Chapter 3

Interesting title. Let me explain. Chapter 1, I suppose, would be our lives up to our retirement. Chapter 2 began with our retirement and trip west last fall. Chapter 3 represents a new phase in our lives, beginning with the acquisition of our "dream" motorhome, a 2009 Tiffin Allegro Bus 40QXP, and continuing with our newest venture. As most of you are aware, we have embarked upon a new business venture. We will be working as vendors at various RV trade shows selling dips, that's right, I said dips! We will be representing a company known as "Dip'n Good Dips" at these trade shows. We have decided to call ourselves "The 'DIP'lomats. Our first trade show takes place in Farmington, NM from October 14th thru the 17th. Our product line includes 15 flavors of dried dip mixes and 2 flavors of "sweet treats" (Pumpkin Spice and Raspberry). In addition, we will also be selling the "coolers" used to keep the dips cold while on display. We are anxiously looking forward to this first show, as it will serve as our "baptism of fire". We actually did work at this down in Nashville last July and August, to see if this was something we wanted to do. We had so much fun that we are now going for it!

OK! On to the good stuff! As I mentioned, we purchased a new motorhome in September and, as a result of having to arrange the insurance and registration by telephone/FAX/e-mail/snail mail, we were not able to get underway until Friday, October 2. Our first stop was in Chicago to pick up additional sales items from the couple who sponsored us for this distributorship, Steve and Sherry Metz. These are two of the hardest-working people we have met. They work about 40 - 45 shows per year, traveling far and wide to attend these shows. In addition, Steve has his own appliance repair business, and builds/restores vintage automobiles in his "spare time"! We spent Sunday afternoon and evening with Steve and Sherry, going over some important items regarding these shows.

On Monday morning we again got underway, heading for Albuquerque, NM, where we met up with Charlie and Kathy Burch on Wednesday at the Balloon Festival. The trip to NM was basically uneventful. Kathy did get to drive the new motorhome for a bit, and she really enjoyed it. She was quite nervous at first, since it is longer and much heavier than our Discovery was. However, she soon discovered how easily it drive and handles on the open road. We are truly impressed with the quietness and power of this coach. The interior is quite beautiful and spacious when all 4 slide-outs are extended. We will try to post photographs of the motorhome, exterior and interior, soon.

Today we ventured down to the balloon festival, where we got some very good pictures of some of the "shape" balloons, so called because they are in the shape of familiar things (see the photographs). We also visited a museum here which houses replicas of Nuclear devices, from weapons to medical instruments. Quite interesting and educational.

Tomorrow, we hope to be able to get more photos of the balloons closer up to them. We may even get to photograph them taking off and in flight. The weather through Saturday promises to be ideal for balloon launching. Be sure to check back for those photos. We will be in Albuquerque until Sunday. Then we will head up to Santa Fe to do some exploring along the "Turquoise Trail" before finally heading over to Farmington to get ready for the show. We will keep you posted via this blog.

Here's the link to the web album:

http://picasaweb.google.com/cbenoitiii/MovinWestAgain?authkey=Gv1sRgCKmVjZHVxYaoqgE&feat=directlink