Tubing, or, my disasterous weekend!

Welcome to Monday Morning, the place where weekends end. We went away this past weekend, and boy- was it not a great weekend.

Let me back up a bit. Every year, my dad's family gets together to camp, and tube, and have fun. Private land is made available to us one week a year, always the week containing the first Saturday of August. It's my dad's boss's land. When Raegan was a baby, I went for the first time. I don't recall if that was the first year they got together, or just the first year I went.

There were 3 campers and 1 tent, and roughly 15 of us total. It was empty and peaceful. That first year, I was driving a car that died when it rained. Well, Friday night, it rained. Saturday, since I hadn't brought a suit or a life jacket for Rae, we were stuck at the campsite. I waited most of the day for the car to dry out so I could leave, and when it finally started, we took off. By the following summer, I was living up north, and forgot all about it.

In 2005, over the first weekend, I had a birthday party for a friend's little boy on that same weekend. My Grandma was having a garage sale as well. I drove down Friday night, set my stuff up, and we had a yard sale on Saturday. After the yard sale, I drove the car down her long driveway to get her newspaper, then back up to the drive. I shut the car off. 20 minutes later, I went to start it, and it wouldn't start.

I tried to get a hold of dad to come look at it, but found out they were gone for the weekend. I couldn't remember where to go, but got a hold of some family who gave me general directions. Grandma, Raegan, and I drove up there (the place is only about a 30 minute drive), so I could see about borrowing dad's 3rd car. He kept a beater around for the purpose of driving when one of the cars was dead.

Long story short, I wound up getting the car, then me and Rae spent the night up there. Boy, had it grown! There were probably 10 trailers, and 5 or 6 tents. There must have been about 40 people who stayed over night. On Sunday, Mona (my step-mom) took Raegan tubing down the river for the first time, before we headed out for my friend's son's birthday party.

The following year, I decided I wanted to go. To make it easier, it was just me and the girls staying Thur-Sunday. We got there, stayed the night, then on Friday, Mona took us tubing to see how Gilly would do. She didn't do good. On top of that, my keys got sucked to the bottom of the river. I borrowed Mona's car to take me home, and pick up both Nick and his car keys. Chris was with his Grandma for the weekend.

We wound up tubing the next day, while my mom took both girls. It was fun, and relaxing, and aside from the day before, my first tubing trip ever. I loved it! What's not to love? Relaxing in the sun, floating down a nice warm river, with a drink in hand, and my two favorite guys (my hubby & my dad) by my side?

In 2007, Nick and I had sitters for the kids, and went down just for the day on Saturday. We drove down early in the morning, went tubing, then stayed at my mom's house nearby for the night. It was still fun.

In 2008, last year, I went camping with the girls again. It was a long weekend. My step-mom was not in a good mood, and didn't like sharing the trailer with us. On Friday, after tubing with the girls, I nearly packed up and left in tears. My step-mom was not in a good mood. My dad calmed me down and had me stay.

On Saturday, the entire group went tubing, and when we got back, my dad was gone. He and I share a rather acute phobia of snakes, and my dad's family likes to tease him about it. He had been dealing with Mona's foul mood, so when they pretended to drop a live snake on him (it was fake), he got ticked, and left. He didn't come back until late Sunday, when most the people were gone.

It was a tense weekend, and I decided I wouldn't camp with Mona & Dad again. When I got my own tent, it seemed like a good compromise. I wouldn't be encroaching on Mona & Dad, but could still camp over. I talked Nick into going, and we brought all 3 kids for the first time.

Come Thursday, I called my dad up to find out when they were going up. I had been seeing reports of rain all week for Saturday up there, but on Wed, it was saying sun on Saturday. I wanted to figure out what I was going to do. I had a few cousins tease me about wimping out because of rain, and I really did want to go. I found out Dad & Mona had decided not to camp out this year.

They would be up Friday during the day, and Saturday to tube. Uh... well, my dad is a big part of why I like going. With a huge family like I have, I tend to feel out of place. I checked with my brother, and he was still going. By Thursday night, Nick and I had mostly talked ourselves into only going for the day on Saturday to tube, then coming home.

Friday morning, I was up early, though, and it was gorgeous out. I wanted to GO right then. We packed the van and car both up all the way (the van's been acting up a bit, so we didn't want to get stuck somewhere, but also needed the space the van provides for packing).

When we pulled in, everyone was gearing up to head out to tube. We had NO time to unpack. It was throw your suits on, grab your tubes, and lets GO. We did, then when we got back to camp, the adult only trip starts- a 45 minute trip further down river without kids. Mona & Dad were there, and agreed to watch the kids, so Nick and I continued on.

