More to the Story

As I was drifting off to sleep last night, I realized that I had left out several parts of our Browns Hole story that were key in adding to the craziness of our trip. And since this blog serves as our family journal (and because its just funny) I wanted to document the “other details” I left out.

After returning home from our 3 hour round trip search for baby formula the two younger kids were zonked out in the car so we had to move them into our tent. We had set up our 10 man tent and therefore had oodles of room for us all but we unfortunately forgot Dawsons pack in play which made us have to get creative with sleeping arrangements because neither Dawson or us can sleep together (we’ve always been in separate beds/rooms). Luckily we came up with the idea to use a little outdoor car seat like thing we had brought to keep bugs away from Dawson during the day and even more lucky is that it reclined to almost a laying position. So we put Dawson in that and then stuffed clothes underneath to make it more “level.” Dawson had a hard time getting to sleep, however, being in a new place and all, so we ended up having to rock him on our air mattress while we got the other two little boys snuggled up tight in their sleeping bags.

Finally the moment arrives and all little boys are down. Adam and I change into our pajamas and also get nestled down into our sleeping bags only to realize that our neighbors who are down the hill from us and across the road are playing music VERY loudly. So loudly that even with earplugs in and a pillow over my head that I could hear EVERY word to EVERY song they played. The good news at least though was that they were playing really good music. The bad news though, was that they played it probably until 2 or 3 in the MORNING! (We went to bed at midnightish). So being the light sleeper that I am, I had a really hard time falling asleep. Plus one of the songs they played was one that I always get stuck in my head! I love it, but once I hear it, I just can’t seem to get the tune out of my head (Your hot and your cold, you’re yes than your no, you’re in than your out, you’re up and you’re down…..that one) So I also had that rattling around in my brain for awhile too! But Finally they turned off the music and I was able to drift off to sleep.

However, the sleep didn’t last long and all throughout the rest of the night I was either up with Dawson (who wiggled out of his covers 4 times and g0t cold), or up because I had gotten cold and had to rearrange my blanket and sleeping bag in such a way as to cover up my head, or up with Harrison who had slid to the bottom of his sleeping bag and couldn’t figure out how to get his head out. Then just when I thought all had settled down and I could rest, I heard some neighbors come in and set up camp next to us at probably 4 or 5 in the morning! ahhhh! So needless to say, I didn’t get much sleep.

The next morning we also had two other kind of weird things happen. At about 6 am my brothers got up and took their 4-wheelers out to go spot deer and Elk and apparently went on a 4-wheeler trail near some campers. Well later that afternoon as they were returning home, they discovered that these lovely neighbors had gone and CUT DOWN TREES (Illegal in National Forest area) and then set up a road block so my brothers couldn’t use the 4-wheeler trail by their camp. Wow. Really? So my brothers ended up having to MOVE THE ROADBLOCK so they could return back to camp.

Then later that afternoon as we were sitting around the campfire talking, we had the other neighbors (the ones that came in at 4 or 5 am) come over, walk into our camp with Jakes Dog (who apparently had wandered over there) and throw the dog into our camp, swearing, and saying they would kick the #%*& out of the dog if it came over again. I was totally shocked. I mean I can understand that the dog was bugging them, but did they really need to come over and make a scene and swear in front of all our little kids, instead of politely ask us to keep the dog in our camp (especially since Jake didn’t even know she had gone over there and was bugging them). It was kind of crazy. So anyway, I thought I’d also capture those funnies from our trip as well.

If you have been around the Harrison family much and know of our vacation history, you will know that stories like this are pretty common. Its something we’ve all come to just expect and laugh at. I’ve created a list in my personal journal of some of the crazy things that have happened to us on vacations and its just humorous. From Forest fires, and flash floods at Flaming Gorge, to all but two of us getting the plague at Lake Powell, to gusts of winds that knock over trailers on the freeway, to ER trips from water weenie rides, to near drownings at Ubba Lake, to having propane bottles fall off and drag behind my Dad’s truck in Goblin Valley, to boats catching on fire, to wind storms blowing tents into gullies, sending water toys flying like kites, and jet skiers unable to return home, to coming upon accidents where cars have lost control and wrapped themselves around trees, and the list goes on. One of these days, I’ll write about all these fun trips, but for now, I just have fun laughing at all the crazy things that seem to happen when us Harrisons go on vacation. Its all for the Story! 🙂