Ah, camping...
Beautiful weather for camping at Allegany this past weekend. Spent it with family and roommates of my brother (who coordinated the event). This was the first time in years that we had gone camping at all (most recently was tent camping in New Hampshire in '00, but that was disastrous), and the first time since like '98 or '99 that we had gone to Allegany. Camping used to be a once-a-year thing; I practically grew up in Allegany, with the number of times I'd stayed there with relatives.
Allegany was also where Heather and I first went camping, somewhere around '90 or '91, and also where we went on honeymoon -- with the wedding party. Both of those trips were on Anderson trail, and were a blast. It may seem crazy to take the wedding party on a honeymoon, but it was a lot of fun and will always be remembered.
So, it's fitting that the kids' first real camping trip was to Allegany. We stayed at Beehunter trail, with actual bedroom-type wall dividers, and bath houses with toilets and shower stalls. Not that there was any hot water to speak of, but that's beside the point... Anyway, it looks like all of the cabins in Allegany have been upgraded from wood-burning stoves for heat, to vented propane space heaters with thermostats. Quite a welcome change, for those who enjoy camping in the winter, knowing how difficult it is to keep a fire burning overnight in a stove.
The kids really enjoyed the weekend, and are looking forward to the next one. We went on a couple of hikes (to "Bear Springs" and "Bear Caves"), built the requisite family campfires, and had a couple s'mores. Stephen spent most of his "down time" playing with the nearest water faucet, filling up water baloons. He couldn't tie them, just fill them. And Talia enjoyed the little pile of dirt next to the one cabin, making little sculptures. The adults had plenty of time to talk, and to enjoy a new tradition -- a late-night crock pot of chicken curry which Heather made, just in time for the munchies to hit, that was almost completely devoured.
We were all a little sad to leave, even though we were ready to go home to our own beds, and take a real shower with hot water. On our way out, we drove around a bit and noted that Allegany is largely unchanged over the years, abeit Anderson #1 (where Heather and I first stayed at Allegany) is gone, replaced with two new cabins.
The requisite s'mores, after dinner.
My sister with an odd fire-baked banana concoction. Heh, she's the one that stayed in Japan, so what would one expect? ;-) The banana was tasty, though.
Kick it up a notch!
Talia, instructing one of my brother's roommates, the finer points of dirt sculpturing
The trip to the "Bear Caves", where there are no bears and there are no caves. But that's ok, they liked climbing on the rocks (as can be seen by the general level of dirt which they accumulated), some of which were as much as 30' tall.
This is generally about as close as one gets to bears in Allegany. Except in this case, they're actually dog tracks. ;-)
That's about as much as we saw of Stephen during the day, with him playing with the water faucet. Fortunately, it was spring-loaded, so he got a workout while using it, and it would shut off as soon as he let go.
Is it next summer yet? ;-)