Wednesday May 13, 2009

Make-a-Wish Trucker’s Convoy

The Weekend – Part IV

We are grateful to the convoy organizers for giving us a great spot. Notice the walkway to the left of the chapel. Almost everyone who came to or left this lot walked behind the chapel.

Cerwin called an official to thank him for the spot. He said the official count was 370 trucks.

Curvin High and Cerwin High

Yes, they are related – some sort of distant cousins.

Then it was finally time to get in the truck. We were in the third lot, which means we were close to the end of the parade.

The girls climbed up to the top bunk to watch the trucks leaving the middle lot. We couldn’t see the first lot from our rig.

And me – of course I took pictures while waiting for our turn to move.

This is the line of trucks that will leave ahead of us.

The exit to Berle Industries was lined with people.

A few miles into the parade, we looked for Inge (center), from TFC’s headquarters office, who told us where she would be watching the convoy. We noticed that she was talking to the Amish man next to her, and pointing toward the chapel, so I expect she was telling him about the ministry.

This is one of the photos she took. If you look closely, you can see me waving to the Amish boys on the left.

This was my view of the boys.

She quickly ran across the bridge and took this picture.

I love getting to this area where there are lots of Amish families watching the parade.

One of the fun things about being at the end of the parade is that we eventually meet the trucks that are at the head of the parade.

I told you there were a lot of Amish in this area.

The exit at Brownstown is a great place to take pictures of other trucks as they go under us.

There were several fire trucks right behind us, and because of their constant sirens, it really felt like a celebration parade.

I wonder how many bolts of material they needed to make these dresses.

Brownstown, Akron, and Ephrata streets were lined with people.

I concluded that we had the best ride of the day.

While most trucks are normal working trucks, and many a lot more elaborate than the chapel, our rig represents the Lord and a ministry to truckers , which brings a variety of responses: some men removed their hats and waved, we got lots of “thumbs up”, others clapped and cheered, and many who support the ministry or know us personally stood up in the middle of a crowd, yelling and waving, hoping to get our attention.