RV Park Deck in a Day- Almost

All of our kids were camping over the weekend, all in different places! Dan and Heather were at Breezy Acres down near Fond du Lac in their camping trailer with their kids. Erin and Waylen were up at their camping trailer near Wausaukee with their kids. Heather and Jesse were tenting it with Jameson and friends up near Dave's 12 Foot Falls by Amberg.  Little Whitney was with her other Grandma so she was the only one NOT camping.

Since they were all gone doing their own things, Steve had the opportunity to take a few days off work. We managed to get 5 days in a row to get away.

We loaded up the motorhome the night before, and took off on Thursday morning. We headed up to the Door County Peninsula--- you know,  the tall skinny finger on the east side of Wisconsin?

Beantown Campground was our destination! link: http://www.beantowncampground.com/  It is run by John Anderson, an old school chum of Steve's when he used to go to high school in Door County.

Our own Pops Pfundtner had secured a seasonal campsite there for his motor home. Two weeks ago we got him all set up on his site and that's what put his plan in motion for this weekend.  We rented a campsite right across from him on the right.

He had contacted Home Depot and had a shipment delivered right to his campsite. Look at this! Enough wood to build a deck and a box with 4 chairs and a patio table and umbrella.

INSTANT DECK KIT

SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED

Hahaha - that's where Steve comes in.

Pops has a very nice campsite that faces out over a meadow of wildflowers, with some peaceful dairy cows that stroll along on the horizon in the next field over. Right next to his camper pad was a perfect level spot, but it would be all muddy if it rained. So that's why he thought it would be perfect idea to build a nice little deck entertainment area, complete with a patio table and chairs.

We had got up there about noon, and had a little lunch with Pops. As soon as I was putting away the lunch stuff, you know Steve.. onto the task at hand  He was leveling up and squaring the first few boards for the frameworks. We had cement paving blocks to help hold the frameworks in place. I helped, but Steve did most of the work.  The finished deck would be 10 feet wide by 16 feet long.

ZOOM ZOOM ZOOM

As soon as the framing was done with the floor joists, 

now it was time to add the flat deck boards. 

This was now about mid afternoon, and he was zooming right along.  The sun was shining, it wasn't too hot out, and the breeze was blowing in nicely across the meadow from the west.

This is the Project Supervisor, and the ever-faithful Job Boss at his side, making sure everything stayed on task and went smoothly.

By 4pm, Steve was reaching the halfway point of the deck boards.
 He better hurry up if we expected to have supper on the deck!

Ahhh here he is, placing the last deck board, while Dad P was getting everything ready to go on the grill for supper. He had brought up some wonderful fillet steaks and made grilled vegetables along with a special poppy seed cake roll for dessert.

The Project Supervisor did the final inspection and declared the deck done and fit for dinner. Time to toss the steaks on the grill!

While the food was cooking, the next project was to quickly assemble the patio table. It was so cute watching these two work together. What a wonderful memory to have both of them assembling this table and figuring it all out like two typical men. Of course, they did not read the directions, but the table managed to get put together anyhow.

There were a few leftover parts, I still haven't figured out what they were for --- because I think somebody threw away the directions???

The wind was blowing in and it was getting so cold, we decided to eat inside of Pop's motorhome.  They got in few games of cribbage while I watched some HGtv on Pop's King Dome Satellite.

We slept good that night, especially after a long day of project making by Steve. First thing Friday morning, you know Steve. He was chomping at the bit to get going.  But ... I reined him in. He decided to cook us a wonderful breakfast in the camper and had his dad come over to eat with us. The sun was peeking out and it was going to be another good day. 

Don't you know it, Steve decided now it was time to do Phase 2 of the deck. Right after breakfast he was back to work. He added on a 8x5 section in front of the doorway, that was just perfectly level with the deck and the motor home.

We took a little break for some lunch and Dad took us and the neighboring camper, Kathy, out to lunch in Baileys Harbor. We went to a cute place called DC Deli. Baileys Harbor has plenty of little places to eat, so this should keep Dad P busy for a while visiting each one. It seems everywhere he goes, he knows somebody. They lived up here in Door County for 20+ years. Heck, even going to the post office takes him an hour because he runs into so many people to talk to. LOL

Back at the campsite it was it was Mr. Zoom Zoom Zoom again for the afternoon.

Phase 3 was another section of a nice wide deep large step level with the bottom edge of the motorhome door.

He retracted the automatic metal step and locked it into place. Now his dad can step directly from the deck into the motorhome without any difficulty. His arms can be full of bags and he can set them down on the wide step as he negotiates the door. I think it was a pretty nifty design that they figured out.

