Doodle Caboose Train Trip
Those of you who follow news around the store will have heard about the Train Trip we recently took. I have to tell you that since 1998 I have planned and orchestrated scrapbooking weekends and retreats and hands down this was the BEST one I have ever planned/participated in! And I have been to some great ones throughout the years... We all had such a great time! Such a good time that on the trip home some of the girls got Amtrak route maps and had our 2009 trip all planned out-looks like we are headed to Savannah or Charleston! You will not want to miss out on the next train trip-I promise you, you do not!!
If you want to read my account of the trip (and maybe get a little sad that you couldn't make this year's) then read on. If you want to see all the crazy fun we had make sure you click on the Photos Albums section of this blog and then click on Doodle Caboose.
First of all, we met up at the Tampa Union Station in the Ybor city area and the station itself was a total blast from the past. It was decorated so pretty with original fixtures and the classic, large wooden benches. We boarded our train and like some of the gals said later, the fun started the minute we boarded. Train travel is awesome! There was tons of leg room, enough in fact that you could recline in true Barca-Lounge style! You didn't have to buckle in or stay in your seat, you could stand up and chat and roam around the cars. Or in my case you can sit right down with your funny aisle-mate, Maria, and promptly spill her whole cup of flavored coffee! At least it smelled really good! Right away Stacey and I wanted to get the lay of the land and found the Club Car and the Dinning Car. We made dinner reservations and we all got to eat together! The food was surprisingly yummy! Most of us made friends with the Club Car porter and since the "What Happens" Rule was invoked I cannot say anything about that! After about a 4 hour trip we met up with our shuttle bus driver (decked out in fancy duds) and he took us to the Holiday Inn Downtown in St. Augustine. Check-in was super easy and we all went to our rooms with hopes of "hooking up" and doing something fun. Well...after I unpacked I checked in with the girls and found most of them in their PJs! There were a few intrepid souls who went out and had fun but curling up in bed watching some late-night show just sounded great!
The next morning everyone met up at Davenport Park. It is a lovely park with an old-fashioned carousal and picnic benches. We had Dunkin' Donuts coffee and scrumptious pastries from a local shop called The Bunnery. Oh my! They were great! Stacey, Jill, Heather and I stayed behind to get the room all set up and the goodies passed out and we were ready when they all arrived back. The really cool thing about our conference room was that it was on the same floor as our rooms! Very convenient! Some gals came in and dropped off their cropping gear only to turn around to head out again to explore the historic city. Those who stayed were happy to have their own table and set up and started working right away.
The crop room stayed busy right up until the time we had to leave to catch the Old Town Trolley that was taking us on a city tour before we went on to OC Whites for dinner. We learned a lot about St. Augustine's history from a very knowledgeable trolley driver who insisted it was her first day, but none of us believed her! Half of the group got off the trolley early to enjoy a quick "happy hour" before our reservation time. After the tour we met up with them and were shown to an upstairs room where the windows were open and a beautiful breeze was coming in from the water. It was lovely! Two popular choices for dinner were the crab cakes and the fried shrimp. Holey moley was the food good!! I had the crab but was sitting across from Judy who had the shrimp and was I happy when she offered to share a shrimp with me! Julie tried her first Mojito when Leisa ordered one and they looked great but I don't know how they could have been better than the classic pina colodas that Stace and I had! If you are ever in St. Augustine, you must eat at OC Whites. (A special shout-out goes to Robin, my sister-in-law, for recommending it!) The Old Town Trolley sent a special trolley to pick us up since the regular trolley service stops at 6pm. How cool was that? Our own personal shuttle!
Once everyone was back at the crop room, happy and full of yummy dinner (I forgot to mention the Key Lime Pie in Raspberry Sauce that we had for dessert! What was I thinking? It was fabulous!!) Leisa got us started on making our beautiful train album that she created especially for this trip! It was done in the very pretty Wild Saffron paper line from K&Co. She used tons of matching embellishments and by the end of all our cutting, sanding and inking we had a fantastic album to keep some special Doodle Caboose photos in! You have to check out the album the next time you are in the store! Friday was the night that most everyone stayed up late and laughed and chatted the whole time. It was amazing to me how nice everyone was and how it felt like we were all old friends getting together for a usual trip!
