The further I get from the wonderful ten days away the harder it is to remember all the things about it.We decided to try to go away for ten days with Abigail since there was Stony Rendezvous in Johnstown the weekend before memorial day. This would have meant back and forth driving or to just stay out west. We chose the latter.
I remember snippets that make me so happy. One night, Ron and Janet went to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary and after Abi was asleep it was just David and I with no electronic distractions. We sat at the table and played two rounds of Yahtzee while my ipod played songs that haven't been played in a long time. The shake and clatter of the dice, the quiet music and the two of us thinking our moves out loud was all the night held, too cold for the frogs and bugs to be out yet.
Slowly, over the week, though, a solo, long-winded croon could be heard from some hidden frog. I spied one single lightening bug looking for love while I stared at the fire after David had driven into town for his wi-fi fix.
The first morning at the ranch, the fourth day away, David took Abi to breakfast and then to vacation school (the local daycare we used last year as well). This was the usual pattern for the five weekdays at the ranch. David and Abi would depart while I got to sleep or read or wander around in the morning sun. That first morning I stayed in bed and read. I got up to go to the bathroom and eat some cereal but otherwise I plowed through 1/3 of that book the first day. It was quiet with only an occasionally call from a bird. I did miss my streaming music in these moments. I never realized how much I liked to have it on.
Now back to the routine of work, dinner, TV, bed. Back to sitting all day and night, thinking in my head what I'll do with time when I get it again, not realizing the time is there if the TV goes off. I wore my pedometer while away and reached the goal of 10k steps everyday easily. Tromping around the ranch, walking to the bathroom, back and forth from the fire pit to the chimenea after scrounging any piece of wood I could burn. Being away and coming back has made me long to have a more active lifestyle. Not like mountain biking and marathons but more like one where walking around is done more than ten minutes here and there throughout the day.
Here's some stuff from the trip:
Pickle Backs - A drink of whiskey following by a swallow of pickle juice. Sitting around the fire with 25 others, the bottle and jar went round and round. Pickle lovers grabbed a gerkin or two before continuing it on. It shows real friendship that almost everyone partook in putting their lips on the glass. Along with pickle backs there was moonshine from Tennessee (obviously), cheese that was either called or from a store called Cheezus of Nazareth. Both the pickle backs and cheese were brought by our friend Jeff, who introduced me to Old Chub scotch ale last year. He is clearly a keeper. And he added to the kayak lexicon "2nd poops" which is when you sometimes have to go again in the morning, so getting ready and leaving for the river is delayed until 2nd poops happens.
Vacation School - nothing like dumping your child at the local daycare while on vacation. The rational was we wanted to keep her scheduled and also wanted to keep her entertained and climate-controlled. I also wanted to sleep, damnit, which is everything a vacation needs.
Mystical Flames - This was better received than I thought it would be when I bought them. I guess it helps that we are a bunch of hippies who are easily amused. The mystical flames are a packet of chemicals that, when burned, turn the flames blue, green, and purple. They were especially fun when accompanied with the kid's pack of fireworks David picked up on the way back from an excursion to a store in Pittsburgh for specialized Birkenstocks. Every time we pass somewhere that sells fireworks I ask to stop or buy some and am always told no as we continue on our way. David didn't know that I've never lit fireworks and have always wanted to. PA law states that PA residents can't buy fireworks that leave the ground so we were stuck with poppers, screamers, sparklers and so on. near the end we just tossed them in the fire to see what happened.I worked on my fire apprentice skills all week long, making fires in the chimenea near the deck.
dinners and Rummikube were on the picnic bench. It was nice to eat outside as the sun went down. Of course, a few nights I was granted a Duraflame log to get the fire started. On the night that it was just David and I, I tried to start the fire the old fashion way - with paper towels and a barbecue lighter. The fire lit a while and then died to coals. David and I sat in the dark chatting. He was about to go check the internet when I saw a tiny spark go up. Then, with a small poof, the fire just came back to life from the coals. I still have much to learn but I was super excited to see it come back. I sat, after David had gone, and watched the fire grow and recede and grow and recede along the logs. I stayed up many nights past my bedtime watching the fire, either alone or with company.
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Hummingbirds - it was fun to watch the hummingbirds come to the feeder on the deck throughout the day. There were different colored ones and they even started fighting each other over the feeder. I spent time trying to capture the birds mid sip and got some great action shots. While alone on the ranch, with David down at the local outfitter working through his emails, I walked around and noticed things I never noted before. The wind chimes and the stuff squirrel that hung along the house. on Sunday as the sun was coming down Abi and I ventured into the back part of the ranch that I never ventured into before. The light was amazing so you could see me darting for the Abi Shack to grab the camera and darting back so no time was missed. 
Cucumber Falls - Part of being away and not paddling gave us the opportunity to do things we hadn't done before. The rivers were so high that I didn't paddle. The one day I would have paddled I opted for lazing around. David paddled six days out of the ten and he was mighty bored for the other four. Three of the days David paddled were during the Stony Rendezvous while in Johnstown, PA. He paddled Friday, Saturday and Sunday. He got to paddle the Shade Creek and the Stonycreek at high water. I paddled with him on Sunday at a higher level and the water was very cold through my warmer gloves. The other three days he spent on the Stonycreek midweek at normal flow, the Yough at 5.2 feet and then at 3.9 feet. On one of the days he didn't paddle, we went to look at Cucumber Falls, the waterfall that is tucked back near the rapid with the same name. I have passed it many times but never gone to see it, too busy running shuttle, heading to the and from the river, dinner or the ranch. This was the perfect time to see it. You park your car in the small lot and there a short staircase to the waterfall. It was peaceful and pretty. There was dry rock near the top of the fall so I climbed out and sat for a bit. Then we headed back to the ranch to kill time on the porch which gave us three bars on our cell phones. We also showed Abigail the natural waterslides that were roaring with such high water. Crockpot and pot luck - On Monday I served a popular crockpot meal to Ron and Janet and they loved it. It was decided that I would make it for the group on saturday night when everyone arrived. We also ate well with steaks, potatoes, grilled chicken and tortellini, and of course pizza hut. Cause I am pizza hut lovin'.
