(click here for today's pictures)
Oh what a wonderful, wonderful day. It probably doesn't take much for me to really have a great day especially when we mark off one more state park along with a national memorial site from the national park service.
We slept incredibly well until the gun shots and then the loud quacking and roar of ducks. We guess that since it is duck season, some folks got an early start this morning. Their early start caused the ducks near us to go absolutely insane-if we hadn't been awake from the gunshots, the ducks would have surely woken us up. That was fine though because Robby and I went right back to sleep.
After our last time camping, Robby and I added another blanket to our bed. The blanket is incredibly cozy and warm-so cozy and warm that I would get hot during the night and have to kick my leg out of the blanket...then I would get cold and have to move my leg back in.
We took a while to start stirring last night. I even read some of my book this morning as I sat on the bed looking at the back window at the lake. It was nice and I could have stayed there longer, but breakfast was calling our name,
Robby had a bit of difficulty with his grill this morning due to all of the wind so it took him a bit longer than usual, but soon that bacon was cooked. Then there was pancakes and egg in the holes to make. Breakfast was delicious and thankfully in the sun, it wasn't too freezing outside.
We gobbled up breakfast and then started on our breakfast clean up. It didn't take long to pick up and soon we were in the car headed to the trail of the day. The trail of the day was Delta Point Trail. It was 2 and a half miles long though the trees. It was a super neat trail full of bridges to cross and little hills to go over and over. Some of us were starting to feel like we had walked a few more miles than 2.5 when we got back to the car.
They dropped Campbell and I off at the visitor's center on the way back to the campsite. We got our passport book stamped and even bought a sticker for our sticker collection. We then made a few sandwiches and grabbed a few packs of peanut butter crackers and hit the road.
The goal was to drove to Arkansas Post State Park. It was about 40 minutes away, and we were about 10 minutes away when I did look and see that they were closed on Mondays. That was fine since we still wanted to see it and things were outside.
We drove up to the park, but Robby's GPS kept telling him that he had 2 more miles to go. He thought that was odd and did some double checking. Some how he saw that there is a part of the National Park Service. Gracious me. We would have kicked ourselves forever if we had not seen that.
Robby and I are such lovers of the national park system-how could we not realize that we were near one. Shame on us for not doing our research. Robby also quickly saw that the park was closed-stupid covid, but the grounds were open.
We still drove there and got out. I was picking up stamps for our national park books, and the ranger inside saw us and came out. She gave the kids Jr. Ranger books and badges and told us facts about the park.
The Arkansas Post was the capital of Arkansas for a few years, it was also the site of a few Civil War battles and the Arkansas Gazette was began here. We walked around a lake looking at their signs. As we were on the sidewalk, Reagan was walking in front of us when a huge armadillo came up and started running beside her. That crazy girl didn't miss a beat and kept walking. I would have squealed and ran as fast as I could. Not Reagan, she just kept on walking as that armadillo crossed the sidewalk about 3 feet from her.
After exploring the National Park site, we went to the State Park. Even though it was closed, we still went all around the grounds exploring. It was quite interesting, but since they were closed, I will have to mail them to get my stamp for that state park.
On the way back to the campsite, Reagan drove the whole 40 minutes. She did really well, even though Anderson wasn't too convinced and kept asking me if Dad was a little less jerky. We arrived alive so all was well.
Back at the campsite, Robby thought about starting a fire, but it didn't take much convincing him for us just to do s'mores in the camper. It is chilly outside! The neighbors all seem to have fires, plus surprisingly, most of the neighbors are staying here through Thanksgiving. I guess if you don't have any family around, then why not come camping for Thanksgiving. Robby and I may do that when we are old and the kids are spread out everywhere.
Campbell and Graham went fishing on the little pier near the camper. It was chilly outside but they seemed to enjoy it. They didn't catch anything at all but had fun trying. While they were fishing, Whitman and Keaton were riding their bikes. I guess all of the bike riding that I have been doing with Whitman has paid off. He can follow her pretty well and does well enough that his bike riding lessons with me are being cancelled. Actually, he needs a new, larger bike which would help him even more. That may have to wait until his birthday though.
Robby and Graham had showers this evening before we started on our chili. I will also have a shower later tonight mainly because Robby needs plenty of water in the grey tank tomorrow when he dumps. It didn't take long for us to heat up all of our cans for chili. Anderson did say that chili was his favorite camping meal.
Our chili was delicious. After eating, we cleaned up and turned on a basketball game that Graham had been wanting to watch. Robby did go to take the trash out, but reported back that the neighbors with the glowing fire didn't last very long and were already back in their camper-it is just chilly out there tonight.
After a good while-long enough that the kids thought we had forgotten about s'mores-we finally pulled them out. I was distracted with a book and playing on my computer. Robby thought that he had ordered chocolate for the s'mores the other day from Walmart. He had forgotten to do that, and since I had already been to Walmart twice on Saturday we opted to not go again. Necessity is the mother of invention so we rummaged around until we found our chocolate stash of leftover Halloween candy. We dug out the Hershey chocolate bars along with the Reese's peanut butter cups for s'mores.
And in case you are wondering, those peanut butter cups make them best s'mores ever. I could have had me another one or two of those. After cleaning up from that, I sat down to finish the blog. Now that I have finished that, I am about to get in the shower. The heater is running in there so it will be more like a sauna than a shower!
