30 March

The last couple days have run together. We arrived in Kuwait at about 2130 local time which is 9:30 PM it took us 17 hours from the time we left Atlanta to the time we landed I Kuwait. From there we inprocessed and headed out to meet with our convoy at about 0430. We didn’t get any sleep that night and have only had a few cat naps as I type this. It is currently 2130 local time 0n the 31st of March. We didn’t make it to Camp Echo tonight because we got a late start. Even though we arrived on time to pick up our convoy they were on crew rest until 1100 hours since they didn’t arrive until 0300 that morning. The trucks that we rode in were very well equipped. They had as much armor on them as the Hummers do which was quite comforting as we crossed into Iraq at about 1230. There were several camels walking around the fence and the polish troops jumped out and took the opportunity for a photo op with the camel. It was quite humorous. As we drove along Kathy (the truck driver) took the time to point out many of the features about Iraq. Mainly she pointed out some of the IED craters left by IEDs… duhhh lol.
We arrived at Tallil (Camp Adder) about 1630. They put us up in a nice trailer with some AC and I got a chance to take a shower for the first time in 3 days. The Dining facility was absolutely amazing. They say Camp Echo is even better. If that is the case I am going to have some difficulty losing the weight I want to. Well maybe not today was 101 degrees and it was pretty overcast for the most part. I am told that Camp Echo regularly sees temperatures in excess of 120 and often 130. It was Kind of funny today during the convoy one of the trucks blew a tire and the entire convoy pulled over to wait for it to be changed. Loren and I were standing between trucks pulling security as we waited and we commented that we should get out of the truck exhaust. We moved but the exhaust seemed to follow us. We quickly came to the conclusion that it was just damn hot. Don’t forget we are wearing our Bullet proof vests and helmets. The new vests with all of the protection easily weigh 45 lbs but I am guessing that the bigger ones are pushing close to 55 or 60. I do feel really safe but It is very difficult to move.
Forgive me if I ramble, but I’m a tad tired and just typed todays events as I remembered them.