Home Sweet Home !??>

Can you believe we followed a MASSIVE thunder and WIND storm from Kentucky and the peak of destruction appears to have been our neighborhood, more specifically, our house!

We arrived home at 2am on June 30, after a harrowing drive weaving through downed trees and power lines -- Brandt drove through it ALL  and was a champ!  He even managed to find the ONLY gas station with power for 150 miles when we had only 11 DTE (distance to EMPTY) on our gas gauge -- we were prepared to sleep in the car…

Naturally, the house was dark.  Thirty minutes later, Frank pronounced it safe for us to enter (7 BIG trees down, but none hit the house!)

We will likely not have power for the rest of the week at least, but we don't mind another week of "camping" in our basement to stay cool.

It has been a blessed adventure!

Courtney's pick: Gateway to the… East?

Courtney's pick - Gateway Arch

 Day 22 & 23

16 hours driving (most of it in Kansas) led us to our last stop – St. Louis.  While this city is known as the Gateway to the West, commemorated by the famed Arch, it served as our Gateway to the East.  We were grateful that we had a minivan and air-conditioned RV to tour the West, and not a keelboat or covered wagon like Lewis & Clark and their followers. 

View from the top: Busch Stadium

We rode in a slightly-claustrophobic pod to the top for a great view of the city and Mississippi River.   An experience Nancy missed on her previous visit to the Arch in 1987 with college-roommate, Roslyn (who knew you could go IN it?!).

Next stop: 2629 Kimbrough Circle. J

Fly Fishing, Moose & Pie in the Eye (wow!)

Pie in the Eye for Frank!

Day 21

Frank's first catch & release
Frank and Casey went fly-fishing this morning and Frank is officially “hooked.”  After a lifetime of preferring sit-ups to fishing, he finally experienced the thrill and serenity of casting into a mountain stream, finding that perfect ripple in the water, and the catch/release of a Rocky Mountain Rainbow Trout.

Pickles hiking

In the afternoon, we all went on a hike at Grand Lake in search of the elusive bull moose.  We didn’t see one, but it was a fanstastic hike, complete with waterfall and open meadow (Frank was wishing he had his fishing gear!). 

At 6:30pm, we made our way over to Young Life’s Crooked Creek Camp where we were guests for the evening.  Wow!  It is 9 years old and absolutely gorgeous.  We had a delicious dinner (Carter & Brandt ate 9 bowls of banana pudding!) and got to participate in the “county fair” night – complete with a “pie in the eye” treatment for Frank and a water soaking for Casey compliments of our kids.

We stuck around for the “opera” evening entertainment.  Duke and Luke saved the camp from the gravel baron, J.R. “The Big Rig” Riggins. The highlight was the lip-sync number “Money, Money, Money.” Mr. Steve, the camp speaker, was Steve Chesney, who had been the speaker at Windy Gap in 1983 when Nancy was a Honda wrangler on the work crew.  Somehow, I seem to have caught up to him in age – how is that?!

We LOVE Young Life!