Camping Retreat

On the last weekend in October, we went on our Sunday school class' annual camping retreat to Mother Neff State Park near Waco, TX. It was beautiful weather over the weekend. As leaders of the class, we helped plan meals, activities, supplies, etc. for the group of 14 or so people coming. Since there was a burn ban at the time, we couldn't light fires in the fire pit, but they did allow us to bring tiki torches and set those up around the camp. It actually turned out to be quite pleasant - kept bugs away (the torches burned citronella) and provided light, minus all the smoke blowing in someone's face.

On Saturday, we all went on a scavenger hunt around the park. We broke up into teams and had to go and take pictures of different items around the property that might be there (a wildflower, a butterfly, a rock bigger than a person, etc.) for different point values, and the team with the highest points won. I don't remember who won, but I don't think it was our team. Oh well, we still had fun hiking with our friends, the Sungs and Ginger and Abby (who were very well behaved this year, perhaps because we had just moved into our house the week before so they had a yard to let out lots of energy!)

Overall, we thought the park was beautiful, but they did seem to be a little strict on the quiet time (as described later about The Librarian).

Also, I usually have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, and this was no exception, but our campsite was really far from the bathroom...a good 5 minute walk, which is no problem in the daytime, but at night it was a different story. The first night, I got up and walked to the bathroom and back, no problem, but just as I got back, laid down and was starting to go back to sleep, I heard a bunch of coyotes howling in the nearby vicinity. Umm...yeah. I'm so glad I didn't hear this before, or worse, during my walk to the bathroom! The second night when I had to go, I was really jumpy and kept shining the flashlight everywhere as I walked. I doubt they would have come near me, but still, it's a lot scarier when you're half asleep and alone walking in the dark. I thought about taking one of the dogs with me, but then I thought that if we actually did see coyotes, they might get territorial with a dog and I didn't want anything bad to happen to our dogs.

I love how the dogs look so concerned about him

This lady was the park ranger who we nicknamed The Librarian because the first night she came by at 10:00pm and told us that quiet time begins at 10:00 and people can hear our dogs bark across the park (after she approached as a shadowy figure, walking slowly towards our group...yeah, crazy that they would bark at that...) She told our group that night that she likes to help people use what she calls "library voices" to help keep the noise to a minimum, and wanted to appoint "a librarian" to help maintain order and remind our group to speak softly. I couldn't believe we were being spoken to like five year olds.

Then the next night, Michael was watching the time to make sure we would lower the noise level at 10:00, so before then we were playing a game of Catch Phrase (which you can't be quiet for since you're all shouting a word hoping to guess it right). At 9:50pm, The Librarian drove to our campsite and parked her truck, waiting inside it. Then at 9:58pm, she got out (again approaching as a shadowy figure, rousing lots of barking from the four dogs at the site) and came over to remind us that quiet time begins at 10:00pm. Seriously? Michael was very polite and said he's watching the time and we'll quiet down in two minutes.






The whole group that came. It was a lot of fun and a very nice weekend getaway!