinations for next year s rally masters. Thank you Bob and Debbie for acting as interim rally masters for this year, and, maybe, beyond! Also, another thank-you to Evelyn and Leo for doing such a great job as rally masters since early last year. Thank you, Debbie, for taking such comprehensive minutes at our business meeting. Great news: Evelyn and Leo were at our June rally and she will complete her term as chapter vice-president. Thank you, Evelyn. It was great seeing you and Leo this weekend. I want to thank Debbie and Bob for hosting the Lone Pine Rally. The idea of assigning meals to a variety of members turned out great. Everyone agreed that it is something to think about for future rallies. Also, thanks to ALL the Trackers who volunteered to cook meals for this trip. The food was delicious and there was plenty of it! You ll get all the details in the Rally Report. The next outing is our 8 th Anniversary Rally at River Run RV Park in Bakersfield. The information and registration form is at the end of this newsletter. It is an important rally because we will be voting for 2016 officers so please clear your calendars and join us. The nominating committee will be sending out absentee ballots for those who cannot attend. I look forward to seeing everyone in September. In the meantime, stay cool, stay healthy and stay safe, Nancy Carnes F#379803 Chapter President
PAGE 3 Vice President s Message Happy Fourth of July to everyone, be safe. We just had a rally in Lone Pine. Was it hot? No it was very hot. July and August are our dark months as they are the hottest months of the year. Leo and I were fortunate that the gal from Dialysis was kind enough to rearrange my days so we could attend the rally. It was short and sweet but nice to be around our Chapter friends once again. Thanks to Bob and Debbie for being the host and hostess and thank you to the other members for taking care of the meals. It was a nice change, no pot lucks this time. Poor Bill Kitt didn't enjoy it this time. He took ill and had to go to the clinic for meds. We saw him Sunday Morning for breakfast. Hopefully we will see many of you in September for our Annual Mtg. I am keeping my fingers crossed we will be able to attend. Asking all of you to keep yours crossed as well :) Until then, VP Evelyn
Golden State Trackers 20 June 2015 Meeting Minutes PAGE 4 The meeting convened at 9:31 am with President Nancy Carnes presiding. Nancy led the group in the Pledge of Allegiance. She then reviewed the minutes from our last business meeting held at the River Run RV Park in September 2014. The treasurer was not available for an updated treasurer s report. Evelyn has decided to stay on as vice president until we vote in new officers in September (which means she ll be it until the New Year). Bob discussed information regarding Indio. The new budget was proposed. New information for Indio was discussed. Indio will now be open on Sunday instead of Wednesday. Due to the extra days WMHA is looking into providing one or two bus tours. We discussed the Officer Appreciation Party as that has been added back into the Indio program. The trackers would like to volunteer again to work that. The parade theme of the Call of the Wild was discussed. The motorcycle theme was voted on unanimously. Fred suggested that we should meet at every rally to discuss the parade issue. Bob and Debbie will look at getting cut outs of motorcycles for the folks that have scooters. They will also look at getting a loop recording of Born to be Wild. Nancy will look into making masks of Marlon Brando and James Dean for possible use during the parade. Dee will take on the job of historian. Nanette will help with that. Thanks ladies. The Rally Master position is open and we need a volunteer. Tom discussed the August rally. He looked into the Californian RV Park in Acton and booked 10 spaces. How many people want to go to Acton? It seems like several folks were interested. They would like to stick with the food plan that was used at Boulder Creek. (Please see below for revised information). Leo suggested that we all come up with ideas for next year s rally schedule and send them to Nancy. She will pass them on to the new rally master when they are chosen. Nancy thanked Nanette for offering to be our delegate at Madison Wisconsin. Judy Key will be there and has offered to help Nanette as needed. Fred made a motion to adjourn. Leo 2 nd d the motion. Meeting was adjourned at 10:09 am. The meeting reconvened at 5:40 pm. August rallies were discussed and it was decided that we should drop the August rally and go dark. Debbie made a motion and Joanne 2 nd d it. Bob brought up our term of office. He suggested that each term be for 2 years. This will be one of the items up for discussion at our September meeting. Joanne made a motion to adjourn and Debbie 2 nd d it. Meeting was adjourned at 5:55 pm. Debbie Golk Debbie Golk Honorary Secretary
