Once we had left the Duncan area we drove to Guthrie, Oklahoma where we played at the Oklahoma International Bluegrass Festival. It was almost as dark as it was at Duncan when we got to Guthrie so all we did was find a camp site and go to bed. The next day things kicked into gear. We were the first act to play so we were a little bit nervous. It was rather windy that day so we were unable to use our own Omni-directional microphones, which picked up the howl of the wind too much. Situating ourselves at individual mics which were spread out across the rather large stage was a little bit more challenging for us as we were not able to hear one another play a clearly as we usually do. But the set went well over all. We spent the rest of the day listening to the other musicians and resting.

The next day we went to a school where we gave the Southeast Alaska Odyssey Show twice. We returned to the International Bluegrass Festival with barely time to spare for our next performance in the children’s tent. This was also school kids that were bussed into the festival on field trips. There were as many curious adults crowding into the tent as children.

After we were done there we took our stuff back to our bus and then I ran back to listen to the Rockin Acoustic Circus (who we had met in Duncan.) The rest of the day was spent like the one before. But we did get asked to sign an autograph book by someone named Lillian. It was a really cool book. Lillian has been an avid bluegrass fan for the past thirty years and has kept a memory/autograph book of many performer she has enjoyed listening to over the years. The book contained photographs and notes from all kinds of people, many whom we had never heard of before and a lot that we were familiar with such as Dolly Parton, Rhonda Vincent, Vince Gill and the like……

On the last day of the festival we listened to a family of musicians called the Young family. (We met them in Duncan also.) That evening we spent visiting with them. Later they taught Laura, Abby and I how to line dance. It didn’t really work because we were all dancing to different rhythms. It was still fun though. Before we parted that evening their younger son Nathan and I found that we could both click our tongues like each other. You might find that to be completely useless information but it wasn’t. Because neither of us had ever before met another person who could accomplish such an impressive stunt. So we were both just clicking at each other randomly the rest of the evening.

That was the last night of the festival so the next morning we got up early with the intention of going to a church that we were supposed to play at that day. When we started driving we found that we were not moving. It seemed that we had sunk down into the muddy earth. Our neighbor campers had a four wheel truck and they offered to try and help pull us out. By the time they gave up their tow rope looked like cheddar string cheese. Eventually my dad, Paul, got a tow truck to come and pull us out. It did the trick but there were two Grand Canyon size trenches where we had been pulled by the time we were out. We expected the park owners might plant some flowers in the trenches. It looked as if the tow company was going to have a very full day of towing judging by the other stranded Rvs around us. By the time we were out of the campground we were too late to go to the church so we went and did laundry. The next day we spent driving to the Turkey Track Festival in Waldron, Arkansas.

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