04/29 – 05/02/2010 Lake Wappapello State Park, Missouri. I left Pennsylvania early after work, about 8 pm, and it took me about 13 hours…not the 11 hours that both my “trip-tic” and my GPS had said it would take. But when you throw in rush hour traffic along with a couple of accidents 13 hours didn’t seem so bad. When I got to camp it was dark and windy which made setting up my tent a bit of a trial. Instead of rigging a central line for the tarp to hang on I draped it over the tent, “nailed it down”, set up my bedding and got my clothes in the tent. The winds were buffeting the tent to the point where the walls looked like they would break the support poles and the tent would collapse…they didn’t. So, with the violent flapping of the rain fly waking me from my slumber now and then, I got through Thursday night.

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This past weekend brought about two feet of snow, major amounts of shoveling, sore muscles and hazardous road conditions. I was decided to stay inside due to Pennsylvania declaring a state of emergency and people being asked to stay off of the roads. So, I worked on the site, as well as other projects, trying to work out the tabling/ordering of the recreation links…sounds like all boring stuff. It is, even if you do this for a living…I don’t. It can be part of the job I do every day but it’s a once in a while thing.

As well as the site work I’ve been checking out state park camping schedules. The campgrounds in PA. state parks open around the second half of May. So, that means I can do a lot of day hikes until then or grab a private campground site and go from there. It’s still up in the air.

I have my vacation set for the last week of April, early May. I’ll be going to Trail of Tears State Park in South Eastern Missouri. I checked it out last year with my friends from the area and I’m just waiting to book my camp site reservations. I can only book a maximum of two months in advance. I’m also looking at places in Virginia, Maryland, Michigan and West Virginia, but most of my trips will be in PA., hopefully I’ll get the chance to check out a few places in the northeastern corner of the state as well as the PA. Grand Canyon.

Well, I’ve done enough gabbing for now I had better get back to work…I hear there could be more snow coming.