A couple of weekends ago some buddies and I took a weekend trip to Starved Rock for a men-only camping trip. There were five of us: me, Jeremy, Dave, Eric and Colin, but the camper wasn’t all that crowded. Parking was, however, since most of us had to drive separately.
Jeremy and I headed to camp early Friday afternoon. We dropped the camper off at the campsite then drove to Ottawa in the rain, where we played a round of disc golf in the rain. Afterwards, we drove back in the rain and set up the camper in the rain. See a pattern? Dave showed up around 7pm and the rain continued pretty heavily until about 8:30pm. Around 9:00, Colin and Eric showed up.
On saturday, we hiked most of the trails at Matthiessen State Park. The weather was very cooperative, but the previous rain made most of the trails in the lower dells very muddy; Colin found himself knee-deep in the mud at one point. I fell in the pool at the bottom of the falls (apparently wet slanted rock is slick). Colin was attacked by a salamander at the same pool (okay, it just climbed over his foot).
Dave and Jeremy had to leave around mid afternoon, so Colin and Eric and I headed out to Starved Rock afterwards. He hiked up St. Louis canyon followed by heading up Starved Rock itself around sunset. On top of the rock we ran into a group of amateur “ghost hunters” looking for “orbs” in their digital photos.
Sunday morning, we ended up sleeping in pretty late, so Colin and Eric had to leave. I took the opportunity to winterize the camper. Now it’s time to wait for spring… Actually, I’ll likely try to plan a tent camping trip like last year if I can swing it.
I posted the pictures from our excursion on the photos page. In case you’re wondering about the pictures, I’d just gotten a new camera, so we did a lot of fooling around trying to get interesting action shots.