6th Anniversary - Watoga Campsite

Waiting out the rain.

In celebration of our sixth wedding anniversary, we wanted to relax. We wanted to get away, be in the quiet, do a little fishing, do a little snoozing... camping sounded good to me. Sometimes it seems that we attempt to celebrate an anniversary and it turns into one of these if-our-marriage-survives-this-we-can-swing-one-more-year type things. This was one of those times.

BUT - we're focusing on the positive! Many lessons were learned: don't wait until last minute to plan a three-hours-away camping trip that requires reservations; feeling good about cooking on the dutch oven is a matter of just doing it, and doing it again, and again; gross things sound and feel better when you devise cheerful nicknames, and even better when those nicknames are made up Frenchy words.

Long story short, we got to the park of our choice without a reservation and told we could choose either privacy and riverside bliss OR electricity. We chose electricity. This landed us seven miles away from our intended original destination within the park. That's seven miles at 25mph - if you want to go to the riverside and fish, 20 minute drive. If you want to visit the gift shop or pick up a map or brochure, 20 minute drive. Pool? Rec center? Stinkin' park EXIT? 20 minute drive.

We were able to have some really cool experiences regardless of our initial frustrations and its going to take me three or maybe even four posts to get it all down. I'm going out of order because these are the easiest pictures for me to access - Watoga: the campsite experience.

Campfire, night two

Beaver Creek Campground, site #1 

Home away from home, pine sap dripping from above

Anniversary breakfast, homemade sausage, casings exploded

Really good campfire toast.

All packed and ready to leave

Leave nothing behind

The only thing that's missing from here is the fact that we were 30 yards from a festering cesspool of runoff water. Silver lining? It had two  "fountains" that ran intermittently to stir up the water enough to keep the mosquitos out. To perk it up a bit, we called them the "bubblers" (and "les bubles", pronounced "lay boo-blay"). They ran for about five minutes out of every twenty. While we were happy to not be getting malaria, with the weather being the spongy mess it has been all summer long, each time the bubblers turned on we went into split-second total panic mode, thinking it was a downpour.