March 2014 in West Virginia

March 27 - 30, 2014:

I haven't seen my West Virginia crew in several months.  The weather forecast looked favorable, so Judy and I decided to take our new 5th wheel camper there for a "shake down" trip.  It was still winterized, so no water use, but the heat will work just fine.  We'll use Matt's house for all the water needs.

Matt and Jaime live on a beautiful 18 acre hill top lot.  We set up the camper on the side lawn.  When we arrived Thursday afternoon, the temperature was a mild (for us) 60 degrees.

The trip from Gouverneur to Matt's is a long drive, about 560 miles and 10 hours.  The new camper traveled flawlessly and the trip down was smooth and uneventful.  Most of the trip is on Interstate highways.  We took both of our dogs, Judy's Zoey and my Zoey.  Judy's is a high energy Alaskan Malamute, while my Zoey is a low key Golden Retriever.

The grandchildren were a hoot.  Chasen recently turned 5 and Kaylin is coming up on her 3rd birthday.  We played hide and seek, catch, and took long walks with the dogs.  The weather was fabulous.  We have had a long, old fashion winter at home, so the green grass and 65 degree temperatures were a treat.

Sunday morning we awoke to reality!!!

Over night  two inches of snow had accumulated on top of rain soaked clay soil.  Try as we might, we could not hitch the truck to the camper.  The soil was too slippery, causing the truck to nearly slide into the camper.  An even if we hooked, I'm not sure I could have controlled the truck well enough to back off the yard.  Judy had t work Monday, so we had no choice but to leave the camper there.  Oh well, that just means we will have to make a return trip in a few weeks and pick up the camper.  The silver lining is that we get to visit the kids again.  :-)