Indian Princess campout

I am sore. Sore, with a capital ‘S’.

I got this way camping this past weekend. I know you’re thinking something along the lines of “Should’ve brought an air mattress to sleep on…”, but it wasn’t as a result of sleeping on the hard ground that brought about the soreness. No, it was taking a left at the horse trail instead of a right.

Saturday was a beautiful day and Sarah and I were packed and ready to meet up with my buddy Chris and his kids by 10:30. After a brief “where the hell is my wallet” delay, we headed out to our campsite for our first Indian Princesses campout. After getting there and setting up camp, we kicked the soccer ball, made flutes out of bamboo stalks (or tried to anyways), and greeted other dads as they showed up with their kids. Being as it was a Nation’s event, it was Indian Guides (which Cody was in for 3 years) and Indian Princesses all at the same campground. Quite a collection of kids.

We did the usual burgers and dogs for dinner, having way more food than we’d ever eat. Afterwards it was down to the bonfire for our big meet and then afterwards back to individual campfires for S’mores. Poor Sarah…halfway through the meet, she started asking if it was S’mores time, and after we got back and she had a couple she asked me, “can I go to bed now?” One story later, she was sacked out.

I stayed up, played poker with the dads, smoked my pipe, did the things dads do when the kids have all crashed. Then before we knew it, it was after midnight. Time to cash in and get to bed.

After an excellent breakfast the next morning (scrambled eggs, bacon and pancakes), one of the other dads and I decided to take a hike down to the bay. We’d gotten directions from John, who’d done it the previous day. So after packing up most my stuff, Danny and I grabbed our kids, along with 4 1/2 year old Anna (she and Sarah get along famously), and we headed down to the bay.

When we got to the afore-mentioned horse trail, we turned left. Obviously, looking back, we should have turned right. We hiked along the trail, dodging muddy hoof prints, crossing small running streams, ducking spider webs and generally enjoying ourselves. After a short bit it was apparent that we’d gone the wrong way, but Danny and I decided we’d just keep going because the trail was [i]supposed[/i] to loop back around.

After 45 mintues, we came to a dead end, and realized it didn’t loop. So we started backtracking. Naturally both Sarah and Anna were kind of pooped, and poor little Anna with her little legs just couldn’t keep up. So Danny and I started hoisting Anna on to our shoulders and taking her for rides. We finally made it back to camp about 2 hours or so after we left. Everyone but Chris (Anna’s dad) had left, and he’d just finished breaking down my tent so we could throw it in the back of the trooper. Both Sarah and Anna fell asleep on the ride home, as I figured they would.

So naturally, I’m sore this morning from lugging those two back up the trail. But it was a great time, and Sarah and I had a blast camping together. Can’t wait for our big campout in April…that should be awesome.