PAGE 5 Boulder Creek Rally Report June 19-21, 2015 One word could sum up the rally up in Lone Pine at the Boulder Creek RV Resort HOT! Sixteen intrepid Trackers were in attendance: Fred & Joanne Wells, Sandi Billingsley, Buck & Pat Youngblood, Bill & Nancy Kitt-Carnes, Leo & Evelyn Sweeney, Tom & Dee Williams, Frank & Pat Amore and Nanette Caldwell along with your hosts Bob & Debbie Golk. It was a real joy to see Leo & Evelyn attend the rally after her long battle with health issues. Things are now looking up and we will see more of them in the future. When Bill & Nancy arrived Bill didn t look too good. Turned out he was running a fever of 103! Nancy took him to urgent care the next day where they prescribed antibiotics and rest. His fever did come down and he was able to join us by Sunday. Did I mention the heat? As luck would have it California was in the middle of a heat wave. Temperatures in Lone Pine were 104-106 for the entire weekend we were there. The trees in the park have matured and provided much appreciated shade but you had to move around with the shade as the sun made its journey across the sky. Still, by mid day is was just too hot to be outside so most everyone stayed in their motorhome or the club house during the hottest parts of the day. There is a lot to see up in the Lone Pine area so people did venture out to sight see things such as Alabama Hills and Whitney Portal, all in the comfort of an air conditioned automobile of course. It wouldn t be a rally without consuming lots of food. All the early arrivals went to the Pizza Factory on Thursday evening. Maybe it was the heat but for me & Debbie that pizza and a pitcher of beer sure tasted good. For this rally we decided to dispense with the traditional pot-lucks and try something new. We asked for volunteers to plan, shop for and prepare meals for our rally attendees. The volunteers would be reimbursed the cost of the meals from the rally fees collected. Friday evening Debbie & I along with Bill & Nancy served hamburgers, French fries, beans and coleslaw along with a light Jell-O dessert. For me there was nothing like slaving over a hot barbeque grill in 100. Saturday morning found the Amores and the Williams serving up breakfast of scrambled eggs, sausage, hot cakes, cinnamon rolls and fruit. Saturday evening the Wells and the Youngbloods made sloppy Joes, beans, coleslaw, fruit and chips. For dessert we had strawberry shortcake to celebrate the anniversaries and birthdays. For Sunday morning Sandi and Nanette brought out the left-overs from Saturday s breakfast since there was still so much to eat. We all had plenty to eat for the weekend, and it was good too and all for only $7.50 per person per day. Plus we did not have to deal with preparing something for a pot-luck and then deal with all the usual pot-luck left-overs. We liked the concept and we hope others liked it too. For our give back effort for the rally we all contributed several bags of clothing and shoes to be donated to the Inyo- Mono Association for the Handicapped. We had quite a pile by the time everyone unloaded their donations. Representatives from the association came by on Monday to pick up the bags and they greatly appreciated our donations. With the rally over it was time to say our good-byes. Some left Sunday and others stayed over an extra day or two. Maybe they just loved the heat and didn t want to leave. Our 4 legged pals had a tough time as the asphalt lanes in the park got really hot during the day which made for light stepping and quick walking. The park was full as this was their summer season. On morning walks around the park I would notice only 2 or 3 empty spaces. As you would expect the pool was very crowded each day and we had problems with noisy neighbors who thought nothing of staying up until 2:00 AM talking and laughing. This was probably not the best time of the year to visit this park as past visits in the spring or fall have been very pleasant. It is a very nice park and the park staff were very helpful so certainly worth a return trip (but not in the summer!). Thanks for attending, Bob and Debbie Golk
