On the Road Again (kinda)

In anticipation of our next trip with Scoopy, we began gathering all the things we wanted to bring with us. We placed each item in a designated area in the dining room.  Some things we had been saving for years because we knew we wanted to have them in our rig – beautiful new linens, a few kitchen items, some dishes, a cappuccino machine, a couple of small tables. It wasn’t long before the dining room was chock-a-block with stuff.

Since we were leaving Ace Yukon with Zac and driving to our storage facility in D.B. (Steven’s VW Bug) transport space was somewhat limited. Still, we managed to cram it all in there, and just before noon on Friday, we headed to Puyallup to liberate Scoopy from her storage spot.

Our first task before we even got there was to scope out our exit strategy. We can only take a right hand turn onto the street from the storage facility, but we needed to go left. That required us to find a large turnaround spot where we could get ourselves headed in the right direction. As luck would have it, a couple of blocks away, we found a huge commercial truck station that provided exactly what we were looking for.

With our minds at ease, we finally reunited with Scoopy. Our hearts dropped when we saw that the storage spot behind her was now occupied. That means we’ll have to try to back her in upon our return. Oh well.

Scoopy looked exactly as we left her, all snug in her skinny storage lane. We fired her up and alarms of all kind began to shriek. The fridge was not happy. The carbon monoxide alarm was not happy. It would have been normal for us to freak out, but instead we just methodically went through all the tasks we needed to do in order to get everything under control. Eventually, everything calmed down and we unloaded D.B. and secured all the new stuff we had brought along.

I had intended to bring a piece of chalk so that I could mark the exact position of each tire, but I forgot. I wracked my brain to find an alternative, asking myself, “What would McGuyver do?”  I rooted around until I spied a solution – a tin of Altoids. Problem solved.

Steven carefully guided me out and soon we were on our way to Blue Sky Campground in Preston, WA. It was good to be back in Scoopy, and I felt very at ease guiding her down the road.

When we made our reservations at Blue Sky, we asked for site #22. We were flexible on the site number if our choice wasn’t available, but we were adamant that whichever site we were assigned be a pull-thru. Suffice it to say that the office lady is generally not a happy camper, and no matter how many times we called to inquire, she would not confirm our requests. As our arrival time grew nearer, Steven called and told her that if we don’t have a pull-thru we won’t stay, so she did finally confirm that we had one. She would not tell him which one. She simply told us our reservations would be pinned to the check-in board. When we arrived, our reservations were nowhere to be found, naturally.

This was not the first time camp lady had messed with our reservation – on our last trip here she had the dates wrong and ended up cancelling us. It was just pure luck that space was available when we arrived on our maiden voyage. This time, I had had enough!  I was hoppin’ mad and fully prepared to go off on her. Then she said, “You’re in site #22.”

Oh.

YAY! We love camp lady! We were thrilled to be in our beloved #22, a wide pull-thru with great mountain views. But of course, nothing is that easy.  Amirite?

As we pulled into #22 and began the delicate maneuvers to get Scoopy perfectly situated, camp lawnmower guy decided he urgently needed to tend the 3’ x 50’ strip of grass that separated #22 from #23. He came roaring through with his extremely loud mower and thus ended our ability to communicate with each other during our set-up process. As Steven worked on hooking up water and power, the guy just kept pushing that mower closer and closer to him. It was just obnoxious.  We didn’t say anything because how long can it take to cover such an itty bitty strip of grass? Well, he was very, very thorough.

I don’t think we’ll tolerate that if there is a next time, but still, for our current situation with Scoopy in Puyallup and the kids at home, Blue Sky is necessarily the perfect spot for our weekend jaunts. I think it behooves us to be tolerant, particularly when we get #22.

Our inability to communicate really became a problem when our 30 amp power kept popping off. I’d holler out the window to Steven, and he’d reset it. Over and over, each time I turned on the hot water heater, the power would turn off. We put everything we could on LP, and it still blew. We could not figure it out.

Finally, Steven said out loud what we had both feared. We would need to move to another site. Nooooooo!!! He called camp lady and she told him to go get camp dude to come take a look. He was following camp lawn guy around on a golf cart collecting grass clippings, so he was pretty easy to locate. He came over and Steven pointed out the issue. He thought for about a nano-second and said, “Well, why don’t you just connect to this 50 amp plug right over here?”

D’oh!

YAY! We love camp dude!

I freaked out a little when I realized we did not bring my set-up checklist along. I eventually got it all done, but certainly not in the correct order according to my checklist.

We are now settled and ready to enjoy our evening. I think it’s time for a cappuccino.

UP NEXT: On the road again, part deux.

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