We visited Ft Lewis today (Tuesday, 2 Sept). Fort Lewis is now called Joint Base Lewis-McChord or “JBLM” for short in another government attempt to save money. Fort Lewis and McChord Air Force Base merged on October 1, 2010 due to BRAC initiatives back in 2005. You can find more information on this merger here if interested:
http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=9900
We went to JBLM for a couple reasons. First, a soldier that worked for me back in the 601st ASB, Katterbach GE (2003-2005 timeframe) contacted me on Facebook and invited us to his promotion ceremony. I humbly accepted and we drove through the horrendous traffic on I5 to make it in time for the 1100 event.
Congratulations to newly promoted Master Sergeant Kevin Lamar! He was (and is) a superb Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) that could always be counted on to get the hard jobs accomplished. As I’ve said many times before, my success in the Army as a Chief Warrant Officer is directly attributed to the many fine NCO’s that I had the privilege of working with that did the “real work” and made me look good. MSG Lamar is certainly one of those professional NCO’s and his promotion is well-deserved. After the ceremony, where many kind words were spoken, we then graciously accepted the refreshments (aka “free lunch”) in one of the nearby conference rooms.
Thanks for the invite MSG Kevin Lamar!
The second reason we went to JBLM was to get my meds refilled at the base hospital. That went fairly well after a couple of long waits at different branches of the Pharmacy. It took most of the afternoon because they had to call Ft Carson and transfer my prescription. Then we had to get another ticket to get the prescriptions filled. There sure are a lot of retirees here 😉
After a short tour through the main PX… we had to see if it was any different from other posts/bases… It wasn’t, then we headed over to the FamCamp on base to see what it looked like for future reference. It is called NW Adventure Center JBLM and they have 48 full hook-up sites. It is located on the shore of American Lake. The fees are as follows:
- 50-amp with lake view – $25 per night
- 50-amp – $22.50 per night
- 30-amp – $20 per night
- They also have tent and overflow sites available for $7 and $5 respectively.
We drove through the campground to check out the sites. I was pleasantly surprised, I would definitely stay here if we didn’t already have the awesome spot at my friend’s house in Yelm right now. Plus the price is right 😉
Unfortunately, I didn’t have the foresight to take any pictures when we were there.
We made it back home (Nate Sawyer’s homestead) in time for Stilla to reheat the leftover Sauerbraten from yesterday’s meal for Nate before he came home. BTW- We also saw Nate at the promotion ceremony and he gave us a quick tour of his office, aka closet 🙂
Coach was patiently waiting for us to return from another day’s adventure without him 🙁
That’s all for now… have to go mow the yard for Nate, figured it was the least I could do for his hospitality here, then maybe I’ll have time to get up on top of the coach to give it a washing and maybe waxing before we hit the road again. We were thinking that Thursday would be a good day to head on up to Port Angeles and then…who knows…? South along the Pacific Coast Highway?