Camp-o-rama

It was two years. Two LONG years of no camping. Last summer was the summer of bed-riddance, so camping was not on the agenda unfortunately. TWO YEARS. Surely torture can't be worse than that.
Camping each year always brings back memories of camping trips in years past. My family didn't go camping all that often growing up, but the point is that we went. And we enjoyed it. My favorite times were when we would go driving up the trails in Southern Colorado near Salida so far that when the stars came out you could see every single one of them with perfect clarity, then spreading out a tarp, bundling up in our sleeping bags, and gazing up at them until we fell asleep (and then freaking out when one of the three of us would "swear" we saw a UFO!!!) One of the most memorable camping trips as a child (my siblings and I still talk about it all the time) was one particular summer when my dad was living out in Rhode Island while we were staying with my mom in Idaho Falls. Those couple of years my dad would fly us out for a month or more to spend with him out at magical Yawgoo Pond with Grammy and Grandpa Brown and the family (best summers of my life, I miss it so!). One weekend Dad decided that we needed to visit the Canadian border. Every child needs to go to Canada at least once in their life I suppose, so this was to be my first exit of the country (Canada. Really, it's just like Fiji...). So we packed up an overnight bundle with tent and food and headed of to Maine. It was getting later when we found some campgrounds to settle in on the couple hour trip up north. I remember pulling off into some trees off the highway, turning down a windy dirt road, and then this pristine GORGEOUS lake opened up in the dense forest with a little spot just big enough to start a fire and set up a tent right next to it. And the best part was there was no one around, not a soul, we had the whole lake to ourselves. How lucky could we get??? We set up dinner- I even remember what we ate: some cooked chicken, Boboli pizza crust, and some carrots- it tasted divine, but everything tastes divine when you are camping. The weather was pleasant, cool, overcast, but not chilly- just perfect. While munching on carrots, suddenly our ears perked up when we heard this strange noise. Like marbles falling down a stone staircase. It was quiet at first, and it steadily got louder. And louder. And louder. What is that?? Bees? A big noisy truck rumbling through the forest? A dinosaur?? Then we looked out at the lake where the source of the noise was coming from. A giant wall of rain tumbling its way across the lake. It took a moment to register what that would mean for this poor, defenseless, haven't set up the tent yet family. We scrambled to shove the food away, pack up anything that shouldn't get wet, and launch ourselves into the car as the downpour reached us and continued with lightning for at least half an hour. My dad finally went out and set up the tent in the rain as best as he could (probably reminding himself that camping when you're the only adult of three children isn't the smartest idea). The next morning things had cleared up completely. It was sunny. Warm, in fact. Warm enough to go swimming in this crystal clear gem of a lake we stumbled upon. My dad was cleaning up breakfast and let us get changed so we could go take a dip in this magical water. Rose, my sister, and I walked in fist- the sandy beach we found stretched out with shallow completely translucent water- we could walk out until the water was at our chests and still see our toes in the sand perfectly, and much further. I bet if we boated out to the middle, there would be no murkeys down below, just cool, crisp clearness all the way to the bottom. Except there were a lot of sticks we had to be careful of. Big ones, yes, but also some small ones. Really small ones. Dark, black, maybe the size of a finger length...and kind of glistening, actually. Wow, that's weird. There's sort of a lot of those little black glistening sticks. All over the sand in the water. There was hardly room to step without looking out for them. I startled as I watched them- wait a minute...that one just moved. Just got up, squiggled it's way a couple of feet, and then dropped to the bottom again. I blinked. Then saw a couple more do the same thing. You know those moments in movies where everything is perfect and calm, and then all of a sudden something bad happens, but right before it does, the camera zooms in from a hundred feet away right into the face of a terrified person, and then they gasp and let out a primal yell for help?? Yeah, that was one of those moments. A horrific deadening realization hit me like a ton of bricks and I only had time to shreik "LEACHES!!!" before I was garbling and scrambling and drowning my way back to the shore. Panting, hearts racing on the sand, my sister and I shivered in our towels while my brother, smart one, snatched a couple onto a log and began torturing them with a stick. We packed up and left without anymore swimming.
