Falon’s World

After the rather lousy weather on Saturday, we thought that Sunday may be the day that the forecast was actually correct, so we woke up before the crack of dawn to go down to the beach and see the sunrise. It was pretty dark and cloudy on the way there, but we tried to stay optimistic. While waiting for it to rise, Eric snapped some nifty photos:

Unfortunately, the sunrise was a dud, it got lighter, but no pretty colors to speak of. I got a couple of photos myself but nothing too good:

To prove we really were there:

Eric and I were pretty disappointed as we headed back to the cabin.

It was still really early when we got back, so we copied everyone else and went back to bed for a couple of hours. When we finally got up for the day, we decided to take a trip to Iargo Springs, like we did last year and take some photos. Nick, Dan and Kelsey came with as well.

I had a lot of fun learning about my camera and fiddling around with the darkness and the blur of the water. These are some of my shots:

Eric took a bunch of photos as well:

Which of course are much better than mine (again):

We climbed the 800 million stairs back up to the top. I got there first ( ), with Dan bringing up the rear:

The view from the top is pretty cool too:

When we got back from this trip, we packed our bags and all of our other stuff and loaded up the dogs to head home. While packing, Eric found this in the cooler:

We thought he was pretty neat, so did Mason, who tried to lick it. The drive home was long and Eric started to fall asleep with only 45 minutes to go so I made a concerted effort to keep him awake and we made it. We unloaded everything, cleaned up and I fell onto the bed. A long weekend, but fun.

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Woke up on Saturday morning relatively early considering how late some went to bed on Friday, to rain. Not a storm, just a steady drizzle. I was a little apprehensive about going canoeing when it wasn’t looking so great but was told the weather forecast was to be 75 and sunny. So, we headed out to the rental, did some dropping and exchanging of vehicles (Old Goldie played her part in that) and then we started out on the river.

We had an odd number of people, so Nick took a Kayak:

Just like last year, we saw some birds on the river, not as many though:

Some members of the canoe trip were a little more…risky, than others:

Then it started to thunder off in the distance, then a little closer, until it started to rain. I was already freezing, so I took Nick’s generous offer and put his sweatshirt on:

We came upon a bank where there were several people using a rope to swing out over the water and plunge into the river. Eric started insisting that everyone stop because he wanted to do it, so we did. Then he got up there, and was too scared to go first haha. So, after several other people went, Eric began to prepare, I was watching from below when all of a sudden SPLOOSH! I was under water. What in the hell??? Ben had been coming down beside my canoe, slipped in the clay bottom/drop-off, landed on the end and opposite side from where I was and catapulted me into the river. At least the water was very warm lol. After we had fished out what we could, I watched Eric again prepare and he swung out, I yelled when to let go in case he couldn’t see (he took his glasses off), and he screamed like a girl and thunked back into the hillside before swinging back out and eventually letting go – it was hilarious .

Shortly after we dumped the remaining water out of my canoe, we headed out, although we made several stops along the way, to peel off drenched clothing, go to the bathroom, and drink:

Next thing we know, it starts pouring (we were back on the water again) and thundering like crazy. The water was coming down so hard and fast we could hardly see, let alone dodge any submerged stumps or trees. It was really, really cold and the river water really warm, steam was lifting off into the sky. We stopped and got into the water to have a little warmth:

Then the weather cleared up, the skies turned blue and the sun came out:

We turned a bend in the river and saw this:

So of course, the guys wanted to stop to prove their manliness by jumping off yet another something-in-the-air:

Eric jumped again…well sort of, he lowered himself from the branches pretty far before he let go:

We left from there and it downpoured again, complete with thunder.

This soaked my second borrowed sweatshirt and then I was down to just a towel (not mine either):

Kelsey and I were both freezing and shivering like crazy by this point. Then the sun came out again (are you sensing a theme?):

By the time we reached the end of the trip, it was clouding up and looking like rain again so we hurried and packed up the van and headed back to the cabin.

Ben exercised the boys for us (and Kya a little):

(he’s hitting a ball with the bat and they’re retrieving, if you click on the photo, there’s a note)

We gathered around the campfire for awhile, I was freezing still and couldn’t get warm:

That didn’t last long before 1/2 of us succumbed to the need to nap (and get warm). Eric woke me up awhile later, I ventured outside for a bit, but a couple of people had not gotten up from their nap and shortly after I went to bed for the night. Eric came in much later after playing Euchre for several hours.

