Summer Camping Trip

 

This summer we really wanted to take the kids camping, so with time slipping away and only a few weeks left to go in the summer we decided to go.  It was a bit of a drive, but we went up the Mirror Lake Highway which is a lazy outdoorsmens' paradise. We ended up camping at a place called Lost Lake (which is right next to the road, so not very lost).

We had a large branch break off of one of the trees in the backyard.  We had plenty of firewood.

The fishing wasn't great.  I really ended up feeding the fish.

Abby was in her usual great mood.

Joshy loved the new adventure and all of the rocks.

The level of the lake was really low, so there was a lot of exposed lake bed.  The kids were actually really good about staying out of the mud.

The Mirror Lake Highway tops out at almost 11,000 feet.  The lake where we camped was right at 10,000 feet.  This summer had been so hot that we never expected it to be cold.  The kids were plenty warm because we gave them all of our blankets.  I gave Holly my 0° mummy bag so she was warm, and I got to shiver all night. 

When the very first streaks of dawn began to break I got up to go get the campfire built back up.  Holly joined me pretty quickly and we enjoyed the fire while the kids slept.  Pretty soon we found ourselves in the middle of a chipmunk convention.  The little critters were everywhere.  When the kids got up, most of them stayed in the trees, but the kids got to see a few of them.  After a little while Hannah got up to go to the bathroom.  She froze in her tracks and her eyes grew even larger than they usually are.  Whatever she saw was hidden from our view behind the tent.  I asked her, "What's up Hannah.
She answered "I see an animal."
"Oh, another Chipmunk?" I asked.
"No it's a big animal," she said.
I got up and sure enough there was a moose just behind our tent.  About twenty feet behind this moose was a mommy moose.  Hannah was a little bit freaked out and needed me to walk with her to the bathroom.  I stood outside and noticed some deer coming up from the lake in the distance.

The kids were thrilled to see that a tiny stream ran through the meadow where we camped.  The stream was barely more than a trickle, but they really enjoyed walking along/through it down to the street and back to camp.

At one point Hannah stood on this Island that they found.  I tossed a huge rock into the water at her feet and splashed her.  She was not happy about it.

A hamster could have made the leap from the bank to the island, but Josh looked so good making this jump.

Abby found some pretty little flowers in the field, and she is a sucker for anything pretty like this.

We had a lot of fun on our trip and the kids are excited to go again next year.