Surrounded!

First the really bad news. Back in April we had a buyer for our house. Our closing date was set for June 10th and we were under the impression we had no worries since the buyer had indicated he was pre-approved for the loan. Such was not to be. Just 4 days from our closing date, the loan was denied by the bank and there was no recourse other than for us to put the house back on the market and begin the process all over. Not much of a silver lining to this cloud other than we were able to spend more time with the family – and do some people watching at the park.


We've returned to the Thousand Trails resort outside Leavenworth Washington. If you have been following our blog, this is the park I wrote about last year repleat with new campers and the wonderful shows they provide. That brings us to the sort of bad news that actually came out to the good.

There was nobody here! I'll admit we checked in at the first of the week but shouldn't we expect a few people like minded who were camping out? Nope. We basically got our pick of the camp sites and after two months as camp hosts in a busy park, the place was a blissful ghost town in comparison. About the only time we saw other campers was when we drove through the park on our way to town. That is until...

The weekend! Oh yes, with the weather predicted to be sunny and temps up in the mid 80's, urbanites from the wetter, west side of the mountains once again made the journey to provide us with some sorely needed entertainment. Or so we thought. What we had not calculated was the time of the year. This early in the season and with school still in session, our weekenders tended to be of the more experienced variety and could be lumped into two groups: young families with toddlers and empty nesters. Pretty easy to tell the difference, just look at what sort of critter they kept on the end of the leash.

All of this seemed to occur in a matter of minutes on Friday. We were sitting in the morning sun sipping our coffee and between one cup and the next we had become surrounded. Twin boys bound and determined to inflict severe injuries on each other by any means available on our left and four ankle biting, yipping things that were more akin to rats on a bad hair day on our right. Any movement by the boys or us brought on such a racket that I now know the true meaning to cacophony.

So, rather than watching the ritual of hooking up the black tank or the follow-on banging of the head on the slide we spent our time warding off the tossed rocks, balls, sticks and occasional brother into our site all while trying to talk over the barking of the pack. It got to be a routine; hear the trailer door expect high pitched voices threatening death and destruction. Move around, open a window or touch our door and expect the hounds of hell to alert the world. Fortunately all will end shortly as we'll be heading out after the weekend to go to our very first RV rally.

Our destination? Newport, Oregon for the Lewis & Clark Thousand Trails chapter of the FMCA rally. From description of the group it is a friendly collection of folks who enjoy the northwest, are members of Thousand Trails and also the Family Motor Coach Association. Since Newport is one of our favorite towns, it is sure to be a win win situation.

Have to hurry to leave the park, looking back in the rear view mirror I see the twins have discovered long pointy sticks and are preparing to joust in the road...