What a week - catching up

This has been a busy "vacation" I will try and catch up with a day by day, blow by blow account in this LONG post.

Monday August 25

Laundry day, $10 for 2 loads at the campground. Yep expensive but convenient. After that chore we headed to Winooski to a bike shop and to check our a canoe/kayak launch by the Millyard. The bike shop didn't exist but the launch site did. Steep downhill carry but they had built a slide to allow you to get a kayak/canoe down/up.

Since the bike shop had closed we went to Burlington to get a new tire and spare tube for Suzette's bike. After I installed the new tire we rode down the bike path to Burlington's watefront. Looked in on Friendship but they did not have customers for the noon sail so no one was there. We headed on over to where the Lois McClure had been tied up but she had sailed for Basin Harbor which is the home base for LCMM.

On our ride back to the campground we got a call from Ann that we were to meet them at the fair at 5:00. We left early so we could look for our friend Bruno who work camps there. We managed to find him but used up to much time so we only had about a half hour visit before meeting up with Wally and Ann.

We did the fair food thing, bloom'n onion to get the cholesterol up, then walk to the Ox pulls, walk back to the exhibit area and look before the next course. Sausage w/krut Suzette had a cheeseburger. More walking and looking at exhibits. Time for desert so we head to the maple sugar house/exhibit and get maple frosted doughnuts. Just finished with them and my cell rang. Damn what could that be? Oh it's Fran, our realator, with an verbal offer. Humm that' interesting.

Walked, talked, looked and were ready to head to the car when we came by another Al's. So I just had to have a pint of fries. Hummmm good.

Said our good by's and set the meeting time and place for Tuesday's activities. Now to see what the offer does to our spreadsheet.

Tuesday August 26'th

Called Fran back with our counter offer. Called our Vermont realator(s) to see if we could arrange another showing of properties on Wed. With that set we went to meet Wally and Ann for our bike ride on the fill section of the bike path. We had a nice ride but it was cool and the wind was blowing a bit.

From Biking and Kayaking The Winooski

Back to camp to have lunch and get ready for the next adventure a nice little kayak float down the Winooski. We loaded the 4 kayaks in the truck and headed for McCrea Farm put in and a 3 mile down river float. Damn wind. Once we reached the RT127 bridge it did get windy and choppy. A hard paddle for about a mile, ugly ugly. We were all glad to reach the fishing access take out.

After we returned to camp we started cooking the chili mac in the dutch oven. What no chili mix. Wally went to the store and returned with 2 packets, one is a spare, a six pack of Long Trail and a bag of roasted unshelled peanuts.

When Donna and Jerry arrived we set out to consume the pot of chili and the corn bread we had baked on the grill. After dinner we visited for a while giving Jerry his B'day card and a very used $10 bill so he could by his Interagency Senior Life Time Pass. Wally and Ann left, Jerry and Donna stayed a while longer and visited.

Wednesday August 27'th

After breakfast we went over our Florida plans in light of the pending sale of our Virginia house. I resubmitted my Florida State Parks volunteer application. We received a call to meet Don our realator in Jeff about 1100. We had to stop by Wally and Ann's to pick up some forms that we had had overnighted to us at their address. Short visit and off to Jeffersonville to meet with Don. We went with Don and his father to look at another piece of land. Didn't like it, to verticle. Lunch at Jana's before meeting Diane at the LaBarron property.

Mount Mansfield is in the background

We met the Diane, the selling Realtor, as well as the land owner. We spend about an hour looking things over, finding the lot pins, discussing the covenants and related details. The proposed house site does not afford a view of Mansfield so we want to see if we can move the site.

That burned off most of the afternoon. We made plans to meet with Don on Thursday for breakfast and get the paperwork started.

I needed to be at LCYC by 1700 to sail on K2 so we went back to the camper and downloaded the pictures we had taken earlier in the day of the old hood in Essex.

We had a good sail with what little wind there was.

Thursday August 28'th

Met with Don at JP's in Essex for breakfast and to get the contract offer going. A lot of signing, dating, and initialing. After breakfast and the discussion on buying the property we made our way to Underhill Center to meet with James and Jerry O. who will be our general contractor on the new house. We discussed a lot of items, heating, A/C, ICF, siding and roof choices to name a few. Since we were most of the way to Jeff. we decided to visit the Union Bank and talk about a building loan and other accounts. We had a very productive meeting with Susan Lassiter VP/Branch Manager. Next we called Peterson & Ruple and made an appointment to meet on our way back to Essex. Another good discussion so we decided to use them to represent us and signed a POA so Lori or Barry could sign for us.

Back at camp we started putting things together so we had less to do on Friday morning before we left for Moose River. Off to Wally and Ann's for dinner and talk.