12 October ‘09 Well it’s all began again….”We’re On The Road” !!!! Now let’s catch up a little for the last few weeks. Louise and I drove over to Ellensburg to bring back our “Winnie Minnie”
2 weeks ago, I drove the coach and Louise followed with the Grand Vitara. This was really the first time that I had the Minnie out on the road and up to speed, it went very well for the 2 hour trip. Then it was getting it ready for the “long haul”… In between working on the Minnie and the Endeavor (getting it ready for winter storage), we went to a number of family events as well. One weekend Joelle and Amy came over from Coeur d’Alene and became the first to stay a couple of nights in the Minnie. On that Saturday, we took the day and went down to Issaquah and took in “The Issaquah Salmon Days”, a large celebration that welcomes the salmon back to the hatchery each year. The small river is packed fin to fin with these large fish that have fought hard to get all the way back “home”. Lena also drove over to see us and to visit with her cousin Amy.
She drove from Yakima for a short visit at Salmon Days and then went on to a meeting for her Yakima High Drill Team.
One demonstration that I’ve never witnessed at Salmon Days, was a young Moroccan man doing some very impressive wood carving.
One demonstration that I’ve never witnessed at Salmon Days, was a young Moroccan man doing some very impressive wood carving.
He was using a stick with a string to turn a piece of wood while he used a couple of “toes” and his hand to finish the lathe work…pretty interesting.
Leslee drove over a few days later to wish us happy travels and deliver some of the most fantastic apple pies…I can still taste every bite…mmmm good !!! Finally, we got what we thought we would want to transfer from the Endeavor to the Minnie, it took a while but we did it. Now to “winterize” the Endeavor and move it into storage. Winterizing was a little easier than I thought it might be, cross your fingers for me that I did it all right and we have no surprises when we get back this next May. We chose a 45 foot covered storage area in Snohomish thinking that with the length we might be able to store the Grand Vitara there as well…well it didn’t work, we were about 6 feet too short. We couldn’t waste any more time looking for another spot so we took our good friends Ricardo and Suzie up on their offer…we would drive the car and the Minnie down to Portland and leave the car there for the time we’re away. Anyway, we might need the car for a day or two while we were having some work done on the coach. We stopped off to see Mikleane, Ric, Drew, and Louise for coffee and muffins, and then drove out to have lunch with Ben and Shirley at Lake Martin before heading down I-5 to Portland. We pulled into Ricardo and Suzie’s place just after 6 and were all set up prior to dark. 9am the next morning and Louise and I were at Camping World ready to have the Minnie serviced with an oil change and furnace cleaning/check-up. Then it was off to a tire shop for new tires and shocks. Before you know it and it’s almost bed time and I’m sitting here at the table and rushing through this so that I can get to bed. It’s going to be up early and on the road heading south be for you know it, “night all”.