Getting to know you… (DE)

We arrived at Rehoboth Beach DE and Delaware Seashores State Park after a 1.5 hour drive from Salisbury and were greeted by Susan K, half the team of Susan and Jamie K, our co-leaders. We settled in our site, looked at our fellow caravaners, then moved on to a picnic table area for a 5:00 PM meet-and-greet and dinner.

There are 25 rigs, maybe five of them Airstream motor homes. We know (slightly) one other couple—Susan and Ed B of Sonora—members of NorCal WBCCI. The others are from around the country with a bias toward east of the Mississippi. Several of us are on our first national caravan while the others have been caravanning for many years—two couples have completed 25 caravans—and many know each other from previous caravans. We are among the younger. Talking with them later, we learned many travel for at least half the year, independently and on caravans. There is at least one full-timer. There are four people traveling on their own (2 males, 2 females).

Dinner was catered by “Hook-em and Cook-em” and was really very good: scallops, fish, clams, shrimp, green beans, rolls, apple pie, and carrot cake. For drinks they had lemonade and iced tea (sweetened).

After dinner Jamie K had everyone introduce themselves, and handed out a binder that contains a list of participants, schedules, maps, duties (the leaders are unpaid) and a small RV-repair write-up that hopefully will not be necessary, but you never know. (Two rigs were delayed on arrival – one to replace a refrigerator, and the other for alternator problems in the tow vehicle.)

Susan K, introducing herself, mentioned there are several blocks of outlets in Rehoboth Beach, including Chico’s, with pants way on sale. Meeting broke up and Marcia gave me the choice of going immediately or the next day, and I picked immediately because she was looking anxious and I didn’t want to start the caravan with too much ‘tude. (I am embarrassed to admit I got caught up in things at the outlets and bought a fleece vest, even though I have a down vest in the trailer and a fleece vest at home. To make it worse, it was from Eddie Bauer, and we have an Eddie Bauer Outlet two miles from our home.)