What a great find. The Creeks Golf and RV Resort in Cave Springs, Arkansas is a nice little campground. From our RV we can see the 18th green and it is only about 100 yards from our RV to the golf clubhouse. Our $35 nightly fee includes electricity, water, sewer, cable TV and WIFI plus Murray gets 20% off his golfing fees.
Yesterday Murray played 9 holes then collected me to accompany him on his last nine holes. In the photo below he has just driven up to the RV and you can see the 18th hole behind him. I ended up being his golf buggy driver and personal photographer for his last nine holes.
We had been lamenting the lack of wildlife that we had seen so far on this RV trip, so I was quick to get the camera focussed when I saw this cheeky squirrel. I drove the cart right past him, and he didn't even flinch. So when Murray got out to putt his ball, I walked back and took this photo.
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| Dangerous alligator |
After a pleasant day on the course, we had a nice dinner in the RV and were both happily working on our laptops when our weather monitor alerted us to a nasty storm that was currently in Oklahoma and was moving in our direction in NW Arkansas. We kept the TV on the weather channel and the picture kept getting scarier. There was talk of baseball sized hail and 70 mph winds and of a tornado touching down and taking the roof off a bank building and uplifting an RV in a town in Oklahoma. Let me tell you, any hail, let alone baseball size hail can do serious damage to the perspex vent covers on the roof of our RV. Once they are damaged, we would be exposed to rain entering the RV, not to mention the hassle of having to find an RV service repair centre, order in a replacement part, wait for it to arrive, and then the inconvenience of waiting around while the work is being done. So Murray got on the roof and covered the main perspex cover with a rubber mat, hoping that strong winds didn't displace it before it did the job of protecting us from the hail!
From what we could see on the weather radar, our town of Cave Springs, Arkansas seemed to be on the edge of the storm's path, and given the storms original north -north-easterly direction, we hoped to miss the worst of it. We went to bed around midnight after checking we were still on the edge of the storm, and taking comfort in knowing that our weather monitor would alert us if we were in danger. Just in case, we removed our emergency bag (passports, radio, bottled water, basic toiletries etc) from under the bed and got it ready by the door with a torch and umbrella. We also put out a set of clothes to wear, if we had to leave in a hurry. We weren't to get much sleep as the monitor started going off every 15 mins. Initially the alarms were for our listening area, but not our town, so I turned it off and closed my eyes. This continued for 2 hours, but by 2.30 am, the alert now included our town. Uh oh. We immediately got up and got dressed while looking at the radar. By this time, our town (see the green dot in the middle of the photo below) was right in the path of the storm. The direction of the storm had moved to be more easterly. Darn. The dark green areas show rain, the yellow with red centers is severe storm with lightning, thunder, hail and rain, and then the red overlay is the potential tornado path. Within a few minutes the next alert said 'leave mobile homes now, not in 5 minutes time'. We locked our RV and walked quickly to cover the 100 yards to the basement of the golf clubhouse.
It was comforting to be in a safe place with the company of the other campground residents (and about six dogs). I bought my laptop along, but another chap had his laptop open and was already accessing the weather channel, so we were able to follow the tornado threat continuously. In the photo below, Murray is with a few of the others following the progress of the storm from our safe refuge. Most of the other refugees were to my left and in the entrance area watching the storm. I was thankful to have my iPhone with me, and using the golf house WIFI, I was able to play Words With Friends to distract me and help pass the time. Worked a treat! Around 4.15 am the initial tornado threat had passed, but as another tornado was building, we were on a 'watch' alert until 6am. The $30 weather monitor is worth its weight in gold. At 6am the alert was over, and we both were able to go to bed, happy in the knowledge that being retired, we didn't have to be at work at 8.30 am like some of the other campground residents.
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| Following the tornado threat from the safety of the clubhouse basement |
Great picture of the squirrel. Didn't know their tails were so long.
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