Last year was the first official Webteam Canoe Trip. This year some people weren’t going and there were some newbies along as well. Eric told Nick, Dan and Kelsey to meet at our house at a time I knew was totally unreasonable for us to be ready by – and I was right. So, we frantically rushed around trying to get everything together before we headed out: the dogs and us in the van and the other three following behind. When we stopped for gas I started to scope out the back of the van and realized that while Eric had remembered the tent and the EZ-Up (to go over the tent in case of rain), he had forgotten sleeping bags, pillows, air mattress etc.

We arrived at Ben’s cabin and decided the dogs could sleep in the garage in their kennels and we would sleep upstairs in the extra beds. It was a laid-back evening. Predictably, we had to run to the store and pick up some things we had forgotten and then everyone settled in for some card playing and campfire sitting.

There was an attempt to make popcorn over the fire, which resulted in:

Bailey decided he wanted to go and visit the neighbor’s black lab, Ben had to carry him back and Midas was very excited at his reappearance:

As the night wore on and people drank more, it was decided that laying out in the middle of the road would be a good idea.

Although Eric did get some cool night shots:

There was quite a lot of alcohol consumed:

Although that does not include several wine bottles full of other “stuff” .

After everyone was sufficiently drunk, we all went to bed, some of us earlier than others…

After unloading the U-Haul for the second time…

We all load back into the truck and begin the journey home.

We are already exhausted, eager to get home and just want this horrible trip over with so we don’t even stop and sight-see. It starts to pour again…with all of our stuff in the bed. Who cares? At this point we just desperately want to get home. Eric starts to fall asleep so I take the wheel for 3 hours or so (North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia), until I’m so cramped and in pain from being in the same position throughout the whole trip that we are forced to stop and stretch – the dogs needed some time to move around as well.

We finally make it to Ohio (thank goodness!!!!!)…and hit a deer. A buck. It bangs up the front of the truck a little but nothing major and everything still works. Since it was the parent of the person we were moving we were forced to get and incident report from the local police. Who were all so busy that they asked us if we could possibly not get one, but when Eric insisted, had us come to them to receive it. After another 45 minutes of waiting and photo-taking (by the police of the truck) we finally got back on the road. Could anything else go wrong?

Yes. Mason has diarrhea in the back seat. Luckily it’s mostly on the dog blanket but…ugh. So we stop at a Meijer gas station and clean it out as best we could and I force some Pepto-Bismol tabs down Mason’s throat (during the process of which he manages (in his mad thrashing) to slice open my thumb. The dog will eat poop but not the meds – go figure) and get back on the road yet again. We don’t get very far before we’re both drooping and absolutely MUST stop. We sleep for a couple of hours, potty the dogs and get back on the road. Only to stop a couple of hours later, again for more sleep. This trip pretty much sapped both of us totally. We’re hardly talking at this time and both just want to get home and shower and fall into a bed where our knee caps aren’t bent continuously and our butts aren’t completely numb.

We eventually do make it home (I don’t know about you, but I had some doubts there for awhile) and start to unload – only to find out that we must get a move on cleaning the truck out because it has to be picked up immediately. Things are even taken so far as to accuse us of not getting home at 3 am like we planned (how DARE we sleep!!) and to blame that on the dogs (not on the stupidity of the entire trip as a whole), we are shown no sympathy or understanding after this insane favor we carried out and forced to begin the unpacking process at this moment. I am more angry than I’ve been in awhile and allowed myself a quick shower before we vacuumed every inch of that cab, washed the windows, scrubbed the carpet and in the end, left it cleaner than when we received it.

At this point in the vacation, every single thing I was looking forward to didn’t happen and we are both so exhausted that we don’t want to do anything else but sleep. Unfortunately, we get yet more…news. Since we didn’t use the van, we are told that some random guy we don’t know is going to remove the hitch so that it can be sold on EBay and the money made back that was spent. I am incensed. Here we drive to NC, hauling a crap-ton of crap, it takes SIX HOURS longer than planned, deleted all vacation-y enjoyment from the trip, were treated like we were not trusted to use money only for gas only to get there and find that no one will tell us which house to drop the stupid trailer at, are told that our crappy trip to the coast for the sunrise must be funded out of our own pocket, unload the crap-ton of crap at various places (after Eric had loaded it to begin with), sleep crammed inside the cab of the stupid truck, get chewed out for sleeping and are now told that we must accommodate yet another time for the van to be “worked on” …not by the company that put the hitch on, but by some other guy, because “$300 can’t be wasted on Eric right now”, so it must be sold on EBay.

