Morrison Camping Adventures 2010

Camping. I never went as a kid. My dad worked away a lot and my mom is not the outdoorsy type. Mike decided that we should take a camping trip to Keystone Lake. I got online and found out all the information about where to go and how much it costs to camp out in a tent. We decided to go to Walnut Creek State Park. Located near Prue Oklahoma its really pretty. It didn't take us long to get out there and once we were there we unloaded the car and started to set up camp.

It wasn't difficult to get the tent up although we discovered the other tent was broken so we all crammed into one tent. Which wasn't to bad, I slept on a blow up mattress with Conor and Mike and Jordan slept on the floor next to us. After we got the tent set up Mike started on dinner.

We decided to have hot dogs for dinner since they would be easy to cook over a fire pit. Just as we started to cook dinner I heard what I thought was thunder. The wind started to pick up and sure enough it started to rain. Luckily I had put the cover over the tent by that time so we could sit in the tent and be sheltered from the rain. Although it was very hot in the tent we tried to make the best of it. It wasn't too long before the rain quit and we were back to sitting out in the chairs. We even walked down to the water to check it out to see if we wanted to go swimming. We decided not to in the end.

We all tried to lay down about 10pm, Conor was having too much fun and didn't want to lay down and I was too hot to care if he did or not. I laid on the mattress while Mike sat out in the chair, the air was cool from the rain and we had a decent breeze off the water. But of course it started to rain again. So we zipped up the tent and tried to go to sleep. I faded in and out, camping is not for pregnant women, but for the most part I had a good time. It was really humid and because I was so sticky I opted to just sleep in the clothes I had on rather than try to change into something else. Plus the only place to change was the bathroom and it was bug central. The toilets were clean but there were bugs everywhere, crickets, spiders, beetles, grasshoppers, you name it it was probably in there. I had to flush the toilet just to get rid of the bugs that were in it, I didn't like the idea of sitting on the toilet with bugs jumping around in the bowl, what if one jumped on me? I shouldn't complain at least I had an actual toilet to use.

Around five in the morning I was woken up but a very loud rustling sound. By then the rain had quit and we had the door to the tent open for a breeze. I sat up and asked Mike if he heard that. He popped up and looked around. Then he says "Oh its just a raccoon." I look out my "window" and sure enough there's this little raccoon staring back at me very close to the tent. Mike zips up the tent and I hear the rustling again. I realize at this time that the raccoon has gotten ahold of the bag of chips we had sitting up against the tent. This is a brave little raccoon, we had the bag of chips laying up against the tent right by the door. For about 10 minutes  hear rustle, rustle, crunch, crunch, then nothing. I decide hes gone onto better things and I try to go back to sleep. I find out in the morning he took the bag and ripped a hole in the bottom to better access the chips. I guess he didn't see they were already open. (LOL)

Around six I decide to get up, Jordan is up also, Mike and Conor are still sleeping. The sun is peaking over the water and I'm so uncomfortable I don't care what time it is. I got out of the tent and sat down in one of the chairs. I start to look around wondering where the little raccoon went off to. As I'm looking around I see three trees across the street full of some kind of bird. I then watched more of them fly overheard and land in the trees. I asked Mike later and he says they're turkey buzzards. As I sit there I can hear all kinds of sounds. I hear an owl, a woodpecker, a variety of birds and of course flies buzzing. I can also hear geese flying overhead, it was neat to watch them land in the water in an amazing formation. As I'm sitting there I see the turkey buzzards spreading their wings. At first I thought it was two males telling each other "hey this is my tree" but Mike said he thought they were warming their wings in the sun which made sense considering they didn't start it until the sun was all the up.

Mike and Conor don't get up until around 7:45. By then Jordan and I are starving. So we open up the doughnuts I brought and start tearing down the campsite. Mike and Jordan take down the tent, I start folding blankets and loading up the smaller items and Conor plays in the dirt. It doesn't take long to get everything loaded up and we're on our way. At this point I have never felt more disgusting and I smell bad. I call first dibs on a shower and off we go. Since we're not that far from home we get back around 9 a.m. I immediately head for a shower. I send the kids up to their room for a nap so that Mike and I can lay down.

All in all it wasn't too bad for my first camping experience. It was would have been nice if it hadn't rained but hey this is Oklahoma. I really enjoyed hearing all the birds. I would have liked to go swimming but that's alright I'm sure we'll do this again. I didn't even mind the raccoon. I was actually amused by it. I look forward to going again. Although next time I think Id like to go in the spring or the early fall. I don't mind the heat but not when your almost 8 months pregnant!