PAGE 6 GOLDEN STATE TRACKERS EIGHTH ANNIVERSARY RALLY September 18-20, 2015 WHERE: River Run RV Park 3715 Burr Street Bakersfield, California 93308 Phone: (661) 377-3600 COST: $120 PER RIG W/TWO ABOARD $94 W/ONE ************************************************* Arrive anytime after 12 noon on Friday unless you are one of the early birds and have made previous arrangements. Rally fee includes Friday night and Saturday night RV spaces, Friday dinner, Saturday breakfast, Saturday dinner and Sunday breakfast. If you wish to come early and/or stay late be sure to let me know, and I will make the reservation for you, but you will be responsible for paying at the office for the extra nights at check in. It will be at the rally rate ($33 per night). There is no extra charge for your dogs. AGENDA Friday September 18 4:30 PM: Happy hour. NO hors d oeuvres required. 5:30 PM: Dinner provided by hosts. Saturday September 19 7:30 AM: Coffee & Bloody Mary s at the Clubhouse. 8:45 AM: Catered Breakfast. (Please see menu below) 9:30 AM: Business Meeting and election of new officers. Rest of the day to explore the area. 4:30 PM: Happy Hour. NO hors d oeuvres required. 5:45 PM: El Pollo Loco Catered Dinner Sunday September 20 7:30 AM: Coffee at Clubhouse. 8:30 AM: Breakfast provided by Hosts SAFE TRAVELS MENU FOR HODEL S CATERED Saturday Breakfast: BACON BISCUITS AND GRAVY SLICED SMOKED HAM FRESH FRUIT SCRAMBLED EGGS ASSORTED MUFFINS ROASTED BREAKFAST POTATOES HODEL S CINNAMON ROLLS SALSA LEAVING TRACKS This month we will be helping out our four legged friends at the Kern County Animal Shelter (http://www.co.kern.ca.us/acd/) located only 5 minutes from the RV Park.
PAGE 7 They have 2 wish list web sites, one for their shelter animals and one for their foster animals. They collect donations for foster parents that are temporarily taking care of animals that may be injured/ill or too young to be adopted. They provide the foster parents with all of the supplies so that they don t have any out-of-pocket expenses. Some of the items are expensive but there are many less expensive items that can be picked up at the grocery store or local pet store. http://www.amazon.com/wishlist/1ffx78iuos6av/ref=sr_1_1_acs_wl_1?ie=utf8&qid=1391118465&sr=8-1-acs http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/j672j0yg8njc/ref=cm_wl_rlist_go_v Items they would appreciate include Milk Bone Dog Biscuits, tennis balls, chew toys, cat litter, puppy pads, bags of dried food for adult or senior dogs, Friskies canned cat food, throw blankets, and new or used larger blankets. Old terry cloth towels would probably also be appreciated. If anyone is looking for an additional RV companion, you can check out the dogs and cats Friday and Saturday from 10 am 4 pm. Tucker hopes you ll help his friends! DIRECTIONS TO RIVER RUN RV PARK: NORTH ON HIGHWAY 99. TAKE THE ROSEDALE HIGHWAY OFF RAMP (get in the left lane). LEFT (WEST) ON ROSEDALE HIGHWAY TO GIBSON. STAY IN THE LEFT LANE AS YOU WILL BE TURNING LEFT AT THE 4TH SIGNAL (GIBSON). LEFT (SOUTH) ON GIBSON STREET. PROCEED TO BURR STREET AND TURN LEFT. PROCEED TO THE END OF BURR STREET TO THE ENTRANCE OF RIVER RUN RV PARK. PLEASE SEND THE RESERVATION FORM BY SEPTEMBER 04, 2015 TO: Nancy Carnes 40242 Jacinto Way Palmdale, CA 93551 HOME PHONE: (661) 718-2868 CELL: (661) 400-7266 ************************************************************** NAME: ARRIVAL DATE: DEPARTURE DATE: PHONE NUMBER: AMOUNT ENCLOSED:
PAGE 8 THE BACK PAGE JULY CELEBRATIONS BIRTHDAYS Shirley Donald - 7/4 Dee Williams - 7/18 ANNIVERSARIES Jim & Maureen Wheeler - 7/22/62 Sunshine Column If you know of anyone in the chapter that is not well or in need of some well wishes, please let Evelyn know. You can also let us know if YOU need well wishes, thoughts and prayers. Be well!