One day in July, Tom and I were sitting in the RV.  It was a really pretty day – a break from the constant rain of May and June.  I was talking on the phone to my parents and Tom was working on the computer.  All of a sudden there was a large cracking noise.  Tom looked up, then jumped up and ran to the other end of the RV.  Me, being slower on the uptake, sat in the chair and watched a tree fall across the back end of the RV.  The whole tree just suddenly fell over!

I told my parents I would call them back and Tom and I headed out of the RV to see how bad the damage was.  While I was talking to them, I felt like I was watching the tree fall in slow motion.  A quiet leaning, and then a louder rush and crackle of branches and leaves as it swooshed down outside the RV.  Outside, the tree was quiet and recumbent.  Although leaves and branches had brushed the RV, the trunk and large branches missed us by inches.  Even the bikes on the back of the RV were undamaged!

The next day we let the Chief of Interpretation know about the tree, and he put in a maintenance work order.  Later that morning the Head of Maintenance came out to look at it.  “Wow!  You were lucky it didn’t hit the RV!” he exclaimed.  Soon several other maintenance men appeared.  All of them were impressed by how close the tree came to hitting the RV without actually doing any damage.

Before noon, several guys showed up with a chainsaw and a bobcat.  Within 20 minutes they had the tree cut up and pushed into the woods surrounding us.  No evidence remained of our close call except for a few leaves stuck in the bikes.

Tom and I were very grateful that the tree didn’t fall on the RV.  It could have been very damaging.  For the rest of the summer we were both skittish every time we heard a branch falling off a tree.  We were glad to get out of the woods with only one near miss.