by Madyson Grey
Rafael asked the questions that they had written down the night before and got answers to all of them. They spent the better part of the morning in serious discussion. They talked about permits, cost of utilities and insurance, the workamper program, various RV club membership programs and which ones the park was currently participating in, when the busy season was and how things were during the slow season, upkeep costs, and everything else any of them could possibly think of.
When they had just about exhausted all possible issues to discuss, Rafael made an offer that was a couple hundred thousand dollars below the asking price. Mr. Vest countered by dropping his asking price by a hundred thousand. After some deliberate hesitation on Rafael’s part, he agreed, and the men shook hands. After that, it was a matter of paperwork. Gobs of paperwork. Rafael wrote a check to Mr. Vest for the total amount, which he then verified by calling Rafael’s bank. Of course it was good.
“If you two are hungry, how about if I take you out for lunch, since it’s past time,” Mr. Vest offered when the deal was done.
“That’s very kind of you,” Victoria replied.
“Yes, it is,” Rafael agreed.
“Okay, then. If you’ll follow me in your car, I’ll take you to the best place in North Ca’lina for down home Southern cooking. You’ll want to know where to go every time you come to check on the park.”
“Sounds good to me,” Victoria said with a smile.
The café wasn’t very big or fancy. It was just a plain little place, but the waitress greeted them warmly and showed them to a booth by a window that overlooked a pretty little yard where rose bushes bloomed and a weeping willow tree shaded the green grass and an old wooden bench.
The food, when their orders came, was served family style in serving bowls from which they dipped up their own plates. There were mashed potatoes and gravy, fried okra, fried chicken, sliced tomatoes, and biscuits with plenty of butter and honey.
“If this is what Southern eating is all about, I’m sold,” Victoria said around a mouthful of fried okra. “This stuff is delicious! I’ve never had it before, but this won’t be the last time, either.”
“I’m with you,” Rafael agreed. “This is fabulous. I didn’t think anything could top Mexican food, but I could eat like this the rest of my life and never miss another taco.”
“Glad you like it,” Mr. Vest said, smiling. “Not everyone likes okra, but it’s one of my favorite vegetables. I like Mexican food, too, though. We have a few pretty good Mexican places in the area.”
It took the rest of the afternoon to complete their business. Mr. Vest took Rafael and Victoria in the RV park office and introduced them to the park manager and the workamper who was on duty as the new owners. Of course, they had all met previously, but this was a different kind of introduction.
“George is a highly reliable manager,” Mr. Vest had told them before they went in to meet him. “I strongly recommend that you keep him on. He’s the guy who really knows all about this park. He knows where everything is, what can go wrong, and how to fix it. He gets great reviews on the website, and he is well liked by guests and staff alike.”
“That’s good to know,” Rafael told him. “I know we will be glad to have him, especially since we live in California. As long as he is trustworthy and honest, I’m sure we’ll get along fine.”
“He’s as honest as the day is long,” Mr. Vest assured them. “I’ve never missed a penny since he’s been the manager.”
“That’s great,” Rafael said.
So when Rafael and Victoria were introduced as the new owners, Rafael assured George that as long as he kept doing as good a job as Mr. Vest had told them he did, the job was his.
“Thank you, sir,” George said. “I appreciate that. I’ll keep on doing the best I know how to do. If there are any changes you wish to make, just let me know, and I’ll work with you just as I’ve always tried to work with Bill.”
“Sounds good,” Rafael said. “So to start with, I’m Rafael and my wife is Victoria.”
“Thank you, sir, Rafael,” George said with a nod of his head. “Victoria, ma’am.”
“Since as far as I know, our business is finished, I’ll let you talk with George, and he can fill you in on all the day-to-day details, and I’ll go home,” Mr. Vest told Rafael.
The three shook hands all around, each thanking the other for the ease of the sale, and Mr. Vest took his leave. Rafael, Victoria, and George spent another hour or more talking about the park.
“Are there any improvements that you know of that need to be made?” Rafael asked George.
“Well, let’s see,” George said slowly, scratching his head. “The office building here could use a new paint job. It’s been about ten years since it was done, and it’s beginning to need it again. Say, are you going to change the name of the park?”
“I don’t believe so, at least not at the outset,” Rafael said, looking at Victoria for her input.
“It seems to me that if the park has a good reputation under its current name, that it would be the sensible thing to do to leave it alone,” she said. “That’s my opinion, anyway. I like the name it has. I think Smoky Trails RV Park is a nice name. We could put up a banner that says “Under New Ownership” maybe, if you want to, though.”
“Yeah, we might,” Rafael said. “We’ll see.
“You do know that the name is a reference to the Smoky Mountains that we’re in here, don’t you?” George asked.
“I kinda figured so,” Rafael said. “I see a lot of places that use the word ‘smoky’ as part of their name.”
“One thing I definitely think we should do is revamp the website and make it a lot more detailed and user-friendly,” Victoria said. “I think I can handle that. I did the website for the art gallery while I was there.”
