Been Away For Awhile

I have been away from blog land for awhile.  It seems that work overwhelmed me in late July and I just didn't have time or the willingness to sit and work on it.  If you hadn't heard we had to move the parts department (every part and bin) to another location so our construction company could tear down our old digs and rebuild them with a completely new parts area as well as customer waiting lounge and service drive.  In the process, we were required to vacate the premises and will, before long, move the whole thing back upstairs.  I look forward to it being done and set up for the coming year.  It is no fun to move a complete parts department from one place to another.  Messed with my physical and emotional well being for over two weeks even though the move was done in five days.

Back when our grandson Zach was a young and tender age (can't remember exactly what age) he watched a Public Television special about the Mt. St. Helen's eruption in 1980.  He became so enamoured with the volcano and ever thing about it that we were amazed by his knowledge at such a young age.  Mia and I gave him books about geology, world wide history of mother earth and even bought him the video which he still watches today.  We even purchased the The U.S. Geological Survey report about the eruption of Mt. St. Helen's.  See my blog http://trailercamper.blogspot.com/2011/12/home-and-grandsons-birthday.html

Last Friday we had an opportunity to help Zach realize a dream he has had for some time.  It started with some research and the purchase of some permits and guides from the Mt. St. Helen's Institute.  A date was determined and we made plans to pull the trailer down from Gold Bar and load it with Zach for a trip to Cougar, Washington.  We left Thursday morning and arrived at the RV park in the early afternoon.  After setting up the trailer we went to explore the area and find the trail head.  It is several miles out of town on twisting roads to a fire service road that is gravel and winds up the hillside in a cloud of dust.  We found the trail head, looked around and went back to the trailer for some dinner and hopefully a good nights rest.

At 3am I arose to prepare Zach's last meal before his climb.  I went outside and started up the fire and began preparing bacon, scrambled eggs and bagels for his and our breakfast.  With everything packed and ready we waited to leave until just before 5 am.  Zach had to be at the trailhead at 6 am sharp.  We made it with time to spare.

The route

The Look of What the Heck

Zach accomplished his dream and returned from the mountain top around 5pm and was very surprised to find his mother had driven all the way down for the day just to see him return from the climb.  I was very proud of both of them and you could see how proud mom was of her young man.  He had originally planned to stay with us and return home Sunday, but he decided his own bed sounded really good, so he drove home with mom.  We stayed the night and left Cougar at 7:31 am on Saturday and drove up to Gold Bar and deposited the trailer before returning home at around 9 pm.

Mom, Grandma and Honey wait

Nearing the end

Zach returns

Proud mom looks on

I will post more pictures once I figure out what I have.  I gave Zach a camera and he took tons of pictures during the trip.

Hope everyone is doing well.  I'll be posting more as the weeks go by because I really miss putting entries into my journal.