Category: dave

Memorial Weekend Camping – Day 2

On By stefrobrtsIn airstream, barclay, dave, navi2 Comments

The next morning we all had a great breakfast together (I brought fresh eggs from our chickens) and afterwards someone had the brilliant idea to bring out a puzzle – which quickly became a community effort! I wasn’t too keen on puzzles, but I found a piece and then it was addictive, I had to hang around and find a few more.

The dogs spent most of the time with us on leash, but occasionally they had to hang out in the yard while we were at meals.

I distracted them by giving them chewies to work on while we were having meals.

After lunch Dave got into a card game.

Eventually the dogs got so comfortable in their yard they started wrestling and playing – it was nice they had enough room to run around a little bit off leash!

Our van, along with several other large tow vehicles, were recruited as ‘wind breaks’ to help shelter the gathering area from the chill winds that were blowing through pretty much all weekend. That actually worked pretty well, and when someone had to move a truck to drive into town, we really missed it!

This was Navi’s first camping trip, and she did great. We gave her dramamine before leaving, but she still threw up on the trip down. She was a bit nervous about all the attention, even though Barclay was setting a great example of how to schmooze people for treats and lovin’, so she went with a ‘bark first, ask questions later’ policy. She did pretty good though, she just needs to get out more. For the trip home we gave her extra dramamine, and she still threw up. Poor pup! But she was such a good sport about the whole thing.


Soon, another great long weekend in our Airstream was over. Everything in the trailer worked fine. It’s so nice that the trailer has finally gotten most of the bugs worked out. Once we got home it gave us a little trouble emptying the black tank, and the last night there we ran out of battery power, but all in all, it did really good, and like always, it was a comfortable place to call home base.

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Memorial Weekend Camping – Day 1

On By stefrobrtsIn airstream, barclay, dave, navi3 Comments

We arrived in beautiful Trout Lake, WA, at the foot of Mt..hey, where’s the mountain?

This is our annual Memorial Weekend trip to meet our Airstream friends. This time we had about 10 trailers, which is a smaller party than usual. A lot of people had to cancel at the last minute. 

Many of the regulars were there as usual, and brought instruments, because it just isn’t a party until the music starts up.

We got our little trailer setup, along with the new ‘dog yard’! This really worked brilliantly. The dogs enjoyed having space to hang out and watch the goings-on.

When we were just hanging out in the trailer, it made the trailer seem bigger because the dogs could be outside enjoying the sunshine.

The weather was kind of crazy. Storms kept blowing through, and it was one of the coldest visits we’ve had there! It’s been a late spring all over in the NW, and this place felt like it could have snowed at any time!

Dave wanted to snap a picture of me and Barclay in front of the mountain. I tried to smile, I don’t know why it looks like a grimace!

We spent downtime hanging out in the trailer until the storms passed.

When the sun came back out we took the dogs for a walk to see the stream where it crossed the main road. It was really high and roaring!

We got a glimpse of the mountain at last.

 

We cooked potato-dish for the potluck and then hung around the campfire, catching up with friends.

Even though it was cold, the mountain rewarded us with a pretty show at sunset.

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Lap dance

On By stefrobrtsIn dave, mighty, navi6 Comments

There, that title should get some hits 😉

Dave came in from mowing and sat down in the office, and immediately Mighty took up residence on his leg. Soon Navi jumped up in his lap, even though lap capacity is really only 1 max!

But that was ok, she just sat ON the cat!
 So they re-arranged a bit (Dave looks thrilled)…
 Hang on, we’ve almost got it…
 Purrfect!
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Enchanted April

On By stefrobrtsIn dave, theater1 Comment

I went to the theater today to take pictures of the play they are working on – Enchanted April. It’s a very sweet little play about a couple ladies who run away for a vacation to Italy to get away from their dreary lives and husbands, and end up finding their way back to them.

Most of the people in the play are our friends or at least people we’ve worked with before. My hubby was in charge of the set building. The first act is pretty simple, and black curtains on the back wall hide the second act set – an Italian courtyard with columns, pergolas, flowers, and a lovely mural one of our talented artists painted. Dave and I spent a lot of time (ok, mostly Dave, but I helped a few days) getting those columns mounted securely. It’s nice to see it all done and being used.

I took pictures with my camera, but I’m still figuring it out, and I had some problems getting the exposure and color balance right. So I gave Dave my old camera to use and he took pictures at the same time. We ended up snapping about 1000 pictures between the two of us and whittled it down to under 200, and of those he only used about a dozen for the promo materials. Thank goodness for digital!

Dave has an upcoming play where he needed to have red hair, so he went ahead and had it colored – talk about a change! I should do a blog post of the ‘many faces of Dave’, he’s always changing his looks for whatever play he’s in!

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Camera lens #3

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, dave, navi, pets2 Comments

My ‘new’ Nikon D50 camera came with three lenses. The first is a Nikkor 28-80mm F3.3-5.6 which is the basic kit lens, so it’s the one I played with first. The second one is a Tamron 18-200mm zoom lens, which I have been playing with the last couple weeks – seems like that is the lens I’ll be using most of the time. The third lens is one the previous owner bought as a spare when he left his kit lens home on a trip, and so it is quite similar to the first lens, it is a Nikon 18-55mm F3.5-5.6. So it covers a range that could be described as wide angle, to not-quite-as-telephoto as the other lenses. For that reason I hadn’t been dying to play with it. I’m not even sure I’ll keep it, but I popped it on the camera to take a few shots today.

