Those pictures I mentioned

We were about 5KM upriver from where I was last time, and on the other side of the river. We picked a nice spot, flat, right by some sandy banks sloping down to the river. But there was some garbage from previous, less environmentally-conscious campers, and a bit of old cow poop laying around.

So we moved about 40 meters up river to a slightly less flat, wide space, but still nice. A little further away from the sandy 'beach', but, you know, still nice. And we set up camp.

15 minutes later, we were very glad we did, as the 40 or so cows and twice as many sheep and goats filed right through where our tents would have been to clamber down the nice sandy slope to get their drink on. I guess the cow poop should have been a clue, but really, it was quite old. After the herd departed, we noticed they left fresh presents for us.

As the sun began to go down, the son got to work gathering kindling to start a decent fire for shashlik.

And then he wisely stepped back to watch his handiwork go up in flames. Fire is hot, you know...and Jack knows too.

The next day was all about swimming, running around, and hanging out in the camp. What it wasn't really about was a nap.

But it was about hanging in diapers with new pal Slava...

...chilling on the cooler with mom...

...and trying to steal dad's beer.

We threw in a little DVD time in the afternoon for good measure.

And what camping trip would be complete without washing the dishes naked?



We were rudely awakened Monday morning at 4:45 am by a pretty heavy rainstorm, with thunder and lightning in the distance. We all got up, put our rainflies up, battened down the hatches, whatnot, then settled back in to sleep/count the time between thunder and lightning. By the time it was close enough that I couldn't get the 'wuh' sound of 'one' out before the thunder struck, we got Jack into the car and were picking up the rest of camp.

And then it stopped. Completely. And the sun came up, and we were all awake, and it was 5:45. So we broke camp and got a head start on getting home.

And I was only pulled over 2 times this time.