Day 5 (Saturday) started out with another quick swim in the pool, but then it was time for Becky and me to go participate in the reunion golf scramble. I played with Becky’s grandma’s sister (Regina), Becky’s aunt (Mary Pat) and a longer distance relative (Matt) from Wichita, KS. We didn’t play so well and I in particular didn’t help the cause. The golf course, Fisher Creek, was in a neat setting in a valley just off Table Rock Lake. The course itself wasn’t particularly nice – it was half a par 3 course and half a normal 9 hole course. The greens were terribly slow, so I never really adjusted to hard you had to hit something to get it in the hole. We finished with a 36 on a par 34 course, which wasn’t very good. The winner was a 35, but you never really know who cheated and how badly. Most of the discussions around the golf tournament are related to how everyone is making up their score. Becky’s uncle Reed decided not to play, because his team already had a score of 29, so they didn’t have to play.
After golf Becky and her mom had extra tickets to head back to Silver Dollar City with Katie for more rides. Ever since we found out we were going to Branson, I had wanted to head into Arkansas, because it is one of the few remaining states (Alaska, Connecticut and New Mexico) that I had yet to visit. Becky’s grandpa was looking for something to do that afternoon as well that didn’t involve walking around the amusement, so he agreed to join me and Amelia. I think Amelia regretted the decision to come along, because she screamed for half of the 2 hour drive each direction. We headed to Bentonville, AR to see the Wal-Mart visitors center. It looked like a 75 mile drive on paper, but with the extremely windy roads of the Ozarks, it took just over 2 hours. The terrain for the trip was very interesting and even with little population, you can find a Southern Baptist church every mile. We reached Walton’s 5-10 store in the heart of Bentonville and took a trip back through time to see Sam Walton’s desk back in the good old days. It’s amazing the height of success reached by Wal-Mart and how they seem to get attacked for their low wages/working concerns when they should be lauded for keeping inflation down over the past few years considering the escalation in gas prices and house prices.
Saturday night was time for the reunion dinner. It was a nice dinner headlined by chicken parmigian and prime rib. I got some noodles for Amelia on my first trip through the line, and she took all of them and stuffed them in her mouth at once. This brought laughs from all the tables nearby as 90% of the noodles slid down her shirt on to the floor. The girls were so tired by this point that meltdown were coming faster than normal. Katie and I headed off to play some more Chutes and Ladders (Dora Edition of course) and we were soon joined by Amelia. After dinner, we were able to talk Grandma Nola into putting the girls down, so we headed off to the local bar with Becky’s cousins Laura, Jerome and Kevin. We had a good time there, getting a chance to relax and take it easy for a little while.
As soon as we hit the bed that night, we knew we had a long drive for the next two days. We only hoped the girls would be well-rested.
Eric's space 