Sleeping in was only on the agenda for a very few-most croppers were up, had breakfast and started their day early. The crop room was quiet though as most people headed out to see some sights. I'm not sure where Lori and Freddi visited, but I know Jill and Heather visited lots of stores and Barbara and Julie saw lots of stuff including a mandatory visit to the fort after breakfast at The Bunnery. Shirley, Stacey, Kim and Barbi all set off in search of trouble breakfast and beautiful sights. Leisa and Trina slept in a bit then set off to hook up with Shirley's crew. It was funny to hear Leisa tell the story later on about how they found the crew by following Shirley's laugh from a few blocks away! I got to meet up with my brother (BrotherDoug) and niece, Lydia who helped coordinate our trip and with Robin we all went out to yummy Greek lunch. Funny thing was as we were leaving the restaurant we bumped into the big "crew" who were off in search of the winery. The rest of the day we got the giant TV set up in the crop room and we just chilled, cropped and watched chick flicks! Everybody kept wondering where the girls were and I assured them they were at the winery waiting for the last trolley call to come home!! LOL I was right, too! They said they had the best time with Lori and Freddi (who they met up with at the winery) sitting on the rooftop lounge, sipping Sangria, soaking up the sun and breezes and listening to a live jazz band. Sounds great, huh?
I think the only people who had more fun was Shorty's Crew! (I love calling Cathy "Shorty") Judy, Carole, Cathy, Shorty and Jodi went out sightseeing and were the only group to complete the Digital Scavenger Hunt. They were given a list of things to get pictures of them doing and bring back to get points for each completed task. They had to do easy things like "sample fudge" or "build a pillow fort" then do really funny things like "bus a table at a restaurant" or "demonstrate a scrapbooking tool to a stranger". Boy did it ever sound like fun. You can check out some of their funny photos in the Photo Album section! And since they were the only team to really work on it they took away the big prize of the weekend!!
Sometime in the early evening our masseuse, Tyra showed up. She was so charming and sweet and I think almost everyone in the room had a fantastic chair massage! Tyra was such a great girl to talk with and when she was done with all the therapy she made a little speech to the room. She told us that she was so blessed to be included in this great group of women and that she enjoyed our "energy". She said that she felt inspired seeing all of us friends together that she wanted to plan some time with her girlfriends. How cool was that? The Doodle's crazy bunch of scrapbookers inspired this nice girl? We loved hearing that! In the evening Jill offered to go pick up Outback for whoever wanted to order, so we all pigged out on another really yummy meal! I was sure that there would be some who wanted to "crop through" until our bus picked us up bright and early for our return trip, but I was wrong. By about 2am I think we had a cleared out room. Of course, when I got back to our room Stacey had on some interesting medical show and I couldn't turn away from cougar attacks, cactus accidents and the like! It was late before I finally turned it off!
I had to be up early to make sure that everyone else was up early! I was knocking on doors at something terrible like 5:30am! I counted all the heads in the lobby and we boarded our shuttle back to Palatka. We got to see the sunrise on the road and once we got to the train station and found a Dunkin' Donuts within walking distance we were happy! Back on the train we were a much more mellow group than we were heading out. Lots of sleeping girls. Only a couple of us went to breakfast in the Dinning Car. The most popular thing to do on the ride home besides sleeping was to plot out the next route for the Doodle Caboose Train Trip! Jackie got a map and she, Stacey and I picked either Charleston or Savannah for our 2009 trip!
My favorite part of the trip has to be when I heard over and over, "When are we gonna do this again?" or "You are going to do another one next year, right?" or "This was the best weekend crop-ever!" I must agree with all those sentiments and say OFFICIALLY that (unless something weird happens) we will do another one next year and that if you want to have a great time, make sure (and I mean this!!) that you are there when the conductor shouts, "All aboard!"
Jen