“Yeah, good idea,” George said. “That’s the biggest complaint of the customers that I hear, is the poor website. But I don’t know how to do it, and the guy who put it up is no longer here.”
“If you can give me a list of all the best local attractions, and all the places that guests can go using the park as a base, and all the best places to eat, I want to incorporate those things into the website.”
“I’ll do that,” George said.
They talked on until it was time for George to be off for the day, and time for Rafael and Victoria to get some supper.
Chapter 3
“Well, we didn’t get any sightseeing in today, but I think the day was well spent,” Rafael said as they walked back to their motorhome.”
“Yeah, I’d say,” Victoria agreed wholeheartedly. “Now we’ve got another property to add to Thornton-Rivera Enterprises. Cool, huh?”
“Yeah, very cool.”
That evening, Rafael made a new entry in the Thornton-Rivera system, adding in Smoky Trails RV Park to the database of properties owned. Tuesday morning, he and Victoria went in to Arden to open a new account in a branch of their bank located there. This account would be solely for the RV park deposits.
He had gone over with George the procedure for depositing all of the funds received into their bank. Nothing much would change on the RV park’s side of things. The daily deposits would go into the bank each evening, and every two weeks, the employees’ wages would be direct deposited into each one’s personal account.
The couple spent a week there in the park, both sightseeing around the area and familiarizing themselves with it, and getting to know the park itself, so that when they were 2,800 miles or so away from it, they would still have a clue as to how to address any issue that may come up.
The day after Labor Day, Rafael and Victoria headed east through North Carolina. They passed through Raleigh, collecting that capitol building, and proceeded on to Kitty Hawk where the Wright Brothers made their historical first flight. Then they visited Roanoke Island, home of the Lost Colony of the late 1500s.
Turning south, they made their way into South Carolina to Charleston, where they spent about thre
e days sightseeing there. Traveling south along the Atlantic coastline took them through Savannah, Georgia, where they took time to enjoy the grand old historic homes in the area.
Florida was next, with Disney World, the Everglades, Miami Beach, the Keys, and other places of interest. Then they doubled back up into Tennessee, where they visited some Civil War battlefields, Nashville, and of course, Graceland in Memphis.
By this time, the motorhome was pointed in a westerly direction, so they meandered through Arkansas and then turned north into Missouri, just before entering Oklahoma.
“I almost hate to be going west,” Victoria said as they crossed the Missouri state line. “I know right now we’re going north, but we are working our way west.”
“Why is that?” Rafael asked.
“Because it means that our vacation is getting close to being over. It has been so nice to have all of this time with just the two of us together, no work to be bothered with, and mostly no catastrophes or traumatic events to have to deal with. No one has died on this trip; no one has been hurt, kidnapped, or otherwise molested. I almost dread going home for fear it will all start up again.”
“It has been a wonderful time, hasn’t it?” Rafael said, reaching across the console for Victoria’s hand. “I hate for it to end, too. But this won’t be our only trip, honey. We haven’t been everywhere yet. And there are some places I’d like to go a second time. Some of the states we just barely were over the state line, and didn’t get to see much. So we’ll do this again. I promise.”
Victoria squeezed his hand and looked at him with so much love in her eyes that he had to quickly focus back on the roadway so that he didn’t wreck. When she looked at him like that it was all he could to do concentrate on whatever else was at hand or he would be lost in her eyes. Just thinking about her made him look for the nearest rest area where they could pull off the road.
After he had parked the rig, he took Victoria by the hand and said, “Come here to me. I can’t wait for tonight.”
He led her through the coach to the bedroom, slid the door closed, and laid her down to make love.
“I love you so much,” he murmured in her ear, as they lay entwined together in their afterglow. “You make my life worth living.”
“I love you, too, babe,” she murmured back. “Without you, I don’t know how I would have survived this past year and a half. You’re my rock and my hero.”
He possessed her lips again in an intensely intimate kiss that fanned the smoldering fire into burning flames again. Once again the two became one flesh as their bodies joined, seeking to assuage the fire that roared within.
An hour later, they were dressed again and back on the road. Their immediate destination was St. Joseph, Missouri, and the last known home of Jesse James. This site was on Rafael’s list of must-see places. He had grown up on tales of outlaws, and Jesse James was his favorite.
The road west took them through Kansas, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada. They took two more weeks covering these four states, driving leisurely and stopping often wherever their whims were so inclined. They spent time in Rocky Mountain National Park and around Salt Lake City and the Great Salt Lake. They also took their time going through Nevada, checking out the small towns the highway went through or close to.
On the northern outskirts of Las Vegas, there was another RV park for sale. Victoria had found it online, so when they neared the area, she directed Rafael to it. They rented a space for the night, and then walked around to see what it was like. It was a decent park, but they could both see the potential to turn it into a really great park.
The price was relatively low, as the owner knew it needed work, and he was getting up in years and was just tired of fooling with it. They stayed for several days, talking with the owner and the resident manager, discussing similar issues as they had prior to buying the park in North Carolina.
