Getting ready for training

I am in the final part of getting ready for my combat skills training in Wyoming. I have to attend a course prior to deploying and they are held all over the country. Most of them are done at Fort Dix in New Jersey, but the class there was during my leave and well, it was more important for me to go home and see the wife and kids then go play soldier. Luckily, my command was able to understand and get me a different class, therefore, I was able to see my family. Thanks to them!

So now I will be attending Advanced Expeditionary Skills Training at Camp Guernsey. Its a ten day course and is supposed to be very fast paced. I assume it must be considering the last time I did this kind of training was at Camp Shelby in Mississippi and it was five weeks long. I tell you what, there is nothing worse than running around the woods in 95 plus temps wearing body armor. My uniforms seemed to be constantly soaked. Gotta love a cotton tee shirt!

My tickets are in hand and all I need to do is make sure I have all of my gear that is needed for the class. They gave me a big long checklist, so just like Santa I'm checking it twice. Thankfully, this time I am used to the heat from dealing with Turkey, so there I have a leg up, but that vest sure does get heavy, even heavier with water and a combat load.

After I get back from training, I do some last minute outprocessing, get some more gear and uniforms and then get on a plane to Germany to wait for my team and the plane that will take me down range. While not really looking forward to the deployment, I am looking forward to getting it started. The sooner I get started the sooner I will be done.

I leave Sunday morning. I will do my best to keep up with the blog while I am there, I am just not sure about how much internet will be available.

Stay tuned dear Readers!