Our ride didn't realize 9 of us went down, so had to pick us up in shifts. While Nick was being picked up, I found some space, and started to set the tent up, then he helped me get it up completely. We unpacked, then went into town, grabbed the van, and some groceries.

Through out the whole evening, mentions of rain came up. We told people we were NOT planning to spend Saturday night, because regardless of whether or not it rained Saturday, it was supposed to rain over night, and on and off all Sunday. I had zero desire to pack up a tent in the rain.

Friday, we had fun. I think I had 2 drinks over the course of 4 hours, nothing that got me buzzed or drunk at all. However, several people DID get drunk. My brother & his girlfriend went through a LOT of beer Friday night. When I went to bed, Nick had been in bed since around 9- he doesn't like socializing much, and was bored. Well, turns out, the air mattress had a very slow leak.  By the time I came to bed, it was almost flat. We hadn't packed sleeping bags for us, so there wasn't any padding under us. We both got almost no sleep from there on out.

We were both up really early. My aunt Peg, who is grouchy, sarcastic, and has no fear of saying what's on her mind, made some rude comments to Nick. He was up first, my aunt Caroline followed, then aunt Peg. My brother's beer bottle & can horde hadn't been taken care of, so there was a small table FILLED with close to 24 bottles & cans of beer (at least 18-20 of which came from them two). My aunt Peg looked right at Nick and said something about the drunks being pigs and not taking care of their stuff.

He told her he was in bed before 9. She shut up for a bit. At this time, I was running into town to get some breakfast, and use a real bathroom. When I got back, my brother's girlfriend was cleaning up the bottles & cans. Apparently, aunt Peg mentioned it again when more people were out there.

I get there, and give Nick his breakfast sandwich, and I'm eating mine. Gilly's up, and eating a hash brown, but the other two kids were still asleep. I let Gilly eat both their hash browns and toss the empty bag into the trash. Aunt Peg starts making comments about eating McDonalds. I said, "Yep." She said, "It's camping, you don't eat out at camping." I said, "Yep, it's VACATION." She also made pointed remarks about drunks, while looking at me. Um, excuse me, but bite me. She's worse than anyone in my family when it comes to being a drunk.

-eyeroll-

On top of that, I was dealing with Amber & my niece teasing me about anything they could. Morgan is starting to become more and more like Amber, and I don't like it.

While I was gone, I used my phone's internet to check several websites, and got the same thing- raining hard, mid afternoon. Thunder & lightening. Joy. We started packing up after telling everyone that. Amber, my brother's girlfriend, went to check it herself, and said, "No, it's only a 55% chance. It's not going to rain." Well, sorry, but I checked 4 sites that each said rain. She checked the phone's weather feature on her phone.

I was irritable to begin with, and decided it was time to start packing up. Nick and I decided that the high potential for rain wasn't worth getting stuck on the river just to tube. It was supposed to rain dead in the middle of a 3 hour trip down the river. No thanks.

When we were packing up, I started back out towards the fire, and about 6 of my cousins & Amber were all making fun of me and my paranoia over rain. I was not happy. We had planned to stick around till later in the early evening. After all that we'd dealt with that morning, I was done. I wasn't having fun anymore, I was pissed, I wanted to leave.

We got packed up by 10, and I was tempted to just leave, without saying anything, but I couldn't do that. Instead, I sent the kids around while we packed to say their good byes. We left, and headed into town for the car show. My uncle Sam has a nice (drool) little 1968 Shelby Mustang GT500KR, which is pretty rare. Only 933 of that particular one were made.

I have a cousin who does the car show every year with his 1979 Pontiac Firebird, as well, but I had never seen the Shelby. We went there and drooled for a bit. I have a bit of a love for muscle cars. I want LOTS of muscle cars when I finally get rich. I mean, I plan to fill a huge garage with them.

Gilly played a game and got 2nd place, and won a nice set of dominos and a bag of candy. When we left, we grabbed lunch, and took our time heading back home. Nick and I were both so sore from sleeping on the ground, that moving hurt, but sitting still for long bouts also hurt.

I'm not planning to camp over again with my family. It was irritating, and not fun. More and more people brought irritating dogs- one in particular was chained up, and barking almost constantly. Why bring the dog if you are just leaving it chained up and not paying it any attention? At that point, it's time to hire a neighbor kid to come and let the dog out and feed it.

One aunt also mentioned that it wasn't a fun weekend. She said she probably won't stay over the weekend next year. I can't say as I blame any of them. It was NOT fun.

Edited to add:

I talked to my dad on Sunday, and apparently, it rained BAD up there on Saturday.