Anniversary Weekend Adventure

So, this past Sunday (Sept. 14), was my 11-year wedding anniversary.  Wow, it blows my mind sometimes to realize that I have been married for that long.  We've had our ups and downs for sure, but all in all, I am happier and even more in love than I was 11 years ago when we said our vows at the Fort Wayne Botanical Gardens.

To celebrate, we decided to do nothing.  No, really.  We made arrangements for the kids to be gone for the weekend, and we set off with no specific plans.  OK, now I should clarify this...  What we decided to do was get in the car and start driving and keep driving until we felt like turning around and coming back.  The weather in Fort Wayne was somewhat ugly on Saturday, so our only specific goal was to keep going until we found sunshine.  This trip was not about the destination (since we didn't really have one).  It was about spending time together and sharing a common experience.  We drove, we talked, we listened to music.  We wandered off the main highways just to see where we would end up (knowing that the GPS would bring us back to the beaten path if need be).

For the curious among you, we left a little after noon and headed south, after a quick look at the radar showed the most promise of sunshine in that direction.  We got out from under the clouds and into full sunshine about an hour past Indianapolis, but we had it in the back of our minds that we really wanted to get all the way to the mountains.  We didn't make it that far, but that leaves another adventure for another day.  We stopped at a rest stop a half-hour or so away from Louisville, and decided that we at least had to go that far.  We crossed the bridge into Kentucky, took some pictures of the downtown skyline, and drove around the University of Louisville campus for a little bit.  Then, we got back on the highway and headed north.  On the way back, though, we chose to get off of the interstate near Brown County and just explore our way around the back roads.  We stopped in at Brown County State Park, but decided not to pay to go in, as it was already almost 6:00.  We wandered around the back roads for a while, meeting back up with the interstate near the southwest corner of Indianapolis.  A few hours later, we were back home at the end of a truly enjoyable day filled with nothing specific.

I'm sure to most people, especially with gasoline prices just over $4.00 a gallon, this would seem like a somewhat insane thing to do. On the surface, I would agree.  But, honestly, how many people spend thousands of dollars on 'vacations' that do nothing but stress them out and cause conflict?  Does my $150 for gasoline and food really sound outrageous?  I don't think so, especially since I would say that it ranks up there as one of the best road trips ever.

Labor Day Weekend Camping Trip

This past weekend, I took my son and a couple of his friends on a camping trip, partially as an early birthday present (his birthday is today, Sept. 2).  I had decided to go the Family Camp Weekend at the Anthony Wayne Scout Reservation so that we could take advantage of some of the activities that the boys enjoy there, but don't get to do much of when we go for Cub Scout Resident Camp.  For example, they open up the BB gun and archery ranges, which are both popular activities with the boys.  During Resident Camp, however, they usually only get to do each of those one time, which is kind of a let-down after the waiting around they have to do.  This weekend, though, we were able to pretty much do as much shooting as we wanted, within the three-hour window when the ranges were open!

We went up Friday night, got registered, and had camp set up by 7:30 or so.  We spent the rest of Friday night just hanging out at the campsite, enjoying a nice fire, and roasting hot dogs and marshmallows.  The boys also enjoyed throwing a football around for a while.

Saturday, we ended up being pretty busy.  The waterfront opened up at 9:00 A.M., so after breakfast we got our swim trunks on and headed down.  We swam for a half-hour or so, and then got dry and grabbed a canoe, loaded our gear in, and set off across the lake.  By the time we got back, it was pretty much time to head back to our campsite to have some lunch.  After lunch we grabbed some bait from the trading post and hiked to the far end of the lake for some fishing.  We didn't catch anything big, but we had fun anyway.  We hiked back to camp around 1:45, changed back into dry clothes, and hiked over the shooting ranges so that we could be there when they opened at 2:00.  By 4:45, we were getting pretty hungry, so we went back to camp and started a fire for dinner.  After a dinner of hamburgers and hot dogs grilled over the fire, we enjoyed a relaxing evening of hanging out at the campsite, throwing the football around some more, and of course, s'mores and hot dogs.

Sunday morning, we ate breakfast, broke down camp, and headed home around 10:00.  All in all an awesome campout!  As much as I enjoy camping with our Scouting unit, it was nice to just have a small group, no outside schedule, and much less responsibility and structure.  We were able to just do our thing and have a blast.  It's pretty likely that I'll go back for the Family Camp Weekend over Memorial Day.

Here are a couple of pictures I took with my phone (next time I'll take a better camera).  My son (Will) is the one in the yellow shirt: