Finishing Strong in North Dakota

June 22nd, the first work day of our third week in camp, was a busy one. The plan was to finish the south gable side of the house on Monday. While Team Martin works that location I am disassembling the scaffolding on the north side of the house and returning it to the flatbed trailer. After the scaffold is broken down and stored I began removing the lower deck boards on the west side so we can complete the northwest corner.

This is where we worked on Thursday and almost completed this side of the east wall.

Here's an aerial view with my drone of the east exposure with its new face lift at the beginning of the final week of camp.

The Martin Team working on the south side gable wall.

We saved the most difficult side, the west side, of the house for the end. This where the air conditioners and their associated plumbing, wifi and split level rear deck is located. To start the mounting rail for the first course of vinyl siding, it appeared to require removing the deckboards where they attached to the house near the foundation. Well, fortunately Ricky did some research on the internet and found a work around that was much easier.

The trick on this side of the house was keeping all the rows level and lined up at the corners.

Wednesday afternoon the vinyl siding was completed with half a day to spare. We loaded up all the scaffolding assembly on the rental trailer for return and cleaned up around the job site. On Thursday Ricky and Bill spent the morning in the maintenance shop tuning up the camp's chain saws and I learned how to operate the camp's front load tractor. I used it to do some road regrading behind the RV area and eliminated some drainage low spots from the heavy rain.

Chef Adam and his "bevy of RVICS beauties" in the camp kitchen!

Three wonderful and productive weeks at Cooperstown Bible Camp were wrapped up on Thursday, June 25th. Our RVICS team was awesome and we loved working with this crew. Karen and I are so thankful for the great support this team provided during the entire project and would do it again anytime!

As usual, Thursday afternoon we started the process of packing up for our scheduled departure on Friday morning. First to depart were Bill and Sandy Martin on Thursday after lunch. They're on the way to Billings, Montana to do another project with Ricky and Tresa Martin who planned on leaving Monday. Christina Beckwith, bless her heart, is sticking around CBC until August 3rd to help Adam out in the kitchen through the summer.

Friday morning after breakfast we said our good-byes to the staff and drove out the gravel road back to the main highway en route to the Alexandria Shooting Park and RV Campground in Alexandria, MN. Their expansive 162-acre property offers a range of shooting activities and a 146 campground facility.

The clay shooting range is on the other side of the RV. According to the office they had just completed the Minnesota high school state shooting championships attended by about 2000 the weekend prior to our arrival.

When we arrived, I considered doing some clay shooting but opted to pass this time around. You would think that a shooting range would be noisy; but even with shooters, it's close proximity to the highway and train track it was remarkably quiet.

We departed Alexandria on Saturday morning for Rice Creek Campground in Centerville just outside of Minneapolis/St.Paul. Before arriving in camp we stopped to resupply at Costco. Our campsite was a large back-in site near to the horseshoe pits. We would be here for two nights to pick up a special package.

Sunday we attended Calvary Chapel Twin Cities with George and Donna Snow followed with lunch at Covenant Living, their independent living facility before driving to the MSP airport to pick up Silas Schneider.

Silas is the son of our good friends Richard and Portia Scheider; we traveled with their family to Turkey back in October last year. They are like family to us and the kids like grandkids. Since Silas was turning 13 we offered to have him join us for a couple of weeks during the summer months on the road. So his parents put him on a plane from California and sent him out to Minneapolis to spent time exploring the Great Lakes region of the country with "Grandpa John and Mimi".

Our first stop was the Mall of America to see it and get Silas something to eat and buy Grandpa some new Skechers.

Mall of America has a gross leasable area (GLA) of 5,600,000 square feet or 129 acres, and 2,869,000 square feet of retail space.

The mall is located across the Interstate from the Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport. It opened in August 1992 on the former site of the Metropolitan Stadium; it's the largest mall in the United States, the largest in the Western Hemisphere, and the 12th largest shopping mall in the world.

More than 520 stores are arranged along three levels of pedestrian walkways on the sides of the rectangle, with a fourth level on the south and east sides. Four anchor department stores are located at the corners. Many have described Mall of America as a "city within a city." Despite Minnesota's cold winters, only the mall's entrances and some below ground areas are heated. Heat is allowed in through skylights above the central amusement park area. The majority of the heat is produced by lighting fixtures, other electric devices and people in the mall.

With Silas a part of our travels, it is now time to head into Wisconsin and eventually the Upper Peninsula of Michegan, the UP.