Is owning a pickup truck a sign of being a "man of the people"?

reefedjib said:

78th Engineer Battalion, Rhineland Kaserne, Ettlingen

edit - it's just outside of Karlsruhe, 30 min south of Heidelberg.

Click to expand...

It's got baumholder, germany beat where I was stationed. Ever heard of it?:2razz:

LiberalAvenger said:

It's got baumholder, germany beat where I was stationed. Ever heard of it?:2razz:

Click to expand...

Oh yeah. As I recall, wasn't baumholder NW of Mannheim? What was the other big exercise area? Memory's fading.

reefedjib said:

Oh yeah. As I recall, wasn't baumholder NW of Mannheim? What was the other big exercise area? Memory's fading.

Click to expand...

AHh, Hohenfels.

reefedjib said:

78th Engineer Battalion, Rhineland Kaserne, Ettlingen

Click to expand...

I was with the 69th Chemical Co. 1stAD in Furth just outside of Nurnberg. I found this pic of Rhineland Kaserne. Hope you like. You know the 1st AD turned over all of the US Army facilities in Furth, Erlangen, and Ansbach back to the Germans around the same time Rhineland Kaserne was turned over. Around 1995. I miss Germany and intend to go back there someday.

Here is a pic of Ettlingen

Time for a sing-a-long. Just follow my bouncing balls!

I Love My Truck

Well, it'll just get you down
If you let life get to you
'Cause everybody's saying something
None of it's true
Well, I just don't care
When them times get hard
'Cause I got everything I need
Right out in my yard
(Chorus):
I love my truck, she's right outside
I ain't got much love but I sure got a ride
It don't matter who lived
It don't matter who lied
I got my truck right by my side
You got Sally and you got Sue
And I got a Chevrolet
She takes me home after work
Don't ever miss a day
She don't care what I am
She don't care what I ain't
But she ain't no cheap pick-up
She just needs a couple coats of paint
(Chorus)
Yeah
She don't care if I don't work a lick
She'll start every time if the choke don't stick
I know that she will never doubt me
'Cause she never leaves home without me
(Chorus)
I got my truck right by my side, yeah
I got my truck right by my side

*********Glen Cambell

SgtRock said:

I was with the 69th Chemical Co. 1stAD in Furth just outside of Nurnberg. I found this pic of Rhineland Kaserne. Hope you like. You know the 1st AD turned over all of the US Army facilities in Furth, Erlangen, and Ansbach back to the Germans around the same time Rhineland Kaserne was turned over. Around 1995. I miss Germany and intend to go back there someday.

Click to expand...

SgtRock said:

Here is a pic of Ettlingen

Click to expand...

Sweet pics. That was our bowling alley off to the left and the BN HQ in front. That's downtown Ettlingen (small village) with walking area. It was a great little place! My girlfriend lived around the corner to the left, across from the big tower on the right.

I've been to Furth, I think. I went as the mechanic for a platoon of engineers that got attached to some INF BN during maneuvers north of Nuremberg. It was so cool, we did maneuvers right in the economy. We stopped at one small village - I was with a couple of INF squads at that point - and I was the only one who spoke some German. It was pure dialect, since I learned it in the German Club on Rhineland Kaserne talking European politics (1988-1989 just before the Wall fell in Berlin). So I talked to the townspeople and they thought I was French. After I talked to them a bit, they went and got cheese and bread and salamis and stuff, and some gluwein and they brought their kids out. We let the kids climb all over the M113s and act like they were shooting the 50. We chowed down. Awesome!

A couple of days later I was back with my Engineers. We were told to setup an ambush for a INF platoon. We had sparse trees for 100 meters, then thick woods with a road going through that they would come from. We setup a split ambush - 113 at the edge of the woods and grenades, artillery (the fake ones for simulation) throughout the sparse trees. We figured the platoon would rollup to short of the change from thick to thin woods, dismount and assault. Most of us setup inside the dense woods to either side of the road. They rolled up and stopped, dismounted and went forward on foot. When they tripped the grenades and the 50 opened up, out in the thin woods, we threw artillery under the 113s and opened up on the commanders. We tore their **** up! Sucks to be infantry.

Good times.

You guys had all the fun.

reefedjib said:

Oh yeah. As I recall, wasn't baumholder NW of Mannheim? What was the other big exercise area? Memory's fading.

Click to expand...

Grafenwehr and it was paradise compared to baumholder. All the hookers had hairy armpits.

The land of Nena and the 99 Red Luft balloons.

Hairy armpits. :rofl

It's just a vehicle. It neither proves nor disproves that someone is a man of the people.

reefedjib said:

AHh, Hohenfels.

Click to expand...

Memories of Hohenfels and Grafenwoehr......Reforger, working for for days with hardly any sleep. Setting it up, tearing it down, convoy to another location, setting up a perimeter, setting up our camp, tearing down again and convoy to the next location. ahhh memories I remember listening to Iron Maiden Number of the Beast on my walkman while convoying through Germany. I am not a number, I am a free man... ha ha ha haaaa

I drove an M809 5ton 6x6 truck with a decontamination apparatus in the bed. Once I got it stuck in Hohenfels. We hooked the winch up to a tree and attempetd to pull it out. As you know the SOP says raise the hood when attempting this maneuver. Well I did and the cable snapped and cut the hood and cab in half. Well we eventually got it out, it took an M88 Recovery vehicle. Man that is one bad ass machine.