Vacation is over and it's back to the real world, although it is a very different world for me. I didn't know what to do with myself yesterday as it was my first regular day at home without having something to do for seminary. I have to say, it felt pretty darn good.

The trip was good. We spent a week camping with my parents in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, Tennessee. The most interesting part of the trip was Thursday night when, at 2 a.m., the wind starting blowing and steadily growing. We hopped out of bed as the tent started shaking and I opened the door. I grabbed onto the side of the tent to steady it but the wind gust continued to swell. About that time, my mom poked her head out of the RV and yelled something which I couldn't hear over the wind and my dad quickly followed her out to try and fold up the canopy on the side of the motor home.

It wasn't over yet as the wind continued to strengthen and I yelled for Karen to open all the windows and the door at the other end of the tent. I quickly opened everything at my end to let the wind go through and then grabbed the tent again to keep it from blowing away. Since we had largely sworn off media of all types for the week, we were caught off guard with this storm. Neighbors began coming out of their RVs to help my dad and mom work on their canopy which was whipping violently in the wind. I expected to see it rip down the middle at any moment. By this time I yelled for Karen to get Jacob into the RV and I held onto the tent for dear life. As the lightening flashed, I watched the skies to see if there was a funnel cloud coming our way. I just knew we were about to be swallowed up by something big and bad...the wind was fierce.

When a couple of people were free from helping mom and dad, I was able to let go of the tent long enough to grab the backup support lines and get them into the ground just as the terential rain began falling and the 50 plus mile an hour wind began to die down. I quickly zipped everything up (well, almost everything! I forgot one window) and got into the RV where we rode out the rest of the storm. Praise God everything went ok. Here is a picture of our camp before the storm...


and here is camp after...


Fortunately, not too much difference which is amazing given the ferocity of the wind. The only casualty was the blue screen porch. The poles were mangled and the screen was shreaded. People around the camp were amazed to see our tent still standing...only stretched a little. It passed the wind test, but it failed the rain test. The rainfall was so heavy and sustained that it saturated the tent causing it to leak in places. The inside was pretty wet. However, that was the only rain we had for the entire week, so everything dried out pretty quickly.

I took plenty of pictures, so if I get a chance I may post some of them on a photo blog for anyone interested. It´s always sad to see the end of vacation come, but in some ways, it is good to be home.

Labels: David C. Price