Ohanapecosh

What a crazy, wet weekend!! Which, we already knew of the possibility of rain from projected forecasts, but had truly hoped for a sunny, warm weekend. We packed accordingly...Mike did a super job of taking advantage of every available bit of space on Ted's trailer. We brought along a box of garbage bags...and off we went!!

So, unfortunately it did rain...A LOT!! We arrived late Friday evening. Grandma Gale prepared a yummy, warm spaghetti dinner while we adults ran around quickly setting up tents & tarps and the kiddos just ran around. It barely drizzled that night, but by 4 am the raindrops were echoing off of the tarps which acted as an amplifier of sorts. Luckily the girls were able to sleep through nature's "symphony", until about 7:30...Mikenna was the first to be roused, "WHAT IS THAT NOISE MOM?" and soon after Kiera, "WHEN IS IT GOING TO STOP!!"
Well, it rained most of the morning. After a hot breakfast of french toast (my mom makes the BEST french toast!!) we headed up to the visitors center...so nice and warm in there...where we saw the new rain forecast to be 100% rain over our entire stay. Just as we arrived, the Junior Ranger program was getting started. We were glad to hear the ranger explain how he would stretch his presentation from 30 min. to an hour because of the weather. He shared some fun tidbits of info. For example, Allison and I learned the 10 different names they have for the 5 different types of Alaska Salmon. Using your fingers on your hand as an aide: thumb--Chum & Dog; pointer--Socket & Red; middle--King & Chinook ; ring--Coho & Silver; pinky-- Pink & Hump; We also had a fun chuckle over the little lady who had to go to the bathroom & the dried out beaver glands...the ranger had gobs of animal pelts that the kids got to "pet" afterwards.
After our warm hour at the visitors center, we headed back to camp; Grandma Gale and Kaylee left a bit earlier and had a long nap in the tent. Kaylee was running a fever & Grandma had a BAD night. Mikenna joined them in the tent, she wasn't too fond of the rain...she just played quietly-coloring, looking at books, etc. The rest of the kiddos just biked, stomped though the mud & water. We adults huddled around the fire, drying out wet clothes and gabbing. By the time Ted & Stacy arrived with their family, the rain had let up some. We celebrated Adam's b-day with a pinata...then down to the river went the dads and kids; the rest of us, again, gathered around the fire.
The "babies" enjoyed finding a dry spot to move their beach toys too...why do they love dirt so much? After a few hours by the river, the kiddos had fun on their spying adventures down by the smaller stream near our camp. They also rode around on their bikes creating a lovely mud spatter all over their backs. The rain stayed away until late evening. By then we were ready for bed, and once again enjoyed the distinct plip plop of raindrops on our tarp...we were still warm...but felt a bit more chilled this night...everything felt damp & we were running out of dry/clean socks & clothes.
After a hearty BIG breakfast Sunday morning (FYI turkey bacon doesn't produce enough grease to make hash browns :( we determined that we had done our best to put up with the rain, but we were through "toughing" it out. We quickly took down camp, amidst the downpour...and relocated our refugee camp to my parents' backyard!
A definite camping trip to be remembered. One I will gladly do again but WITHOUT the rain!!