Meanwhile, very little appreciation is shown, in fact the only thing I heard was more complaining and whining. We were treated as a moving company (and storage if it comes down to it) and we had to request that gas be paid both directions. We were not offered accommodations, let alone expenses for food or anything remotely enjoyable. Nope. It was all about getting the crap-ton of crap there and then screw what happened to us. The result of this trip? I’m still so disgusted and angry I can’t even talk about it without wanting to hit something. Never again. Oh and did I mention that this friend that Eric did all of this for did not even come to thank him in person or even come to say good-bye. Yup. That’s how this all ended. One can only hope that this “vacation” gets better from here because honestly, how could it be any worse?

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Update ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

This post was written from my viewpoint, and my viewpoint alone. This does not mean that anyone else agrees with me.

Eric’s sugar-coated version will be posted HERE…eventually.

He has also pointed out that the receipt issue could have been for tax purposes – although I believe if that was the truth, it should’ve been mentioned and we would’ve taken it more seriously.

Finally, it has been agreed that we will keep the hitch but relinquish the ball.

Sometimes Eric is way too nice for his own good. A lot of times. Most of the time. Occasionally friends will stop him from being nice to a fault, but frequently people take advantage of him. He also often acts before he thinks. For example, he volunteered to haul a whole ton of his friend’s stuff all the way to North Carolina…in my van. Who’s van? Mine. Did I volunteer? No.

Ok, so since that really stupid generous offer of his was accepted, now what? Come to find out that the plan is that we will only be given 1/2 the gas money needed to make the trip down and back. Once we get there and said friend’s stuff arrives, we are on our own to make it home. Sweet. Do we have a couple hundred dollars to throw at a trip in the middle of the summer hauling a bunch of stuff to a place that I, for one, do not want to go to in the heat of July? The answer? Absolutely not. After a whole lot of arguing discussing, I gave in (I honestly did not see a choice) and the plan is put into motion. Eric partially bribed me with the promise of at least one UAD event, perhaps even two. The van has a hitch put on (so that a U-Haul trailer can be hooked to it and hauled to NC), which in itself was a huge hassle and made me late to an appointment, and then we both take a week off of work.

After Mason’s Agility Class, we rush home and start to frantically pack the van (this is after Eric spent the previous evening loading the U-Haul with all of the things that were stored in our garage and spare bedroom). Two hours after our desired departure time (11:00 pm) we pull out of the driveway – fully loaded…to hear…..SCRAPE SCRAPE SCRAPE accompanied by small jerks of the van. What the hell??? It sounds as though the tongue of the trailer is dragging on the ground. I get out and jog alongside as Eric drives and yup, it sure is. After some rather panicked phone calls (one of which was totally worthless and one of which was helpful – thanks Dad!) we decide to wait until morning to see what that stupid company U-Haul has to say. They have nothing. Oops.

So, we are allowed the use of a truck, a Chevy Silverado (not Eric’s) and are also, provided we go down and straight back, going to be given gas money not only to get there, but also to make it home – as long as we bring back the receipts of gas to prove that’s what we did. We cram all three dogs into the back and hope the weather stays clear (all of our stuff was in the open in the bed of the truck) and finally head out bright and early Sunday morning.

The plan is now to forgoe the things I was looking forward to and to just rush down, unload, and rush straight back. I was going along to make sure that Eric stayed alive (he tends to sleep while driving) and whole on the way back. The trip takes way, way, way longer than we thought (Google estimated 12 hours, it took us 18) but the scenery was beautiful and I made an honest attempt to have a good time and enjoy it.

Scenery:

I like bridges

Some shots of the dogs and I:

Spacious….

This is where Midas liked to be, that way when he was too hot, he showered us in dog-breath until we blasted the air conditioning and froze so that they would be comfortable.

We finally get to the house where we’re supposed to drop a load off and…there’s no house number and no one wants to answer their phone at 3 am. What to do now? We desperately wanted to have something enjoyable to come of this trip so we decide to go to the Ocean and have a chance at photographing the sunrise. We wanted to leave the damn trailer but unfortunately, Eric doesn’t feel he should leave it in front of a house potentially not the one we think it is…

2 hours later we make it to the coast (which, of course, we must pay the gas money for)…and it’s raining, pouring, cloudy, disgusting. Eric has yet to sleep, I’m exhausted and cramped from trying to sleep in extremely limited space and the sunrise isn’t even visible .

