Fired up and ready to go

were the words Lyn and I said several times as she drove from our house to the Marriott Courtyard hotel on the south/east side of Columbia where she'd told everyone to meet to board the bus. Check in time was scheduled for 6:30 even though the bus would not leave until 8:00PM.
Thinking because she was dealing with young people, they wouldn't be arriving unil closer to 7:00. Wrong.
One of her fellow organizers was there at the Marriott by 6:10 and had called to report that the bus was there and more than half of those taking the bus were there too. "Fired up---- ready to go".
At 6:20 she called again, reporting that more had arrived. At that point, we were just leaving the sub-division and was about 10 minutes away.

By the time we got there, the Press was there and nearly 2/3 of those going were there as well....
"Fired up---ready to go."

Kurt and his son one of the youngest getting ready to board the bus. Sadly, the little one decided at the last minute that he could not leave his Mother not even for Obama and he stayed behind.
But daddy Kurt kissed his wife and son goodbye and got on the bus. Actually he and Lyn are two of the three responsible adult traveling with what seemed like a bus load of "kids" going off to camp. It certainly had that expectant atmosphere."fired up---- ready to go."
Here is a dad seeing his two daughters and their friend off.He like I, waited tell the bus door closed and was driving out of the parking lot before we got back in our cars to leave.
Just for the briefest moment I thought "I want to go." Then I remembered that they had 17-18 hours on a bus ahead of them

<>I didn't take lots of shoots because the lighting in the parking lot did not make up for the fact that night had fallen. I was hoping these came out okay as it was a moment of hilarity seeing Lyn crawl out of the luggage compartment under the bus after she had placed her gown ever so carefully in an empty space hoping that it would survive the trip and be none the worse for it.

Since tomorrow is a Day of Service called for by Pres-elect Obama, those taking the trip brought canned good and other food stuff as well as clothing to be donated to the Salvation Army in Beckley, West Virginia where they will stop for Lunch at Tamarack.
I hope to have an updated report from Lyn tomorrow on her travels that I can relay to you all. She has a camera as well as her laptop so I hope we don't have to wait until she gets back to see what she saw.