2013 Campground hosting : Second weekend in August

Here are a couple of observations we made this week while doing our work:
Child riding bicycle with life jacket on but no helmet on? Child driving RV around the campground in his father's lap? We continue to be amazed at what some folks think is a good thing!

This week, we had a chance to go into Leavenworth for coffee. The flowers are so pretty-I took many shots.

Corner of Rt 2 and 9th Street

Three friends near the center of town

Stump decorations

Sonny is in the red shirt ahead of me

Rock garden

Flowers to look at while waiting for the crossing light

Private garden with water feature near our parking spot

Rose garden on a Leavenworth side street.

Heading back to Lake Wenatchee over Beaver Mountain on the
Chumstick Highway coming into Plain. Last summer, we went to a
Civil War encampment in this field.

Old homestead in Plain, WA. Many years ago, when the 18th Ave SW neighborhood children were youngsters, our three families rented the old farmhouse in Plain for a weekend of fun. We took the children to Lake Wenatchee State Park where the wind nearly blew us away playing in the water with the big blow up toy that Costco was selling at the time! Whatever happened to that thing?

Newer Plain homestead

I think it's rag weed in the tavern parking lot. On Thursday, we went to the
Headwaters Tavern to meet up with the North Side camp hosts,
Bill and Jude. They are from Tri Cities and are full time RVers.
We shared stories and enjoyed pizza.

Friday night, the sunset was so pretty. The colors changed every minute. I had to take several shots.

Many campers were down at the beach enjoying the view.

Sonny and I don't go far without the litter bucket and "picker upper". Fire pits always have trash in them.

Picnic group in the trees near the beach.

A couple taking in the sunset.. Dirty Face is the mountain to the right and the Wenatchee Range is in the middle.

South side picnic shelter near the beach. The sky was totally pink but it's hard to see that in this shot.

Last night, there was quite a storm over us. Lots of thunder, lightning and finally, a hard rain that made rivulets down the hills to the parking lot. This is the lake at 7:30 am after the storms while we were doing litter patrol. What a blessing to be able to look at this changing scenery every day! Missing my kayak.

This is near the boat launch on the Wenatchee River looking to Dirty Face Mountain around 8:30 AM today. The Park staff were busy at 6 AM monitoring the fishermen launching their boats. It's quite a task to line up
your boat for the launch while up to 10 others are impatiently waiting in line. We heard that someone got so frustrated waiting for the guy in front of him make many tries that he jumped out, opened the truck door and told the driver to get out! He would back the trailer down the ramp himself! Testy group.

The beach a few minutes later as we were walking back to get our Reservation assignments.

Saturdays have a short list of campsite turnarounds so after our job was done, we went off to Costco in Wenatchee. Along the way, we were passed by an old brown Ford Pinto. Many years ago, in the 70s and 80s, I owned 4 Pintos. Sonny and I drove across country on our honeymoon in a 1974 Pinto with no air conditioning in late July's 90* weather. We planned to drive it till it stopped and then fly the rest of the way. That old Pinto made it all the way with only having to have a new muffler in New York state and a quart of oil. I drove it another year after we put in a new engine. There were several more bodies and engine swaps till I bought a Mazda pick up truck in 1984. "Memories"

There is a large fire (80K acres) burning SE of Wenatchee. We could see the plume as we drove along Rt 2.

Closer to Wenatchee and the plume is getting bigger with the wind blowing to the North. It looks like Mt St Helens from Seattle in 1980.

Crossing the Columbia, the plumes look like several fires.

Sonny makes a new friend at Costco

The forest fire looks like it's right behind Costco and though several miles away, we had ash in the Jeep.

On the way back to camp, we stopped at Prey's Fruit Stand to get peaches,
apples, plums and honey. More pretty flowers there, too.

Back at camp, I found my usual spot on the beach to sit in the shade in the
late afternoon. I got warm enough to get into the lake for a quick dip in the cold water which was
refreshing but took 15 minutes to convince myself to get wet. The clouds to the East were building up.

Looking down the lake from my spot, the storm clouds were brewing.

Then, to the West, clouds began to cover the sun. The temp dropped
pretty quickly, probably to 85* from 90s but it dropped!

It was spooky. There are rainbows up near the crest of the clouds.

It never rained but sure looked like it would.

The wind came up to 20 mph so I decided to pick up and go back to get
ready for rain.

Still no rain at 6 PM but the Ranger told us tonight that .25" was
expected tonight with more thunder and lightning. So glad
we aren't camping in the tent trailer!

Baile Glas Dance Troupe from Seattle come to Lake Wenatchee to perform on the Saturday night stage. Girls in green are beginners while the girls in blue have more years of training, Baile Glas means "Emerald City". Their teacher, Margaret, and I are old acquaintances from my days as building manager of the Crown Hill Center where I worked for 30 years.