The trip up to the border was short from where we were, maybe an hour. We passed through customs. I remember being really nervous because we told the inspection man as we crossed into Oh Canada that we were just going to look at some shops, which we did, but when my Dad suggested that we go to lunch as well later, I felt obligated that we go back and tell that man what we were doing. We didnt' specify lunch in those plans, surely they would catch us and jail us and deport us for not being specific with our time in their country. We were fine, though, as it turns out. No jailing. Couple things I learned from Canada: their gift shops along the border are expensive. And their seafood stinks. Really. In fact poor Rose on the way home lost that seafood all over a gas station floor outside the bathroom somewhere in Maine on the way back. Didn't make it to the toilet, but was too embarrassed to tell anyone, so she turned around and walked out of the market back to the car without saying a word and we drove off. As I recall, it wasn't until later when we stopped again on the side of the road for her to get sick again that she confessed to us that some unfortunate gas station attendant was probably cleaning up her puke as we spoke outside the bathroom and she didn't tell anyone. We stopped a couple more times as it started getting late to give Rose a comfortable spot to get it all out. The last time it was dark and cloudy out, we parked it on the side of the highway. Dad realized we may have been too close to the road, so after he got Rose settled, he pulled the car forward a little bit and then heard this crunching noise and the whole corner of the van we were in sunk down on one side. A flat tire. A few things I recall from this experience. Crying because it was raining and we had to wait outside, being panicky because Rose was still puking and I panicked when people puked around me back then, Addison (my brother) being a maniac as usual, then my dad losing it at us when Addison was frolicking too close to the highway and then Dad saying a lot of curse words when the jack slipped and he hurt his hand. We were silent the rest of the trip home.
BUT, like I said, we talk about this trip all the time. Sometimes nightmare trips make the best stories.
This trip last week was far from a nightmare trip. The kids were great. I bundled them up until they resembled that kid who "can't put his arms down" from the Christmas story at night because inevitably in years past they still wake up with cold faces and toes and hands. It was raining some of the time, windy a lot of the time, sunny some of the time, but nothing unbearable. We loved listening to the kids every two seconds on the way up the canyon ask over and over and over again, "Are we in the mountains yet???" and "Can we put marshmallows in the fire yet???". Oh wait...no, that's what we didn't love about the trip, sorry I forgot. Chloe collected bullet shells and rocks and lots and lots of wildflowers for Mommy and Grandma. Linus got really dirty and had permanent streak marks down his cheeks where the tears would spill out when he threw a fit over something (yes, still in that stage of life...), Odell was a doll, as usual. Didn't hardly make a peep the whole time! When it got cold out, I put on two onesies, a pair of pants, a sweater, and then stuffed her in a large thick fleece bunting and wrapped her up in another fleece blanket and she sat there looking like a burrito on my lap in front of the fire (yeah, like I said, a little paranoid about keeping the kids warm). It did get a bit chilly up there, though. Even Craig had to put on his long sleeved shirt- Linus thought it was hilarious when he wore it, he'd never seen his daddy in a long sleeved shirt. We ate lots of yummy food (thanks Grandma!!!!), shot some arrows, shot some air soft guns, took a small walk up the hill, played games,walked down to the creek and picked dandelions, sat around the fire and laughed till our sides were sore, yes, roasted marshmallows over the fire (Daniel put them in between two toasted Samoa Girl Scout cookies- I didn't try it, but it looked really good), and got dirty and stinky for a couple of days. Great fun. Instead of waiting a bazillion years for pictures to download, you can follow this link to look at my facebook album of the camping trip. That way you get to see more pictures anyway.
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.750584186532.2254271.42105531&l=b19851ba82
Looking forward to having the weekend with the kids to myself while Daddy goes away to Youth Conference for a few days (going to go see Kung Fu Panda 2 with Linus and Chloe tomorrow...pending Craig leaves the car for me, he may need it to carry kids/stuff up to camp), and then cleaning the heck out of our house to prepare for all the family coming in town for the fourth of July week for our big summer HOORAH! (can't wait!!!!).
I. LOVE. SUMMER.