Lows:
-Ella had diarrhea for five of the six days we were out. I don’t need to say much more except that oh my god did that suck and I will never ever go camping again with anyone who needs me to wipe their butt.
-The cabin had a woodstove that made fun of us and smelled like dead mice. Ick.
Seriously.
Ick.
-We had to pull stakes in a storm yesterday. I hiked back to the car with the kids and dogs while Chris fought the whitecaps in the lake to get the canoe and our gear back to the landing. It was forty-five degrees and raining and took us two hours.
-I fed the kids Hershey’s bars for breakfast yesterday because the rain prevented us from cooking oatmeal (I realize that, depending on who you ask, this might technically be filed under “highs”).
Highs:
- The Ottawa National Forest Visitor Center. This warm, dry building was staffed by nice, decent folks who gave us hot coffee, our first flush toilet experience in four days, and even provided a little luxury called “toilet paper”. Also, they had soft places to sit (if memory serves these are called “chairs”) and, and, and I love them all so very much, I could weep.
-Swimming in Lake Superior. It was cold, but swimmable this time of year and we all frolicked in the surf.
(Though Chris will insist that he did not “frolick”).
(He so did).
Our cabin was directly on the lake and we had a spectacular view of it through the windows.
-Star gazing with Jay. We started naming stars after people he knows and after getting to both sets of grandma and grandpa, he declared that we had named them all. I guess the other six billion out there just don’t count.
-We heard loons and wolves call at night and watched eagles soar above us during the day. Their call sounds nothing like it does in the movies. They actually sound more like dolphins in real life. Interesting, no? Also, we saw moose tracks and bear poop, but that didn’t bother me too much, seeing as though I didn’t have to wipe its butt.
-On the hike out I kept Jay entertained with stories of a fairy princess who lives in the forest… in a hole in a tree… that looks just like… just like… (pause dramatically as I search for just the right tree)… that one! His eyes would get big and he would insist on stopping to peer inside the hole. Then I would regale him with tales of the fairy princess and her antics with her forest critter friends. It kept him moving, and stopped the complaints about his tired legs and any insistence that I carry him. I would just barely announce, “The End” before he would say, “How ‘bout another one?”
- We had dinner and watched the sun set perched on a huge rock on the shore of Lake Superior, then started the campfire and made s’mores. Clean up was a snap.
-Jay made Inukshooks everywhere we went.
-Home sweet home.
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