cross one off

One summer to-do that I was really craving was camping. We tried exploring a local state park on our anniversary, but it happened to be chock full of tweens looking like they got lost on their way to Gadzooks. Nature fail.

Fast forward to 4th of July weekend - I had a few days off work and decided on Wednesday that we must go this weekend but of course I had no time to deal with logistics, so Brian put on his Good Husband hat and spent hours researching local campgrounds before settling on Governor Dodge State Park, four hours away outside Madison, WI.

Getting a good campsite is critical and the odds aren't in your favor: you could be too far from the bathrooms; be directly next to them; have no shade, no privacy, no grass, no flat surfaces, or the worst upon worst - no place to hang a hammock. For some reason, a random person happened to have made a video on YouTube of all the campsites, so we actually got to choose our site based on a photo, which is nothing short of a miracle. All the shots were taken during the winter, so we were pumped to arrive at this lush little cove:

Other highlights from the weekend included:

Discovery of American flag Budweiser cans.

I feel pretty confident that I'd never had an entire full-bodied Budweiser before that weekend, and yet it took me approximately one second to be converted in the beer aisle at Walmart.

Brian: We're getting that American flag beer.

LB: Ew, what? No Brian that's dumb. And gross...Wait, the cans have flags on them? It's not just the box?...Okay yeah we're totally getting that.

Realizing we forgot utensils.

Nothing makes you feel like a badass more than making bacon-egg-and-cheese breakfast tacos with only foil and a pot. Somehow this assured me that I might survive if I was ever left to die in the woods (totally irrational from all angles).

Playing beer die with a rock wrapped in foil.

Because why not.

post-sink

Hammock, smores, sparklers, lightning bugs, raccoons attacking our cooler, and all things camp-ish.

Geocaching.

So one day we wanted to go hiking but didn't really know how far we wanted to go or where we wanted to end up, i.e. the perfect recipe for a little geocaching. There was only one cache that looked like it was at all near us, so we struck out on a trail and tried to head in the right direction. The problem is, the GPS will tell you exactly how far away you are if you go in a straight line, but when you're in the woods, you have to make some educated guesses about which trails are going to get you where you want to go. And there's obviously no guarantee you're going to find it, if you can even get close.

After about an hour of hiking we were getting discouraged, and I suggested we go 15 more minutes before turning back. Low and behold, we reached a separate trail leading to a cave: the perfect spot to hide a geocache! So we got to a huge rock formation, and the GPS said 90 feet in front of us. We walked around to the other side, and the GPS said 90 feet in front of us. I would say we obviously had no choice but to climb on top of it, but that wasn't obvious to me at all. What was obvious was that we'd wasted a lot of time and now were getting mixed signals from the GPS and had zero indication that this thing was actually going to be on top and were thinking about climbing up something that I wasn't sure could be climbed up. By the time I'd finished processing all that, Brian was in a cheerleader booster position waiting to hoist me up...sigh.

After a little scrambling we made it to the top, and the GPS said it was only 16 feet away. That's about as accurate as it gets, so I started looking while Brian totally lost interest altogether (p.s. this is by far the most fun part - how can you just give up at the end?!). After a couple of minutes, I noticed this:

Upon closer inspection.
Jackpot!

Okay, now I know this story could not have possibly made you as excited as I was to find this thing, but I was STOKED. It's just so cool to go out looking for you don't even know what, and then two hours and one rock formation later, to find an ammo box hidden behind a rock! It contained the usual tchotchkes, a guide of local poisonous plants (thanks?), and a one-sheeter about the history of the park. Nothing too exciting. BUT we also got to see this awesome view, which we never would've stumbled upon on our own. Accidental exploration is really the best thing about geocaching anyway.

Overall, I got my camping fix and thought it was a great way to spend the 4th of July! Cheers for the USA!