Silly little Millie was the Job Boss
and she definitely stayed out of the way
 to not hamper any of the construction process

Yep, the final product met the approval of the Patriarch of the Pfundtner Clan

As for Beantown Campground, they have sites where people can leave their RVs year-round, there are some sites that have Park Model units, and even a few cabins that can be rented. It's not a very large park--- I think with about 90 sites total. It's close to many of the tourist attractions and restaurants and unique shopping places available in Door County. It's located a mile or so out of Bailey's Harbor in a country rural setting.

The owner, John, seems to be a big kid himself. In his family friendly campground, he has a swimming pool, gameroom, playground, and best of all ... this train! He runs around the park every couple hours taking kids for rides. What fun. No cost of course, just pure fun and family camping at its finest.

Here is a little video as they zoomed past.... 

What a fun thing to do.... 

I got out and snapped this pic as it went past our rig. 

Note our flags out on the front spare tire.

Now that the work on the deck was done, we had a couple little projects to take care of on Pop's motorhome. A little of this, a little of that, and soon he had it in spiffy shape. They did a run to the hardware store for supplies, and of course he found more people he knew there too. Pops did some carpet cleaning and window washing while Steve took care of a couple little repairs.

Of course they also got in some cribbage card playing 

and cocktails on the new deck!

We will help stain it next time we go up to visit. 

Firewood is stacked up within reach nearby 

and Steve made a little fire pit with stones.

We attended Sunday service at Steve's parents old church, the Sister Bay Moravian Church. Afterwards Pop's brought us to a wonderful restaurant way up in Gill's Rock, at the very tip of the peninsula. It is called The Shoreline Restaurant and we had a great meal courtesy of Steve's Dad. Thank you for the wonderful brunch, Pops!

Sunday afternoon, Steve's youngest sister Lynn, and her friend Mike came to visit. It was so nice to see how happy Pops was to entertain them and visit on his new deck. He was pretty pleased to have enough chairs for everyone and room for a nice visit in his extended entertainment area. I have a feeling it will be a little social hub of the campground during his visits up there. 

Sunday evening a storm started rolling in. We had originally thought about eating out on the deck again, but the wind blew in cold and temps dropped fast. Look at this amazing cloud formation that rolled in across the horizon. I have never seen a roll like this against the dark sky looking so threatening.

Here is a video clip of it 

that I took from the safety of our motorhome:

We were prepared to bugger out and get over to the large brick shower building and we had the local news and weather radio on to check the storm's progress.

Amazingly, it blew right through and we just got a little bit of rain and barely any wind at all.

Soon the sun was shining through the clouds that were breaking up. Blue sky could be seen on the horizon to the West and the sun was setting in a blaze of glory.

What a fine ending to a wonderful day

Monday morning, we awoke to sunshine and blue skies. In remembrance of Memorial Day, I would like to mention thanks to all of the men and women who gave their lives for our freedom.

Dad P had us over in the morning for breakfast at his rig. He and Millie sure make a pair. She is happiest when she is right next to him with her affectionate gaze watching what he is up to next. She is a registered therapy dog and they do nursing home visits so she can spread her gentle love to others who do not have a pet anymore . She is such a good dog.

Pops cooked us up some swedish pancakes and bacon and pure Wisconsin maple syrup. What a nice way to start out the day.  He does so well with cooking and keeping up with everything, you would never know he was over 80. Adapting after you lose your spouse is hard, but over the four years since Steve's mom passed away from cancer, he has done well.

I wanted to mention our campsite....  at Beantown they have full hookups of water, sewer, and 50 amp service. They also have Wi-Fi in the park that works pretty good, but you can tell in the evenings when all the kids get on it it becomes more sporadic and cuts down in speed. The sites all have nice grass, a fire ring, and a picnic table.

The park is also dog friendly and just about every campsite had a dog or two. Our two dogs, along with Millie, really enjoyed going for walks around the park.

They found lots of places to sniff and explore,
and a few other doggy butts to check out
and visit in a canine fashion

I could walk all three dogs by myself, Finney and Binney stayed on the left and Millie stayed on the right and away we would go.

It was time to pack up on Monday and head on back to home. The weather was pretty nice, and we took a different road home that avoided busy traffic around Green Bay and DePere (which was in the middle of their celebration parade). We stopped at a little parking lot at a fire station in a tiny town and made sandwiches. It was a nice little break on our way home. Although Beantown is only about a hundred miles away, the traffic for the holiday weekend is what we wanted to avoid by leaving earlier in the day.

We got home after a little incident with the Pac brake hanging up. Steve stopped the rig and added the special lube oil and it functioned fine again. Soon we were home, backed in the yard, on our parking pad. Time to unload and bring things in the house, while Steve started working on cutting the lawn.

Home again home again jiggity jig