Georgia Visits

September 3 - 6, 2009

Georgia and her friend, Larry Gruber (no relation to Franz Gruber as we talked about that), arrived Thursday evening about 4:30 p.m. They had arrived in Fargo late morning, rented a car and made a few sales calls at North Dakota State University at Fargo and Valley City State at Valley City. Georgia was a bit up tight because some important university customers were putting last-minute holiday weekend pressure on her. Within 24 hours, however, that was all worked out and Georgia could get on with the business of enjoying her weekend.

Larry, almost 40 years of age, was on his first camping trip. He brought along his sleeping bag that he had as a cub scout about 30 years earlier. Georgia was about to coach Larry that camping was really fun. At first I didn’t understand how that could be possible, but subsequent events throughout the weekend proved me wrong. Larry said he had a wonderful time and that he would like to go camping again.

“My expectations about North Dakota (which weren’t much) were totally blown away,” Larry said.

After visiting downtown Fargo, including the prairie art museum, and seeing the scenery of the Sheyenne River Valley, Larry owned up to what the area has to offer. He is from Cleveland and now lives in a Chicago high rise. He slept all three nights in Georgia Kelty tent without complaint.

Georgia and Larry had to go back to Fargo e ton Friday to meet with the Athletic Director of NDSU. While there, they went shopping at a local grocery -- Sunmart -- and brought back enough food for a super feast. Friday evening we had tacos and taco salad, followed by a movie, and Saturday we had spinach salad, chicken kabobs and corn on the cob, followed by a camp fire. We managed to get in a lot of visiting as well. The weather was fabulous.

On Saturday, Georgia and Larry rented a double-seater kayak to enjoy the Sheyenne River. The park staff gave them transport to a launching place upstream and they paddled three and a half hours back to the visitor center. In the afternoon they hiked some of the 16 miles of trails which have been been built in the park.

In order to be on time for the plane out of Fargo, Georgia and Larry left the park about 10:30 a.m. Lois went to work earlier and I got busy on the bench project after they left. We all had a wonderful weekend and enjoyed the visiting and conversations all weekend long. Thanks for coming out to visit us, you guys.

9.7.09 George and Lois,

I can't thank you enough for being such a gracious host/hostess during my weekend in Ft. Ransom. Camping was such a fun adventure and I thoroughly enjoyed discovering North Dakota! To think that I can now build a campfire -- wow!!

Have a safe and pleasant journey back to Florida. Thanks again, Larry