Is that a pool in your tent, or are you just happy to see me...

We got back today from another wonderful weekend of camping in the Blue Ridge Mountains! We went back to the same place we spent our anniversary last year, Mathew's Arm Campground. On the way there we passed through a couple of quick, light sprinkles...nothing to cause us to worry. When we checked in with the Ranger, she told us the storms were over and we were in the clear. Yay!

She lies.

We got to our site, A17, and started pulling out the goods. The first thing I hear after I step out of the car was thunder. Off in the distance, just a low grumble. Ok. Let's just get this all set up! Just minutes after we set up, God unleashed a storm with all His fury! Holy. Crap. The wind! The rain! The thunder! The lightning! Ohhh, the lightning! Not only did we not get to have a campfire, but we didn't even get to cook dinner! So we chowed down on a box of Cheez-Its...no, that's not a complaint! So after "dinner" we settled down to some reading. Chris rolled over and said, "Oh fuck dear!" (hehe) My first thought was, "WHAT! Did we get struck by lightning?!?!" No. WORSE! We've sprung a leak and we're going down like the Titanic!!!!

That's right. Our BRAND NEW tent... out on its first camping trip.... an hour or so into the trip... You've got to be kidding me. We can't stay in the tent because we'll drown. We can't leave the tent because we'll drown then get electrocuted. So, we waited it out, crouched in the opposite corner of the tent (which also started to spring a leak eventually) until the storm passed. Then we got a towel to sop up the mess.

Kinda hard to see, but if you click on the pic it should get big and might be easier to see

Anyway, we survived the night and came out on the other side. On Saturday we went for a long hike to the 93' waterfall. I really did bad with picture taking this trip. It was a really good hike though, and pretty tough at some points.

Cliff - waterfalls were off to the left. Never got a really good view, bummer!
part of the trail

And guess who we saw again this year? Our friend Yogi Bear! In the past year he has grown up a LOT! Hard to tell from this picture, but it was BIG! Just hanging out behind our campsite.

It rained again Saturday night and cut our campfire a bit short. It was ok though because we didn't have much wood left anyway! As would be expected given our Friday night shenanigans, we were a bit pessimistic about how our tent would hold up against the rain again. But this time, the tent won. It didn't rain very long though, or very hard. We thanked our lucky stars.

Heading back, down Skyline Drive

Despite the tent snafu, we had a great weekend! It was a good start to hopefully many more camping trips this summer!