Camping times two

This weekends camping trip to Matt’s Mountain couldn’t have been better. We had perfect weather compared to last time, hung out with some fantastic people, met some new people who I hope to see up there next year, and generally cut lose. The only thing that would’ve made it better would have been me being able to stay Saturday night as well. But, ironically enough, I had to get back in time to get Sarah and go on our own camping trip with the Indian Princesses.

But back to Matt’s Mountain. I decided that because I was leaving Saturday, I would head up Thursday and get some extra camping in. There were only a few of us there Thursday night; Krysta and Mark, Sam and Rachel, and then Steve and Andy showed up later. We kicked back, drank a bunch, shot Sam’s .50 cal revolver (I just call it the BFG), and just generally BS’d until it was time to hit the sack…which is when Steve and Andy started giggling like a bunch of girl scouts. Krysta told them to shut the hell up and they did.

Friday more people started showing and by night fall there must’ve been 20-25 people there. We kicked into high gear with music blaring, fire roaring and people yelling. Matt won the race to see who went to bed first (i.e., passed out), and the rest of us carried on. I hit the sack at about 11:30, ’cause I was going to try and be back in time to take Sarah to her soccer game (and because I’m the assistant coach on her team).

I woke up at 5:30 (gotta love that body clock) and started packing as quietly as I could. Not sure why I really bothered, other than I wanted to make a grand departure. See, every time I’ve gone, Matt has brought firecrackers to the mountain. This time he didn’t disappoint. And when I say ‘firecracker’ I mean another quarter stick of dynamite. As I’ve said before, those suckers are *loud*.

So, I got the truck all packed up, backed it out of the spot it was in (Sam and Rachel had tied their tent onto the bike rack; I had to carefully untie and hook onto a tree, otherwise their make-shift tent setup in the back of Sam’s truck would’ve collapsed), got it turned so I could make a quick exit, and then got out. I checked the time (6:10), and figured ‘what the hell’. I grabbed the quarter-stick, lit it, threw it into the woods and covered my ears. Quite the bigbaddaBOOM. I then yelled, “CAMP ON BITCHES!” and hauled ass, certain Sam was loading the BFG to take my ass out. I giggled like a girl scout myself all the way until I hit pavement.

I got back in record time. When I walked in, Gail said Sarah was sick and wasn’t going to be able to play soccer or go camping. Telling Sarah that, she burst into tears. She’d been looking forward to camping for two weeks or more. I told her it would just be too cold for her to go. I went ahead to the soccer game to help coach, then came back home.

Somehow, in the next two hours, Sarah made herself better. She came down about noon, said she was feeling fine and could we please, Please go camping? I looked at her, and aside from a stuffy nose, she really did seem fine. Gail shrugged and nodded, so we packed up and headed out. I got serious daddy-kudos for letting her go.

We had a good time with all the other dads and their daughters and sons, but I tell ya, come Sunday afternoon, I was wiped. I sat on the couch, watched football and did laundry.

But damn, was it ever worth it…