Ready? Set? Camp!

What a lovely weekend I've had! We all drove up to Medoc Mountain State Park (just past Rocky Mount, NC) for two nights of peaceful camping. The first day, we set up camp and then went on a three-mile hike. We gallantly trudged uphill and downhill, through dark and leafy tunnels and areas where the air was so thick with the sweet scent of honeysuckle you could practically bottle it and sell it on eBay. The setting sun filtered down through the leaves, sending faint shafts of light across our path and drawing our eyes to our surroundings every time a stray boulder or fallen log was bathed with the light. Then, after some fire-roasted hot dogs and marshmallows, we showered at the bathrooms and then went to sleep. Well, I tried to sleep, but I was distracted by my flashlight illuminating the Bard's own A Midsummer Night's Dream (I'd never before read it and it was a very good read). Then, the temperature dropped rapidly, such that I woke myself with shivering every half hour until day break. But, boy! Was it dark! The next day, we went on another hike, this time with the intent to find fertile fishing waters. Three hours, more than four miles (up and around the mountain), and after spotting only one single tiny minnow, we headed back to camp for a breather. That night, we went to the picnic area, a verdant series of rolling hills reminiscent of plantation homes of antebellum times. There, two men were setting up some high-tech astronomy equipment. When night fell, they let us look through their telescopes and other equipment that I cannot ever begin to describe to see the moon (and it's various craters and mountain ranges in high detail) and Saturn! I could see the rings around Saturn! How cool is that! We then walked back to camp in the darkness, but the moon's brightness was such that it cast our shadows before us as we walked, barring the need for a flashlight. That night was cool, but not terribly cold, as I set about finishing Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets by flashlight. The next morning, I arose groggy, head full of a second night's weird dreams. Both nights, the muse of dreams seemed determined to fill my dreams with thoughts and notions that I had refused to let myself dwell on in my waking moments. Cinderella may have said that a dream is a wish your heart makes, but I hope no such vindictiveness or idle hope sits in my heart that I would wish for such dreams to come true. And now I'm home, tired, ready for sleep, with the prospect of a full and exciting day tomorrow, having convinced everyone that they most fervently wished to see Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End at tomorrow's noontime matinee!