Well, we said goodbye to Kansas City and all of our friends and family a week ago - hard to believe. We flew to our new home of Jackson Hole, Wyoming early Tuesday morning, anticipating our moving truck following close behind. We arrived in beautiful Jackson Hole and checked into the "swanky" Hotel Terra in the Jackson Hole Resort for what we thought would be a few nights. The good news is that we are in a one bedroom condo overlooking the ski resort - it doesn't get much better than this!
Our 2 cars arrived on the car carrier on Wednesday - caked in inches of dried on mud - we look like real off road adventurers - but at least the cars arrived. I guess to get to Jackson Hole, the driver had to drive 9 miles on unpaved road, through 4-inches of mud (or he just wanted some off road adventure...I really don't believe that we are that remotely located). Our cars arriving so quickly is much more than we can say for the moving truck. As many of you know our packing and loading in KC were both tragic experiences! DON'T EVER USE NORTH AMERICAN VAN LINES! They could not fit all of our stuff on the truck, so they brought out another truck to load the additional items. They promised us that all of our possessions would be put into the warehouse and loaded onto a larger truck the following day and headed to JH for a Friday or Saturday delivery. Our calls to NA went unanswered and finally on Thursday we found that our stuff was still in storage in KC and they were trying to "find a truck for our load" - unbelievable considering that we booked this move 6 weeks ago. We are at their mercy though - so we decided that we would make the most of our newly coined "vacation." Happy Hour is at a whole new level in JH...
We spent one day cleaning the house for our anticipated weekend move-in. Then we took a day off and shopped at the downtown farmer's market then hiked in Grand Teton National Park - Taggert and Bradley Lake on Saturday. It was beautiful and just what the doctor ordered with our stress level! Can't wait for some of you to visit and enjoy some of the amazing adventures that are right outside our front door! The hike was 5.4 miles, and included unbelievable Teton Views and two beautiful lakes.
We found out on Saturday that our load was still in Kansas - supposed to load on Saturday, with a Tuesday delivery. As much as we love being on our unplanned, extended vacation - creating our new home would really be nice! The "village" was bustling for the holiday weekend and we enjoyed a great free concert on Sunday afternoon (after another day of more cleaning at the new house and making our new grill purchase....so we will have a clean house, a grill and 2 cars!). Lots of wonderful meals out - we will know all of the hot spots when you visit! We are actually really getting a bit tired of all of the meals out, and have brought in food for a few nights....too much vacation!
To celebrate labor day we decided to hike from the base of the mountain to the top - Summit Trail Hike! It was an amazing hike: 7.4 miles, 4132 vertical ascent, completed in 3.25 hours! We probably won't be able to walk tomorrow - so good thing the truck won't be arriving! It was an amazing day - great weather, beautiful views, and an unbelievable amount of uphill (was it really necessary to make the grade so steep the last 2.8 miles??). The good news is that if you make it to the top, you get a free ride down on the new high speed tram. Saw 3 moose on the way down (glad we did not come across them when we were hiking up).
Oh yeah, the update on our supposed move...we heard from the driver of our truck this morning before we headed on our hike. He has been contracted by NA Van Lines to bring our load to JH (he is from Cody, WY). The good news is that it seems we may get our stuff. The bad news is 1. The driver could not fit all of our stuff on his truck because he only has a 2 axle truck (yeah, this does sound like a broken record...we knew this problem last week) and 2. he can't deliver before Wednesday because they did not schedule anyone here to unload the truck. AAAAAHHHHHHHHH! Did I already say DON'T EVER USE NORTH AMERICAN VAN LINES! So, the vacation continues....and so does the stress! Hope that whatever arrives on Wednesday is at least ours and not completely damaged!
In the meantime, Barry is going to spend the day in the office tomorrow and I am going to the grocery store to stock the house and then do a bit of cleaning (you know the dust has settled again after a week). So by tomorrow afternoon we will have a clean house, a new grill, groceries, 2 cars, and 2 new hiking backpacks that we invested in!
The only other news is that I haven't sent you all our new address yet, for a good reason. First of all, most of you know that they don't deliver mail to the houses here - so much for my adorable address on Melody Creek Lane! And then they assigned us a P.O. Box that was previously rented by a "Matt Nelson". His forwarding address has expired, so all of our mail that has been forwarded here has been "returned to sender" due to the confusion....another AAAAHHHHH!
I am confident that at the end of the day (or week, or month) we will be able to look back on all of this and laugh. In the mean time we will continue to hike, enjoy happy hours, and pray that the truck arrives before the first snow!
Surviving in the wild west so far.....Michele
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