Camping 2010

When I told the kids to gather fire wood, I never thought I needed to explain the necessity of gathering DRY firewood. Consider it a lesson learned and pretty much emblematic of how the experience went.

Abby, Sammy, and I left Saturday morning for the serenity of Pike Lake. Part of me wanted to go to Dillon State Park, close to Zanesville since it's relatively close to our house, but the kids really liked Pike so we opted to go there. The drive down was relatively uneventful until I realized that I left our camp chairs back in the garage. In packing up the van in the morning I had taken the chairs out to make moving things in a bit easier but had neglected to put them back in. Oooopppsssss.....

Chairless but undeterred we proceeded onward to Bainbridge where we unloaded our stuff, set up the tent, and check-in, and by we I mean I. While I worked the kids played in the creek behind our campsite which in hindsight was both a blessing and curse. After getting everything up and ready, I left the kids briefly to go pay for our site. Upon returning I found two somewhat water logged children. For reasons that still remain unclear they both managed to fall into the creek. Hooo boy......

And thus I took two already water logged children to the beach where they could get even more waterlogged. Somewhat to my surprise they both wanted to walk to the beach rather than drive, and at the time that seemed like a good idea. We got to the bathhouse at the beach and Sam and I went into the Men's side to change while Abby went into the Women's side. When Sam and I came out Abby announced that the top to bathing suit was missing. She went on a brief excursion to look for it, while Sam and I remained at the beach. Unfortunately for Abby she wasn't successful in finding the top, so she wore the shirt she wore to the beach as her top. Luckily, she brought a dress along with her to change into after we were finished.

The beach experience was interesting to say the least. There was a gentleman at the beach named "Turbo". I know his name is Turbo because that's what his wife(?) called him and that's how he introduced himself. Were that the only significant thing about him, that itself would be memorable. But it's not. Turbo likes tattoos. Which in and of itself isn't all that remarkable, even though he had a lot of them. Again that doesn't entirely distinguish him, and indeed didn't distinguish from others at the beach, including a good number of the men. Turbo though had a couple tattoos that did distinguish him--on the back of each shoulder he prominently displayed a Swastika. And even that wasn't the most distinguishing attribute of Turbo. No, that would be Turbo's son. Sigh.....

I think I might have mentioned here a few times that Abby and Sam go through some sort of metamorphosis around water, and this day was no different. They rollicked and played and had a marvellous time for about 2-3 hours until it became time to make dinner. I reluctantly pulled out of the water in order to change and make our way back to the campsite. As fate would have it on the walk back to the campsite we found the top to Abby's bathing suit lying in the middle of a path in the campground. And as fate would have it shortly after arriving at the campsite Abby discovered that she did not have the top she wore while swimming--so back to the bathhouse we went.

Luckily Abby found her top in the bathouse, and we were able to return back to the campsite after buying some firewood and 2 "Kozy Kampin' " cards at the park store. The latter is a great deal. For $5.00 each the card entitles the kids to one scoop of ice cream, 2 cookies, a Slushee, and a toy from the Toy Chest--more on that in a bit.

After dinner--hot dogs and chips for Abby and me, cereal for Sam (I failed to get him to eat the chicken nuggets I made for him, sometimes that boy ain't right)--we went back to the camp store so Abby and Sam could pick toys from the Toy Chest. As I peered into the selection of toys in the Toy Chest, I couldn't help but wonder what the Chinese think of us. Sam picked a "Sun Ball" and a plastic and utterly useless fork, while Abby picked 2 animals made from cheap plastic--the workers at the store let them pick an extra toy if they promised to be good.

We left the store and went to look at the animals at the Nature Center. The Naturalist for Pike Lake, who had been doing programs at other parks, returned to the center to feed the animals and talked to us a bit about them and even gave the kids literature on identifying fish in Ohio.

Back at the campsite I tried to get the fire going again while the kids played at the playground across the way. As always Abby made new friends, but unlike most times, these friends I didn't like. 2 of the girls were throwing sand at one another, and caught Abby in their crossfire right in the eye. Grrrrr.....

I called the kids back from the playground pretty much for their own protection but also to roast marshmallows. Sam is a bit worrisome roasting the sugary concoctions. He likes to burn them. Abby is a bit obsessive about roasting the "perfect marshmallow" but nonetheless a good time was had by all. The only downside is that somehow Abby lost her new toys at the playground. I suppose if she was going lose something a $.05 toy wasn't the worst choice.

The next morning I rekindled the fire and started to cook breakfast. I sent the kids out to get firewood. Why they, and in particular Abby, thought that getting a big piece of wood literally out of the creek was a good idea is simply beyond me. Sam got the worst end of the deal, as he emerged a muddy mess from the ordeal.

After breakfast we packed up the campsite and went canoeing. Canoeing wasn't quite as much fun as last year. Sam was really upset that he couldn't sit up front and let his feelings on the matter be known. Abby for her part seemed to lose interest pretty quickly which actually worked in my favor. After a bit I took the canoe in and let Abby off and moved Sam up to the front which made him much happier.

After lunch, we headed back to the beach where for reasons unknown the kids wanted me to throw them in the water. Sam at 30 pounds isn't much of a challenge, but Abby at double that weight is a whole other challenge.

After the beach, we had some ice cream and went home. Sometime after we passed through Chilicothe Sam fell asleep.

Overall it wasn't a bad camping trip, but forgetting the chairs turned out to be a harbinger of things to come.

Really?

So last night a neighbor went GranTorino (without the gangs, guns, violence, and language) on me because my 6 lb dog happened to venture forth on the easement in front of his house. Since Sam was with me I had to censor myself, but I was seething, especially because this particular neighbor frequently soaks the sidewalk in front of his house while watering his front lawn. I can't help but wonder how much damage the guy thinks a REALLY small dog could do relative to the REALLY BIG dogs in the neighborhood that no doubt frequently do their business in his yard, along with the couple of cats that roam the neighborhood, the dozens of rabbits around, and most likely a large number of other animals. I'm guessing that in reality the least of his yard concerns is a six-pound Shih-Poo. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr...........