Taken on October 14, 2004.

Five years ago today: Again, I’m late on this one. For a fair stretch of time I was camping every single year in Chenango Valley State Park with family and friends. This particular year, I remember, it was rather cold a few of the nights. I was sleeping alone in the tent (Eliza wouldn’t have it being that cold) and I recall waking up with frost on my nose. No, I didn’t sleep in that camper.

Oh, I’m the guy looking incredibly tired in the middle. I’m tired because it was probably very, very early in the morning. But when I’m camping there is no way that I will miss breakfast. It is my most favorite part of camping. And, even though we’d be up all night doing who knows what, I have to be awake in the morning for breakfast – no matter how early.

To my left is my brother-in-law Chris and to my right is one of his employees Ryan.

I wish I had taken a lot more photos (I didn’t even get everyone in a photo). I’m looking forward to camping at least one more time this summer (and hopefully for more than just one night). All-in-all a great short trip and everyone seemed to have a good time.

Yearly camping trips seem to be the norm for me since I was a teenager. Once married, the trend has continued, though Eliza was not always able to go. This time I was very happy she was able to go, even though the mosquitoes seemed to pay her much more attention than most of us.

This year, we had the opportunity to camp somewhere close to home. With gas prices the way they are, this just seemed like a good idea. We chose to camp at Keen Lake campground in Waymart, Pennsylvania – which is about a 25-minute drive from our apartment to our campsite. The fact that it was only a 25-minute drive ended up coming in handy.

Left to right starting in back: Chris, Bryan
Second row: Colin, Eliza, Trudy, Josh, Niki
Front row: Giana, Ivan, Ava, Andrea

On our first night at Keen Lake, there was a horrible thunderstorm that hit at around 3am. It was over by about 5am, but most of us were up at that point. What made this thunderstorm so bad, was not necessarily the few inches of rain that ended up failing in such a short period of time – but rather the lightning and thunder.

This storm was literally over our heads. Frighteningly close. One particular bolt of lightning struck the island in the middle of the lake we were sleeping next to. If I had to guess, I’d guess that the island was about 1,500 feet from our very own feet. Those 1,500 feet (or ~ 1/3 of a mile), were all water mind you. When this bolt hit, it made a sound like no other I’ve ever heard. It literally compressed my chest and made me entire body come off of our air mattress. Others said that they felt the same pressure when it hit.

The next day, while kayaking I was talking to Mike Kopa (ex-coworker of mine circa 1999-2001 and now employee of Keen Lake campground) and he told me what happened when that bolt hit the island. On said island is a cabin available for rent. A family of 5 (I think), and their dog were staying in the cabin when the bolt struck. The bolt hit the TV antenna for the cabin, followed it down through the TV (blew the TV right out) and spread through the cabin via the electrical system. Where cords led to lamps, the rug burned. Various appliances were laid useless. And most tragic of all, the family dog was sleeping on one of the extension cords and lost its life due to electric shock.

An incredible story to be sure. But it does show you the sheer force of nature is something that, while attempted by many smart individuals, can never be stopped. I remember talking with an electrician that used to work for a hospital in Chicago, Illinois. He called lightning “magic”, as all their attempts to stop it were useless. He said “…if hit directly with lightning, there is almost nothing you can do to stop it. We have circuit breakers in the hospital that are so big that you wouldn’t be able to touch both sides – lightning jumps across them as if they didn’t even exist.”.

The rest of the weekends weather was very nice, and we did our best to take advantage of it. We went kayaking, played frisbee and bocce, and swam at every opportunity. You can see photos from our trip in this photo set on Flickr.

Can’t wait to go camping again, though I’d rather not wait an entire year to do so.

[tags]camping, keen lake, lightning, thunder, storm, camp, campsite, campground, pennsylvania, waymart, colindevroe[/tags]

We went camping for five days, we had to drive a friend back and forth to Newark, New Jersey, and we had a little shindig in said friend’s honor prior to camping – all of these things could have lent themselves to massive gains for yours truly, but I was able to suppress most of the impulses and came out on top.

Well, sorta. I didn’t lose a single pound. I am still at 206.6. But that is ok with me, considering the beer, ice cream, smores, hamburgers dripping with grease and smothered in cheese, macaroni salad that you wanted to swim in, banana bread, wine, bacon, and various other fatty and high calorie foods were floating around. Oh, and I had quite a bit of sushi twice this week. Man that stuff gets me every time.

I consider it a personal victory that I had the ability to restrain myself to the extent that I did not gain any weight.

From what I read, many of my fellow dieters did well, so I’m really happy about that too.

The camping trip, and the saga that is my computer, will be written up as soon as I catch up on work. Now, off to play some basketball to get back into my normal schedule, and begin seeing results once again.

[tags]diet, the-diet, weigh in, camping, food[/tags]