And this is why you should not take Garine camping

Nobody in their right mind would ask me to go camping with them.  . . And this is why many of my best friends, my husband and various scouting groups have done just that. I would not love you if you were not a little bit nuts.


This particular camping weekend was instigated my those pesky Cub Scouts that are always tying knots, waving around pocket knives, and pushing caramel popcorn at you, i.e. my son. 

In keeping with the Isassi activity theme of "rain-will-follow-you-everywhere," there was a tornado watch and warning on the eve of our trip. This cleaned out the campsite of any debris and other various camping wimps. 

We arrived in the morning to a sparkling campsite and blue skies.  We also arrived very late for the mandatory cub guided hike had left already - bad camper moment #One. 

My husband, the allknowing camper who never allows us to forget that he used to "wilderness camp" in the scrub mountains of northern Mexico with nothing but a bottle of Vodka, one match, and a pocket knife, headed up our family hike - not via the wide and luxurious path taken by the scouts, but "Orange Trail"  - marked as such for avid hikers.  This path included scaling large boulders and tripping over smaller ones.  My kids, as mountain goats are called sometimes, had no problem with this. I, on the other hand, had somewhat of a problem with this. I wound up as the baby sister left behind, serially calling out, "Hey, guys! Wait for me!" as they disappeared around a bend.

Eventually, we arrived at a beautiful waterfall called Cunningham Falls. The sign said that people should not attempt to climb the rocks around the falls. As you can see from the photo here, nobody heeded that warning.  

My daughters flung off their shoes the second we arrived, saying they wanted to use their toes as God intended -- to hang on to the side of rocks for dear life. I said, "Don't come crying to me when you cut your feet and lie bleeding to death in the killer babbling brook!"


They, in their bare feet, waded across the creek. Me, in my sneakers and socks, tried to pick and hop my way across. I made it . . . sort of.

That is actually me standing in the middle of the above photo. You are not close enough to see that I am holding a sopping wet pair of sneakers and soggy, white socks. The only sneakers and socks I had brought with me on the camping trip. Bad camper moment #Two. 

The air was warm. The sky was sunny. The water was cool. 

After some splashing and climbing and sunning and dipping, we headed back to the legal side of the creek. The kids found their dry shoes, slipping them on easily before returning to the forest. I rolled on my wet socks and shoes and made squish noises all the way back to the campsite. 


Once back, we started up a fire for dinner. I had one of my scathingly brilliant ideas! I put my socks on the fire ring to dry. They were far from the actual fire. They would be dry in a flash and I would have warmth for my feet when night fell and it got cold out. This turned out to be bad camper moment #'s Three through Ten:

My socks caught on fire!

I pulled them off the ring, beating them on the ground, since I could not stomp on them in my bare feet. My family watched with their mouths hanging open. Then, they laughed at me. 


I had to call to another scout mom to beg for socks to rescue my chilly tootsies. Good thing we have cell phones for these emergencies.