Our Camping Trip

This was actually a few weeks ago but I forgot to post it. Whoops!

Last weekend we went camping with our friends

Justin, Larissa, Todd, Jeremy, Kelley, Micah, and their three kids.

I didn't have my camera so there are no pictures of our adventures.

We left first thing on Saturday morning and drove down to the beach. Kelley and Micah took down their trailer and were staying at the Barview Jetty Park. The rest of us pitched our tents around the trailer. The weather cooperated with us, for the most part. It was cloudy with some sun breaks, but no rain.

Being at the jetty, the boys wanted to catch some crabs and fish. Larissa and I were good girlfriends and braved the cold wind to watch the boys. The luck was not on their sides, however. I think Justin ended up catching 2 crabs that were male and large enough to keep. Every other crab had to get thrown back into the ocean. The small and/or female crabs were not the only thing to end up in the ocean.

Roughly $100 worth of fishing and crabbing equipment was lost to the sea.

Justin was almost lost to sea as well. He took a tumble and ended up falling part way into the water. Chad also took a tumble, but caught himself on the rocks.

We went on a walk on the beach later in the night to look at the vast amount of stars that were visible in the clear sky. We whipped out Chad's Google Sky Map on his phone and tried identifying some of the constellations. As we were walking down the beach, my eyes turned to the left (toward the ocean) and all of a sudden the waves are rushing up towards us! We ran up to the dunes to avoid getting wet and continued on our walk, against my urgent protests to turn back. You see, I was the one who checked the tide tables earlier that evening, I was the one who knew the tide was still coming in, finally I just turned around and walked away. It only took a second before Chad was behind me, then Larissa, then Justin, finally everyone turned back.

The rest of the time was spent around the campfire. The warm campfire. We roasted marshmallows, talked, laughed, and had a great time. Then it was time for bed.

The WORST night of my life!

Maybe I'm exaggerating, maybe not.

Our tent is not made for cold temps and it was well into the 30's that night. Plus it rained. Plus there was a light above us. Plus our new sleeping bag wasn't warm enough. I didn't sleep at all and just kept adding layers as the night progressed. Finally around 6am, I heard movement outside. Todd woke up with his puppy and made a fire. I opened our zipper and saw warmth calling my name. I jumped out of the tent and sat next to the fire and pulled the puppy onto my lap to warm up.

Everyone else slowly woke up and joined the circle around the campfire and then the fun second day began.

The boys went back to the jetty for more crabbing. I was cold and stayed with the fire. Larissa and I showed the boys we could handle the "manly" stuff and made a trip to the beach for firewood. We may not have been able to carry as much wood back but our fire was fantastic. We even had a private smore session. I watched the baby for awhile so Kelley could take lunch to the jetty and hang out with her husband for a few minutes. I had to reassure her that I would much rather be inside the trailer hanging out with a baby than out in the cold. We had a great time with silly faces and laughs.

Everyone got busy and forgot about the dogs. Well, they were tied up to the fence but... Murphy, Justin's dog, decided to take a trip around the campfire. His leash ended up wrapping around the chairs and as he circled, they ended up in the fire. His leash also ended up laying across the fire and burned in half. Todd and Jeremy notice a billow of smoke rising toward the sky and start running to the fire thinking the tent was on fire. Luckily it hadn't spread that far. They managed to get it under control rather quickly but they had an intense moment.

All of this and we were still on the road home at 1:30pm.