Camping at Fahnestock

Well finally, the photos from our second camping weekend, which was fantastic. We had some rain on the first night and due to someone placing my bathing suit on a window peg (he shall remain nameless) my side of the tent was a little compromised and my matress and sleeping bag got wet. I was warm and dry inside and apart from a cold drop that landed on my face about 6 times during the night I did manage a good sleep. I worried that every one else was also getting wet but I was the only one.

There were on average about 30 people there and the deal was $1- per night per person, so we left our tent from the previous weekend and went back on Friday night after Doug got home from work. Some times the number of people was less and when we arrived on the friday there was only 2 half families there. The group did grow and we had quite a few on the Saturday night. Most of the other families seemed to be unschoolers, those who do not do any formal lessons but lots of experiential learning, when you meet their chn, it is hard to find any fault with what they do.

The weather after the first rain was perfect and warm, we had a great time and next year, we'll make t.shirts. We had been the first to arrive the Saturday before and fittingly we were the last to pull out on Monday afternoon.

We did manage (despite all the sitting around and talking about it) to actually do quite a niced hike. D and I and our chn, plus C and his chn went for about and hour and a half. Part of the time we walked along the Appalachian Trail and as we started that part I wondered if we'd see a 'Real' hiker making their way along the trail (some times during the W/E we'd see Appalachian Trail hikers walk through our camp site) and after about 10 minutes we did. We saw a fellow who had left Maine on the 27 of June and was on his way to Georgia for Thanks Giving...he is doing the ENTIRE Appalachian Trail, ALONE. He was a little smelly I might add.









While we hiked we picked huckleberries and blueberries. This is a photo of the huckleberries, they seem to go on forever, we all had blue tongues.




The boys had a great time using kives and axes to cut and shape wood, it was good for them to practice these skills, since it is not something they usually get the chance to do. Then they sat together and ate a bag of cheezles, although they were stale, neither of them seemed to mind and they finished them all off. (The cheezles had come from OZ in May with my friend and the foil bag had popped, I tried keeping them in an air tight bag but should have just eaten them back in May).





There were many hours of sitting and chatting, laughing and sharing funny stories about life, work, home schooling, families and children. I was constantly suprised at how we could have such a relaxed and enjoyable a weekend with strangers (well mostly strangers).







We all went to the lake, for a swim, play and a much needed shower, how nice, I am not so used to doing without my warm running water these days. We buried all of the children one by one, we let them out again of course and allowed them to keep their heads outof the sand!! The wild and Crazy kids loved it. We made them look like mermaids (boys too) or like a big fish has swallowed them up to their necks, well that is what these photos are supposed to show anyway.









We had to split some wood, so D showed the chn how to go about it and then supervised as they finished off the job, every one of the children there had a go, it was pretty cool for them to swing the hammer, actually hit the splitter in the middle and then see they had cracked the wood, or actually split it all the way, here are our three having a go.










We cooked sausages on sticks, a favouite W thing to do, almost as good as roasting marshmellow, which we also did.



J made Artist Trading Cards with E and the other children, they LOVED it and now J has a new artistic passion. You can find out all about ATC's at www.artist-trading-cards.ch.