On our way to Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival

The date on this post isn't going to be correct because it actually happened a few days ago as we were driving down to California to Grass Valley to the annual Father's Day Festival held here.  We have taken 3 of our grand kids from Utah with us and as proud as I was of them a few days ago, now it's been a different story as this trip has progressed.  They've been bored and complaining to us making the festival less fun for John and I.  But that's not what this post is about anyway it's about our drive down to here which was on June 12th when we headed out of Herriman Utah and we were to drive over to Winnemucca, Nevada then pull into the Walmart there and wait for the Limehouse's to arrive. 
We had less of a drive so arrived earlier than they did, so we were there and parked by 2:30 in the afternoon and they were due in at around 5:30.  It was nice and warm but not too hot so I decided to sit outside our camper and practice my fiddle.
I enjoyed having the time to do so and the campers around us were thrilled to get to listen to me which was fun for all of us.  Suddenly after about an hour of practicing I see this man come running towards our camper pushing his shopping cart and shouting at me that he'd been listening to me fiddle on his way into Walmart and again on his way out.  He said that "I was pretty good and he loved the music and was also a mandolin player."  He had his mandolin along with him in his semi which was parked in a dirt lot beyond our camper.  He asked me if I'd mind letting him play a couple of tunes with me as he said he had a little bit of time he could spare.  So I of course said yes, then he ran to his truck and grabbed his mandolin out.
It was a nice Gibson F-9 and he knew a lot of bluegrass tunes to play and was pretty good on it. We ended up jamming for 2 hours and of course all the campers had pulled their chairs outside of their own rigs and were listening so we got to entertain them a bit too.  He told me that he was from Oklahoma and that his dad plays the banjo and mom sings and plays too.  He'd been playing along with them since he was a kid and so had learned a lot of the old time tunes.  We had a great time and it was so fun passing the time this way until Limehouse's arrived.   This guy had long hair and a long beard and was wearing a Harley Davidson t-shirt so when he got ready to leave I asked him if he rode a Harley to which he replied that he has a Heritage Softtail Classic the same bike as John and I have.  What a small world and what a fun day that turned out to be.  I posted about this on Facebook and got a ton of reponses from people who say they camp at Walmarts all the time but never thought to get out their instruments and play or practice but from now on they're going to start doing so.  I commented back that us Bluegrasser's need to unite and play whenever we camp at the Walmarts and start a bluegrass revolution of a new trend. 

It was just so very fun that I had to share!  Now all my bluegrass friends are laughing and saying "Only you could start a jam in a Walmart parking lot, all on your own as you park there."  I love it!