We got the Chieftain out of storage after sanitizing the water tanks with bleach and checking things over carefully and drove it up to our house in Sun City West. There we loaded it up with our supplies and clothes for the Samboree on Wednesday evening and Thursday morning. Our good neighbor, Marilyn V., got to take a tour of our new toy and really liked it. So with the TiVo set and ready to faithfully record the KU basketball games we headed down Grand Ave to I-101 to I-10 and on to AZ-287 east out of Casa Grande. The driving went surprisingly well although going down I-10 at 65 mph in a huge vehicle that occupied what seemed like a lane and a half was initially terrifying. Seven kept reminding me not to take out the car beside us about every 5 minutes. I finally found a good visual reference point in front of the vehicle and concentrated on it, ignoring everything else going on around me. That was the only way I was able to stay in my lane consistently. White knuckle time, especially through downtown Phoenix. It was comforting however to know that people were afraid of ME because I was driving a big, honking, vehicle that could crush them if they didn't get out of the way. Good thing.
We pulled into the Pinal County Fairgrounds and got assigned a spot to park. Our spot was in RV Siberia - at the end of a row. There were several things about the site that were bad: everyone walked their dog outside our front door, no trees, no other RVs blocking the wind that was more or less howling in from the southwest, it was 50 miles from all the activities, and a great view of some gutted trailers. But, what the hay, we were here, we were excited by everything - our RV, the Samboree, all the people, etc.We headed on over to the registration booth and got our paperwork, official Marti Gras beads and a number. The number, on a wristband, was our ticket to events and the 100s of prize drawings. The list of activities was actually kind of mind boggling at first. Games, seminars, and all kinds of events from morning to night. Looked like it was going to be non-stop fun.
When we got back to the RV to set up we began to realize that our spot at the end of the row was bad. The wind was blowing. Usually wind is not a big problem but in the Arizona desert it is because wind carries dust - lots of dust and it was blowing at us in 10-30 mile gusts. Out the window went plans for setting up the awning, mat, lights, and chairs. We were going to be confined to the RV or inside of buildings unless the wind went away. We did get the hypno twirler set up and almost immediately that we had made a mistake purchasing it. It was too small. 
It was cool, but small. We were concerning about the length of it, 6 feet, and got the smallest they had. Bigger is better. We hooked up to the 30 amp service but didn't hook up to the water. Seven, who worked for the Arizona Water Quality department, contacted a friend of hers still working there for a quick assessment of the quality of Casa Grande's water. To put it bluntly, their water stinks.Samborees are places where people are hell-bent on having fun and they do. We participated in a Sequence tourney, a washer board tourney, helped our local Good Sams club, Kactus Sams, with their booth in carnival, enjoyed the ice cream social, attended a campground presentation, looked at some new RVs, went to a safety seminar, and did a lot of other interesting things. We met and talked to people from all over. Good Sams people are down-right friendly.
On Saturday it began to rain. That's good. We haven't had any rain in the Phoenix area for 140 days or there abouts. A little rain is a good thing in the desert. Settles the dust and all that. The problem was that it didn't stop raining. Our RV was slowly sinking into the mud and was surrounded by 3-4" inches of water. We were concerned. People started pulling out and leaving. One guy evidently forgot that there was an one-two foot deept ditch running down through the middle of the fair grounds and drove right into it. He somehow got pulled out. We finally decided it was time to move and we moved to higher ground. Someone told us about Wal-Mart boots (grocery bags fastened over the shoes) and we wore those any time we left the RV. 
A lot of the outdoor events were cancelled or moved inside. We missed the bean bag baseball game that was held indoors. The golf car rodeo had to be cancelled.Sunday morning we got up to welcomed sunshine. The storm had moved on and things dried out in a hurry. We ate a good breakfast and got ready to break camp. Our old spot at the end of the row was still under water though so we were glad we moved.
We decided to forego the interstate and take the back way to Tempe where we would visit Son #2, the Drewmeister. We drove down Arizona 87 to Elliot Road where we turned to go to Tempe. We had a lunch in the RV with the Drewster, who was impressed with our new toy. We let him drive it 50 feet down the parking lot. He is, after all, still a wild and crazy teenager. Then after getting updated on Drew's progress at college, girl friend, job, and other things, we went back on the road down I-10/I-101 and home. And a good time was had by all despite all the little set backs that kept us from realizing our initial vision. ('good time was had by all' was always appended to every report of activities in a little social newspaper column we used to read a long time ago). The only bad thing was that TiVo failed to record the KU basketball games for some reason.
