WELL THAT WAS A SLICE AND A HALF

Well camping is over and I am at April's til next Wed., the soonest I could get a reservation on the ferry.  I love being here.

Camping was a mixed bag for me this year.  It was not my fave type of camping.  I hope I am not offending anyone here.  That is def not my intention.

 Any other time I might have loved the party atmosphere and the bumper to bumper parking lot style of camping.  But with this family camping trip I would have preferred trees and just our family.  One of the peeps there had a ton of friends, super nice awesome people, but not family.  I don't know, the trip up was a total nightmare as well.  Other people are so much more tolerant than I am clearly.

I left April's at 9 am.  And immediately the traffic was bumper to bumper, stop and go.  And it stayed that way all the way to Hope.  Then on the Coquahalla it was moving but very slowly.  The three and a half hour trip ended up being closer to six tense hours.  I think all of us from the lower mainland have kind of decided that the upcountry people can come down here next time, either that or we find a place down this way to camp.  Better yet we will probably pick a different weekend to get together.  The traffic coming this way wasn't nearly as congested, heavy, but not bumper to bumper.  All of us down here are like lemmings...oh schools is out!!!!!  Let's all get into our cars, trucks, vans, tow our trailers and head north!

Not everybody can make the camping trip every time, but most of us are in a position to be able to get a day off.  I know when I plan the women's retreat I try to pick a weekend that works for the key people and everyone else can figure it out for themselves. And that involves about the same number of people as the camping trip, so I know it is possible.

I wish people could come to the island.  There are so many beautiful places to camp, that isn't Tofino.  In fact there is a new camp site right outside Port Alberni.  It is privately owned by the natives and the logging company.  It is on a small pretty lake and beside fantastic hiking.  It is only one hour from Nanaimo too...easy to get to.  But....and it is a big but, the ferry would add about 200 bucks to the trip.   There are those that won't spend that so we are kind of stuck with mainstream camping.  

We did have a lot of fun and lots of fantastic food.  There was a horseshoe pit, ladder ball, frisbee beer game, martini tastings, swimming and paddle boarding, drinking, pulled pork dinner, curried chicken dinner, pasta and salad dinner, two awesome brunches, drinking, lots of cake, brownies, cookies, and drinking.  A good time was had by all!

Poor Arnie had one of her kidney attacks though.  She, Bradley and I met at the Flying J out side Hope and Bradley drove my truck up and I rode with Aryn.  She was so extremely excited about this trip.  And she was okay the first day but the second day she had a kidney go down, very painfully.  When that happens she simply has to go to bed and wait it out.  We had a spectacular lightening, wind and rain storm one of the evenings so she did open her van side door and watched it.  Poor girl. We felt so bad for her.

Anyway all in all it was a very successful lovely time.  We had three new relatives come and it was amazing to reconnect.  We will take some time this year to see if we can find a happy compromise for next year.  Actually where we were this year would be an awesome place on a less crowded weekend.  And I am so grateful to Kathy and Craig for getting this spot for us.  It is so hard to try to accommodate so many people and they did it!!!!

So apologies for this post.  It won't interest anyone but the ones that were camping and even then......

Stay safe and healthy.  TTYL

'When homeless people go camping, how do they know?'  Dara Gould

ONE OF THE AWESOME MARTINIS

MAKING UP THE CURRY DINNER

DID I MENTION THERE WAS A BIT OF DRINKING?

DAD AND DAUGHTER

APRIL WRANGLING LEELOO AND SOMEONE'S BABY