So, while this may not actually have anything to do with Joe and I going into missions, camping for a couple of days earlier this week has been our latest adventure. We decided to go into Northern Idaho, we picked out a beautiful spot on lake pend oreille and had absolutely no trouble getting a campsite. But that's the smoothest part of the trip....
The first night was interesting enough since neither of us have ever been responsible for setting up camp before, and while we have both been camping with family before it is quite a different experience to do it all yourself. For cutting firewood we had n axe and a bow saw, which was great, however, no work gloves made that quite the experience for Joe throughout the entire trip.
The first morning out there we went out a bit into the woods hunting for more wood, and after not to long found ourselves bring attacked by a nest of yellow jackets... Thank the Lord for His protection because neither one of us got stung. No thanks to the vicious little creeps clinging to my sweater....
Then day two in the woods, a stinging ant decided that my hubby would be a good target and got him good. We also found that a local mouse had gotten into some of our stuff, potentially including some dry food... oh boy. On the bright side that day we went into town and got Joe a good pair of work gloves with made getting wood easier. Furthermore that day a friendly fellow camper with a chainsaw came and cut up our giant log for us. So at this point things started to look up a bit and we actually had a chance to just sit around the camp fire and play games and roast marshmallows.
However, the merry making lasted only so long. At this point I think I was under the impression "what else could go wrong" ..... hm.... I sense a problem coming on... At this point we had made the decision to head home at about 7 sat. evening.. we were planning to stay until mon. mid day originally. So we decided to spend some of sat, afternoon exploring the lake a bit. After doing a bit of impromptu rock climbing we headed up an actual path to the top of this point. At that point I started feeling like turning around would be a good plan. We'd already spent quite a bit of energy and we had had some concerns about poison ivy. It was about the time we turned around to head back to camp that Joe turned to me and told me his arm was itching terribly, AND we saw that tell tale rash setting in that told us that at some point he had found some poison ivy. This is where we decided that enough was enough. After washing him up and rubbing in some benadryl cream ( which by the way works wonders) we packed up and came back to the safety of our apartment and city life.
It may be a while before we venture out to go camping again, but I think we are both determined not to let nature get the best of us.... after all, wasn't man given dominion over the garden ? :)
