Family reunion in Martinsville Virginia

Myrtle Beach to Martinsville Virginia

Time has really flown by this spring, projects in the condo, for the HOA and on the motorhome have kept us busy. We had been home from Florida for about six weeks, so both of us were ready to hit the road again.

This is the second year we've left Myrtle Beach on Memorial Day. We go about 300 miles northwest to Martinsville Virginia. Martinsville is Millie's home town and most of her kin are in the area or just south in Greensboro North Carolina. We stay at Indian Heritage Campground and they rent us a room with kitchen and rest room. This year we had twenty two adults and three babies for our small family gathering.

The annual Tate garage reunion at Martinsville

The timing for our trip, for those not familiar with Myrtle Beach events is to avoid Black Bike week. Some explanation is in order, this is not a Myrtle Beach event, it is hosted by the small black community of Atlantic Beach. Barely four blocks long, the hundreds of thousands of attendees inundate neighboring Myrtle Beach. We live just off of Ocean Blvd, the main cruising route for the thousands of Japanese motorcycles. The riders go non stop all day and all night long and I can tell you the high pitched whine of those bikes will get to you in a lot less time than you think.

That's about all I'll say about Memorial day in Myrtle Beach, look it up on you tube.

New young'ins

As I said earlier we had over twenty attendees this year, all of Millie's siblings along with most of their children and grandchildren. This is the only Bray family reunion anyone has hosted over the last several years so there is lots of chatter between the family members who wouldn't otherwise see each other. very interested in her families genealogy and I know she enjoys getting the family together. I'm familiar enough with most of them that I mingle, well as much as a Yankee can!

The Bray siblings L-R Lucille, Mildred, Ernest, Betty

In addition to visiting with kin, we also went to the Bray family cemetery. I repaired a section of fence and Millie and her sister Lucille raked and patched reseeded some grass.

The motorhome is running well, I only have a few more maintenance tasks to perform and we will be ready for July, when our trip to Canada begins.