Camping is In-Tents

The trip was planned before we even left Morocco. Camping at Monarch at an elevation of 10,500 ft with 6 other families. The wildfires didn't burn here, but there is a fire ban in most counties in Colorado due to the dry, hot conditions. There will be no s'mores. No sing-a-longs around the campfire. So why the hell are we going again?


Because do you know what an intense pain in the ass it is to pack up a family of 6 to go camping? Do you? Not to mention that we are packing them in to a 1977 vw bus that has no air conditioning, no radio, no dvd player and takes mountain passes at the intensely slow rate of 28 mph. With me lecturing that this is what it was like back in my day, that they're spoiled and to suck it up. The kids intensely disliked sucking it up. I think they may need more practice...

So we stopped for lunch to let the engine cool off. Or was that the kids? Whatever. And we found this great spot over looking the river rafters. Where Ember got an intensely close view of the action.

When we got we (and by we I mean Craig) set up the camper and the tents. Tense, I mean tents, because our family is too big to actually sleep in the bus. And the kids are pretty intense of spending the entire weekend away from their intensely embarrassing parents anyway.

That's when our friends, who were there the night before, told us their intense story about their run in with the bear. And that we can't leave a crumb of food out. And that this thing is a bear trap. I didn't recognize it without the red and white table cloth myself.

The kids of course were completely oblivious because they were intense on chopping this log into toothpicks with axes. And playing mafia and murder. You know, wholesome things...

Us adults entertained ourselves at happy hour by having a boxed wine wine tasting. It was so intense we didn't even need cups.

And when you've had a couple of spigots full of wine having a Billy Joel/Green Day/James Taylor/Paula Abdul (yes, I said Paula Abdul) sing-a-long seems so intense, like we're all one with the universe. Or something like that. Although, I'm sure our campsite neighbors would disagree though...

There was this really great hike we were so intense on doing so the kids could fish the lake at the top. It was intensely beautiful.

Until it started raining. And then things got even more intense when it started hailing. Yes, that white stuff is all the hail that pelted us, all the way back down with the thunder and accompanying lightening.

Thank god the fire ban was lifted while we were there and we could have a fire to dry out. Although some shoes were a bit too intensely slow roasted and subsequently charred. At least they dried right?

Now I knew bears would like the smell of say a twinkie. But who knew the bear would also like the intense stench of smoldering rubber? And that's when I snagged this intensely bad, blurry photo of said bear. I'm sure if you take a spigot full of Bota Box Old Vine Zinfandel (the winner of the wine tasting), set your sneakers on fire and squint really hard you'll be able find him in this photo. Or Waldo. Or maybe not.

Now, you might think that the bear was the scariest part of the weekend. Or maybe the hike in the lightening and hail. But no. The most intensely scary part of the weekend was having Dixie, the camp host, ream us out for putting up a clothes line to dry out our clothes completely drenched from our hike and the last day of rain.

That's why we're going to be Whistling Dixie for years to come when we reminisce about this trip.