After some negotiation, Rafael and the owner agreed on a selling price. Then it took Rafael a little while to transfer some funds from a money market account to the business checking account on which he wrote a check for the full price.
They spent another week there, listing all of the things that needed fixing, upgrading, or completely replacing. Rafael worked closely with the resident manager, partly to see what kind of worker he was, and partly because he had to, to prioritize the projects, estimate costs, and outline how to go about getting each project done.
He could see that he would be making frequent trips over to this park for a while until all the upgrades were complete. But that was all right. The park would remain open during the process, which would keep the income coming in. There would come a point in time when one row at a time would have to be closed down to pave the RV sites. But until that time, there were more pressing projects to complete, such as renovating the restrooms and showers.
Before they left, Rafael went over the process once more with Ben, the resident manager, to make sure that he understood what Rafael wanted to happen and in what order. Ben assured him that he would carry out Rafael’s plans, and happily, as he had wanted to have these upgrades done for quite some time. They agreed that they would keep in close contact so that Rafael could monitor the work.
Because this park had been allowed to get run down, and the website reviews weren’t the greatest, Rafael chose to rename the place as soon as he got his name on the papers. They tossed names around for half a day before settling on ThornRiver RV Park, which was a combination of their two last names. They thought that maybe eventually they might have a whole string of RV parks across the country under that name.
It was October 30, a Tuesday, when the motorhome finally came to a rest in their own driveway. They had been gone four months and one day. When Rafael turned off the engine, they just sat there and looked at each other.
“I know I should be glad to be home,” Victoria said. “Everyone I know always says that they like to travel, but they’re always so glad to get home again. But I can’t say that I really am. This has been such a wonderful summer. No problems, well, except for that one blowout, but nothing really bad.”
“I know what you mean,” Rafael said. “It has been great. But I confess to being a little anxious to go over and see how the park is doing. Aren’t you?”
“Yeah, kinda,” she answered. “Yeah, I am. But then I’d be ready to roll again.”
“We’ll take some shorter day trips, or weekenders, or whatever, real often. We have proven that we can leave and everything still functions according to plans. And, at least at this point, we can afford it. That’s another thing. I want to scout out some more RV parks to buy, so that’ll give us another excuse to bum around some more. And we’re gonna have to run back and forth to the Vegas park over the next several months until the work gets finished there.”
“Okay, sounds great. I’ll be looking for some more parks on the Internet again, and make us a list. Then we can drive to the ones we’re interested in.”
“I guess we’d better get out and go in,” Rafael said. “I wonder if Mama Lena is home. If she is, she didn’t hear us pull in, or she’d have been out here by now to greet us.”
“I have missed Mama,” Victoria admitted.
The two got out of the RV that had been their home away from home for four months, and went inside the house. It was quiet inside, and when they went downstairs to Lena’s suite, they found it empty.
“It is Tuesday,” Rafael said. “She’s probably working in the gift shop.”
“Oh, yeah,” Victoria replied. “I guess she would be. Well, do you want to unload the RV first, or go over to the park first?”
“Let’s go down to the park first,” Rafael said. “We can unload anytime. Although, I guess we’d better get what little food is left in the fridge out and bring it into the house.”
“Good idea.”
After they had done that, they got on the quad and rode down to the park. The gift shop was full of people, and there was a line at the register of people waiting to c
heck out. But when Lena looked up and caught a glimpse of her daughter and son-in-law, her face lit up like a thousand-watt bulb. She never missed a beat, however, in waiting on the customers.
“I’m going to find Mickey,” Rafael said to Victoria. “You can stay here and see your mom if you want to. We’ll find each other later.”
“Okay.”
Victoria walked around behind the counter and gave her mom a quick squeeze between customers.
“So good to see you, honey,” Lena said softly. “You just get home?”
“Yeah, just a little bit ago.”
Victoria stood beside Lena and bagged for her to speed up the line just a tad bit. Victoria was pleased to see that the gift shop was busy, and that people were buying, and that the shop itself looked well stocked and clean and tidy. It was true. She wasn’t needed at all here, except to do the ordering. That gave her mixed feelings of satisfaction and a feeling of not being needed.
When the crowd thinned a bit and Lena had a break in the line, she turned to give Victoria a proper welcome-home hug.
“So how was your trip?” she asked. “You look fabulous. The vacation has obviously been good for you.”
“It was a wonderful trip,” Victoria said, her eyes shining. “It was so great to have four whole months in which nothing catastrophic happened. We had a tire blow out early on, and that was scary, but other than that, the entire trip was absolutely perfect. We saw so many cool places and did so many fun things it’s almost unbelievable. I’ve got tons of stuff to show you. We almost had to rent a trailer to put all of our souvenirs and stuff in that we bought.”
Lena laughed at that and said, “I’m anxious to see all your pictures, too.”
“We had to buy two more photo albums like the ones you gave me, because those two weren’t nearly enough.”
“Good grief! You must have really taken a lot of photos.”