27 May 2025 - RV Service Work and Rally Welcome Event

 

Today was the day before the 2025 Alliance Rally officially commences, but it was a full day for many of us that were involved with the Welcome Event.  My morning started early with a trip to the service desk to pick up a new fender skirt I had ordered.  I brought it back and installed it in place of one that was cracking due to age.  There were a couple minor complications to this but for the most part it was very straight forward.

About the time I was wrapping this up Lippert arrived to work on my levelers.  There were a couple issues starting with the left front jack leaking hydraulic fluid and also the left rear jacks were losing pressure.  When the auto-level process extended the left rear jacks they would extend and then slowly sink.  In an attempt to level they would again extend and then again they would sink, not holding pressure.  So the technicians replaced the jack on the front left and then tested the system and of course we could not get it to screw up. 

They did some further testing and then installed a pressure gauge and said they would be back in the next couple days to check the height of the jacks and if the system was losing any pressure.  

After lunch the final set-up continued for the Welcome Event.  This involved the Welcome Event team preparing the food and setting up the event hall to receive upwards of 700 attendees or more. The team that prepared the welcome bags for everyone was set.   The silent auction team continued to receive donated items and process them for the auction.  Games were set-up and also a dunk tank was set-up and filled.  

At 1600 hrs the Welcome Event kicked off and here come the attendees!  Everyone got their food and welcome bags quickly and efficiently, and then they proceeded to play the various games, pitch balls to dunk our celebrities, listen to the live band playing on the stage, and cruise through the vendor area to see what products they were selling.  I took several hundred prictures but will just post a very few:

FamAlly Cares president Ralph Lowther addressing the attendees

The Welcome Event team and their awesome shirts !!

Ally's lined up for the event to start

Folks picking up their food

Dunk tank in full operation.  Water was 62F to start.

Ally's cruising through the vendor area.

The Welcome Event concluded at 1900 hrs and then the annual bourbon tasting started.  I heard a count of 90 different bottle of various makes of bourbon were brought by those attending.  Sample cups were handed out and you could sample as many as you wanted.  It was a "sea of people"!  I bet there were 200 sampling the various bourbons!  My network hard drive has decided to take a break so not more pictures, but it was an awesome tasting event.

Tomorrow is the official opening of the Rally starting with a full breakfast followed by opening comments by Alliance RV leadership.  After that there are events throughout the day.