camping with teens...sort of...

I am just back from two days of camping at Alouette Lake, a provincial campground located just north of Maple Ridge about 45 minutes from our place. I agreed to be the "parental-unit" to a group of ten 17 year olds, including my son. I drove up with three teens and when we arrived, I learned that my site was located a significant distance from the kids' sites. Good thing I took my bike.

My teen has many years of scouting under his belt but he pretty much sat back and let the camping rookies do their thing. I checked in on them a couple times a day, even played a bit of Texas Holdem with them yesterday afternoon. They spent most of their time eating various carbs (their main staple) around an ever-burning campfire. Even though I advised them to keep their food put away at night, when I arrived at their site this morning, they had not only left food out, but there was an open box of cereal on the ground next to an open box of graham wafers. Amazingly enough, it doesn't look like there was any critter activity. I, on the other hand, have been trying to catch the critter that had taken up residence in my van. I discovered it when I opened up my van the morning after arriving to find a critter had snacked on my peaches and nectarines as wel as had a good chew on the box of tissues. I am REALLY hoping it didn't make the trip home with me. I left the doors open on purpose to encourage it to vacate while I was packing up. Guess I will find out tomorrow when I get in to go to work (fingers crossed).

I spent most of my time alone on my site, reading the collection of art zines I took along...including my first issue of Portals which had arrived the day before I headed out (Heather and Joleen, it is amazing!!). I also took up some colorwashes and lumiere paints and dyed paper towel and tissue paper. I have to say I had the brightest campsite around!