Moving and Dancing

This morning we packed up to leave and then took our morning walk. We saw more geese, including this pair with their goslings:

By 9:00 a.m. we were on the road towards the Milwaukee area for the Academy for Advanced and Challenge Enthusiasts (AACE), which is a square dance convention. Again we ran into a closed road. We were planning to take US 43 to I 94, but 43 was closed, so we had to take a detour. We don't like detours. Towing Venture means that we can't change lanes very quickly, but we did find our way to Cliffside (a Racine County park south of Milwaukee).

This is where we started out this morning:

Here's where we're camped tonight through Sunday:

After getting set up, we ate a late lunch and gathered up our laundry. We'll be very busy dancing the next few days, so this was our last opportunity. We went to a laundromat in Racine.

When we returned to our campsite, our friends John and Sandy Walenter greeted us. They are camped in a nearby site. So are Hardy and Judy, but we didn't really have time to visit. We had to fix dinner, eat, and change for the dance in double quick time. The dance didn't start until 8:00 p.m., but I had to be there at 7:00 p.m. for training in how to use the computer program that assigns dancers to squares. I've signed up to be responsible for operating the computer in the C1 hall for several hours during the weekend.

We were very happy to see many people we know at the dance, including some LA folks that we danced with at Trailblazers and some we met at Romney's weekend. Several couples from the Rio Grande Valley were there also. However, we didn't get a chance to socialize much, partly because of all the dancing and partly because some of our friends dance C2, while we dance only C1.

We're dancing to some great callers this weekend, all nationally known. It's a bit of a stretch for us, because we're pretty new at C1 and because we're used to dancing to only our three caller teachers (Randy Dougherty, Darryl Lipscomb, and Joe Saltel). Every caller puts a different twist on the choreography, and we're unused to these new voices. Bottom line is that we didn't dance as well as we'd like to. We expect that getting more floor time is the solution.

We're dancing at the Wyndham Milwaukee Airport Hotel and Convention Center, which has several large halls. The C1 hall in the Grand Ballroom was rather warm tonight, and the dance floor was sticky, which makes for uncomfortable dancing. We're hoping that tomorrow will be better.

The spice drawer fell out and spilled all over the kitchen floor during our travels today. I carefully reorganized and replaced all the spices in the drawer, and then managed to drop it when I was trying to get it back in its track. Our next rig will definitely have full extension drawers!