Dave in the office working (with a cat on the printer)

It’s hard NOT to be cheerful with these smilin’ dogs in the house!
The locust trees are always the last to get their leaves back.
This is the view north over the neighbor’s dilapidated barn.
And this was one of those lovely sunsets where the sun is behind the clouds and they light up with a brilliant outline of the light behind them. Clearly I need to figure out how to adjust my exposure on this camera – not only is the detail lost in the clouds, but in the picture of the barn above it the sky is all washed out. I was spoiled by my old camera having automatic exposure bracketing. I just need to figure out how to do it manually on this one.
So my conclusion about this lens was what I was expecting. It kind of covers a range I already have covered just fine with the other two. 
Another thing I have to get used to with the new camera is that it doesn’t have a live view on the viewscreen – you have to look through the optical viewfinder. That makes it tricker to aim when you’re doing stuff close to the ground. I not only was spoiled by the view screen on my old camera, but it flipped out and rotated around so you could get shots from all sorts of interesting angles. But the quality of the pictures the new camera takes are far superior, so it’s worth the trouble to learn to just deal with the new camera!
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There’s a disturbance in the force

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, dave, jack, mouse, navi, pets5 Comments
There’s something going on at our house…

Don’t blink, or you’ll miss it!

Something viciously attacked the water dish!
The cats are worried…
Barclay and Jack were peacefully enjoying a rawhide, when suddenly
Attack! What could this monster be?!
Introducing..Navi!
Yup, we succumbed to the charms of the 5 month old eskie that needed a home.
She has been a constant blur of activity for the last six or so hours.
Wish me luck for a good night’s sleep!

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Trout Lake 2010 – pt 2

On By stefrobrtsIn airstream, barclay, dave2 Comments
 On the third day we woke up to a beautiful morning

We jumped in the van and went for a drive through the pine forests to a nearby town called Glenwood. We stopped at the Conboy Wildlife Refuge.

Yup, more pine trees.
Wide open marshlands for the birds. Though we didn’t really see any.
Our walk around the park pooped the puppy
But he perked back up in time for lunch..
After not seeing any birds at the refuge, we saw plenty of them while we were parked eating lunch.
And wildlife. Well, almost…
And a pretty view of the countryside
We got back to camp just in time to watch the races – dogs vs people!
A weekend in the Airstream is always a great weekend!

Trout Lake 2010

On By stefrobrtsIn airstream, barclay, dave2 Comments

Every year our camping friends get together for an early summer campout at Trout Lake, WA. We pack up our wee little Airstream trailer and join in when we can. This year it was on the ‘must do’ list!

This isn’t half the trailers – just the ones on our end of the campground.

For me, the primary thing I love about this campground is the spectacular view of Mt Adams just a few miles away.

Of course the opportunity to hang around and catch up with old friends and make new ones is pretty cool too.

Barclay managed to find his way into the center of the circle most of the time and did his best to schmooze lovin’ and treats off the other campers.

 Dave and sleepy Barclay at afternoon nap time for doggies

Dave and Barclay
Dave insisted on getting a picture of me and Barclay!
Closeup of Mt Adams
So pretty and rugged!
We had an expert ‘smores’ cook serving everyone around the fire
And then a jam session broke out
And I just sat staring into the warm fire and enjoying the music
Until it was time to go to bed!

Trip to the beach

On By stefrobrtsIn airstream, dave, travel5 Comments

Dave and I haven’t had a chance to get away for a long time, so today we took a fun day-trip to the beach. We started by heading North to Longview and crossing the Columbia there to get back on the Oregon side. Heading North to get to Oregon seems wrong, but it works.

Paper mill and container ship on the Columbia at Longview, WA.

We headed down to Fort Stevens on an exploratory visit to prepare for an Airstream Trailer rally we are organizing in March. After checking out the park we went to see the Peter Iredale shipwreck,

As you can see we were quite a ways back from it, the water was coming in.

Immediately after getting this picture we were looking at the camera screen going ‘hey, we got it, nice shot’, when we realized the wave was still coming up the beach! We turned and ran as fast as we could, laughing the whole way, all the way to the dunes! 
 
I looked back and snapped this picture, look how much deeper the water is around the ship, and the HUGE logs the wave pulled down across the sand.
We headed North to Longbeach and stopped to visit the boardwalk and watch the far off waves cresting and throwing spray high into the air.
 
 
 
Near the parking lot they had this wonderful relief map of the NW, showing all our favorite mountains. 
 
I got down low so it looked just like flying up the Columbia river towards home…
 
OMG!! What’s that hideous monster?!!
 
We were taking the back way out of Ilwaco and ran across this neat little vacation spot.
 
 
 There was one Airstream mixed in there, mostly Spartans, a Silver Streak, and a couple I couldn’t name. Neat find! I love old Spartans!
 
That was a really fun day, wandering up and down the coast with my wonderful hubby!