Adventures in camping part II...

Camping was a blast. Wet again but good. We got an even better site this time and positioned the tents under trees so they didn't get wet until it rained pretty hard Saturday night. Saturday day was nice though and hot enough to get wet in the waterpark.

Keith & Mary Jo went with us again and brought Jonah. We got set up pretty late on Friday night, the campground was full and there was a large group of girls across from us. All I had to hear was someone say "Let's sing a song!". Oh god, no. Ok, I can handle a couple songs but they sang like 20 of them. Those types you do pattycake to it sounded like, nothing I recognized...I was never a girl scout thankfully though. By the 3rd song, Sky & Jonah were dying. They started shouting "Shut up!" to them and acted like one more verse was going to send them into a mental breakdown. The singing was less irritating the more it drove the boys crazy and the girls would sing louder the more they yelled at them. Luckily this ended at some point. We ended up getting in trouble by the ranger for being too loud after midnight. It's so dark that he stood right next to our table and no one saw him until he spoke. Freaky. We had to use our "library voices" from then on he stated. Poo.

We ended up with some cool site neighbors on the one side and the other side was woods. A couple with 2 kids from around here. They were slightly odd but very friendly. The kids got along great and we hung out at night around the fire both nights playing games and such, sharing wood and Oreos...ahhh, good times. The boy had his turtles with him so the kids had fun playing with them. They also had a dog who played with Kali so it worked out for everyone.

Saturday night was the true adventure. We had all these trails behind our site through the woods so, besides making a very convenient restroom, we wandered around. Mau had taken me back there earlier along the one trail. It was pretty dangerous, especially since it was muddy. I fell in a hole 3 times, almost slid off what I thought might be a cliff (it was dark) and dodged prickly plants. We went back on a trail for what seemed to be forever and took a break. We chilled then walked back the same way avoiding the holes I kept falling into. It was like we had walked out of the twilight zone because once we were out, we realized we had only been like 10 feet back there and it took a fraction of the time to get out. "What? I thought we were way further back." "I know, what was that, like 10 steps?". Mau played "Search & Rescue" with all the kids. He ran off into the woods and the kids, all armed with flashlights, looked for him. It was very organized considering the oldest was 12 and the leader was 7. Mau was hanging off the side of a cliff letting them walk by him then follow them to scare the piss out of them type of thing.

After that we decided to go on a night hike on a different trail. I know, a group of 8 trying to do something "illegal"? Yeah, the ranger stopped us and let us know we were not allowed to be on that trail. Damn. So we went around a different way and these 2 stray kids joined us. It was odd. They walked with us for a bit before someone says "Where did these other kids come from?". As quickly as they appeared, they disappeared and everyone was like "Where did they go?". We gave up after not finding the trail, instead smoking with Mary Jo and the neighbor (Doug) in the woods then wandering around back there listening to the rain and taking pictures and no, I am NOT a hippie.

It was Skylar's birthday so, after we got back, we let the kids swim in the new pool and do the pinata thing then we went out to eat with Keith & Mary Jo to use our hard earned gift certificates. We had to see what the hype in this city is all about. It was cool and we sat outside with a storm blowing in...it was neat. The food is not all that though and they messed up my order so we got money off the bill, keeping the bill under what we had in certificates surprisingly. Afterwards Mau, Sky and I walked down some steps to the river that looked like they rarely got used. We heard voices and Mau gets to the bottom yelling "Come here quick!". What he thought was people having sex turned out to be a guy helping his acid tripping g/f out of the river. She had fallen in and was telling Sky repeatedly how cold it was and how he doesn't want to go in. He half paid attention to her, not seeing the severity of the situation...this is the Ohio River and does have a strong current. Anyways, as we were walking back up the stairs, she collapses onto my back. I'm not sure what happened to these people because we got to the top and looked back and they were gone. Maybe she fell back in?

Oops. Skylar's Pepsi tournament results are posted online finally. He ranked 134th under the, ahem, girls. Right between Samantha and Bailey :P I guess they didn't fix the snafu. If he had been placed in the correct category, he would have ranked between 141st & 143rd for boys out of 500 (judging by his handicap total). He will be starting a summer league tomorrow along with all the neighbor boys...Mary Jo coordinated it and is supervising all except Sky.