A Plan B Day

When we woke up in the RV on Tuesday morning, we discovered it was already 9:30 in the morning. We never get to sleep that late, but I guess we were tired! I'm pretty sure we slept nine straight hours...maybe more! Because of the late hour and the trees, my sunrise picture looked a lot like this:

But isn't this what time off is all about? Rest when you need it? It was such a gift, really, to be able to sleep in so late, uninterrupted! 

Ryan wanted to make a breakfast skillet, so he went out to start the fire and tend to it while drinking coffee. I joined him eventually. ;) 

It was such a perfect morning outside in every single way. Cool but not cold, breezy but not windy, sunny but not blinding...you get the idea. We took our sweet time enjoying the late morning into midday. 

As I mentioned, this place has about zero reception. The only place we had hope of any kind of reception (and even then...questionable for some things) was down by the beach, so after we ate, we walked down there to see if we could get enough reception for Ryan to do his Bible study for work (on YouVersion) and for me to access info for my Bible study's word studies. After that, we just sat and enjoyed the water views. I prayed so very long that day. The water is my praying place!!

On the way back to our campsite, we passed this strange contraption....

Ha!

We had grand plans to kayak the other half of the challenge, so we went back to our site, changed our clothes, and inflated the kayak...

...and here comes the story!

Since our RV is drivable and not a pull-behind, we don't have an additional vehicle to drive once we park, unless we drive separately. The last time we came to Chain o Lakes, we did drive Ryan's truck separately so we could get the kayak to the boat launch. This time, we decided we would carry the boat to the launch. This turned out to be a much longer trek than it looked - probably a half mile (or more) in each direction. So we made our pilgrimage toward the launch, and about 3/4 of the way there, I noticed the bottom of the kayak was looking a little...deflated.

We stopped on the trail to inspect it, and indeed, it was losing air, quickly. We had no choice but to turn around and go back to our campsite for a closer look. And there it was. A slit in the very bottom. We have no idea when or how it happened. There are patches, but I'm a bit nervous about a hole on the very bottom!!! 

So it was a very sad afternoon. We hadn't had any issues with it at all up until now. :( And because it was so late in the day when we started, there wasn't time to rent and return a kayak in the amount of time we had left. So no challenge finishing this year. 

We consoled ourselves with a nap. Because...why not!

Then it was time for dinner: campfire pizzas!

And s'mores. Of course.

We had just enough time to take a walk around the campground, and while we were out, we scoped out the site we had originally booked. It was still a good site, but I liked ours better. Also - don't mind my face, here. Camping = no makeup, usually. 

By the time we returned to our site, it was dark! Extra time for devos!

It may not have been the day we planned, but it was a great day anyway. Lots of hours of talking, praying, and enjoying God's creation! 

Chain o Lakes...Take Two!

For our final camping trip of the 2021 season, we decided to go back to Chain o Lakes State Park. This is the first time we've ever gone back to a location, and the primary reasons we chose to do it were: to finish our kayaking challenge and to see pretty foliage. Spoiler alert! The kayaking did not happen and the trees were just starting to turn. But those two things aside, it was a wonderful "weekend" away! 

Before I tell you about the trip, I have to show you our new RV decoration! My friend Amber (artist extraordinaire) made this for us! It's not a vinyl cutout sign. She hand painted this for us. It hangs right over our door, and WE LOVE IT!

(Our intent is that if we ever get a different RV - down the road, of course - we will have room to write more names on there.)

This was our first trip with our new sign and it looked so pretty! (It also covers some sort of message board that we could not remove from the wall when we bought the RV.)

We hurried to pack the RV Monday morning and felt like we accomplished that in record time. And then...it was time to head to the park!

Last time we were at the park, we liked our campsite okay, but we didn't love it. So before we left the park, we walked around and scoped out a handful of other sites that we would like to try on a return trip. Ryan used that list to pick our site for this time, and his main objective was to choose a site that was close to the trail that led to the beach, so we could carry our kayak to the nearby boat launch. When we checked in Monday afternoon, we discovered the site he chose was actually super, super far from that trail. 

There were so many open sites, though (hello, weekdays in the fall!) so I suggested we drive around to see if any others on our list were open. The third one on the list was vacant, so we drove back to the entrance to ask if we could switch. We were so thankful they said yes! Ryan still has no idea how he got the locations of the sites confused, but we were IN LOVE with the site we ended up with and I'd choose it again if we go back!

There was only one other RV on our entire stretch of road, so we had tons of privacy! We pulled in ad got all set up! Check our our pretty view!!

We had our smoothies and then decided to do a little hiking! Here are a few pictures from our two-trail hike:

When we came back to our campsite, it was time to build a fire and cook our dinner!

It was SUCH a beautiful night, and it was the first time I had been able to be outside without mosquitoes destroying me. So we stayed out by the campfire for a LONG time. Ryan cooked some things for future meals, and we enjoyed listening to the sounds of nature!

After we put out the fire for the night, we went inside the RV and talked forever...which felt like a gift! (Sometimes it can be challenging to have deep conversations at home because we live in an apartment and not much feels very private, so when we're in the car or out camping, we can have great, unhindered talks!)