I could seriously have cried, I never even got out of the truck. Although, Eric got some nifty photos HERE.

We head back to the storage unit to unload all of the stuff crammed into the U-Haul.

Which takes two hours and a lot of sweat. Eric organizes a bunch of very useless stuff everything so as to be the easiest and most accessible and we finally leave to drop the rest of the bits off at the house we had tried to get to several hours earlier.

It is so hot that Midas can hardly function and the other two just want to lay around and pant. Miserable hot. I-never-want-to-move-to-North-Carolina hot (and that’s saying something). Humid and disgusting and sticky and…yeah.

Think this trip is already pretty horrible? Well, the trip home only got worse…

Friday

After class I went home and packed up everything I able to (and could find) and waited for Eric to get home. Once he got there (and found everything else he had “put away”), we loaded up the boys and headed out. We ended up leaving only a little later than planned, but due to a dinner stop (I like to chew my food…), we were running a little behind. Then we stopped in Cleveland, Ohio where the Indians were playing the Yankees at Jacobs Field…right at the end of the game.

It was packed to say the least and we were there for over an hour before we finally managed to escape. I really liked this purple building although I couldn’t capture it how I wanted

Yeah, definitely late now. We finally found the campsite, started to unload and I saw the biggest spider I’ve ever had the displeasure of seeing and had a mild (ok a little more than mild) panic attack. For a short time I refused to leave the truck and insisted I was sleeping in there…Eric coaxed me out though and we slept fine for the rest of the night.

Saturday

We woke up very bright and early (Oh did I mention that the side of the campground we were on didn’t have bathrooms? Or that we were bushes away from a pretty busy road? Yeah…it sucked.), had breakfast and then crossed the road and had a really good time letting the boys swim until they wanted to drop and collecting a wide variety of colored pretty stones. We have project ideas in mind for them…

We also saw this on the beach:

It even has a little “fire-pit”:

The rocks were each only about the size of the palm of my hand they look bigger though. Eric really liked this leaf and asked me to take a photo of it for him:

After the boys were sufficiently exhausted we loaded up we drove over to the Mercyhurst campus for the game. I hung out with the boys in the truck,

in the shade the whole time and it was nice and relaxing (they liked all the attention they got from people passing by who just had to give them a pat). GVSU slaughtered the “other” Lakers 59-7. Then we started the trip home…the long, long trip.

First, we trekked around trying to find a Hobby Lobby to complete our aforementioned project ideas. The night was not off to a great start. Next we struggled to find someplace to eat and finally we drove around for 2.5 hours looking for sand. Not any old sand would do. We needed Lake Erie sand…and Eric finally found it. I had long ago given up and was sleeping soundly in the passenger seat. We crossed the border into Michigan to the realization that we were going to have to stop immediately. Eric was falling asleep, it didn’t matter if I talked to him or he talked to me, his eyes were closed. We pulled over for a loonnngg nap at a rest stop, then struggled the rest of the way home (I had to continuously jolt Eric out of his eye-closing stupor). Arriving at our house at 8 am. Wow.

Sunday morning when we were packing up I saw this…I have no idea what it is:

On our trip home we did a lot more than we were supposed to . It was the best day ever!

We went to some scenic outlooks or random neat places and hiked some trails:

(Turns out I have a thing for water and waterfalls too)

Eric of course got a ton of photos:

We had a picnic at the beach and let Mason swim (this was his first time anywhere with waves so he was quite panicked that they were chasing him back onto shore – it was hilarious!):

Mason ran everywhere exploring…

and was exhausted enough to sleep the rest of the trip for the most part. I am sure the swimming helped too

This photo was Eric’s idea and I think it turned out great

Then we got to the bridge:

where Eric wanted a photo of his rock skipping abilities:

We stopped in Mackinac City and bought a sweatshirt for me, fudge and pasties for my parents, us and Eric’s mom and had dinner and then we were truly headed home. By this time we were leaving Mackinac City at the time that we originally told my parents we would be getting to their house, but we just didn’t want to miss any sight-seeing. They understood and Mom was up and waiting for us when we got there (we got lost for a short time). We picked Midas up, gave our thank-you gifts and were finally on the road to home. Needless to say, we fell right into bed when we got here and slept soundly.

(If you’re interested in seeing even more photos from this trip, go here.)

Saturday we were up very bright and early and stopped in Marquette for the sunrise. This is the same beach Eric photographed last year and we have framed in our house, along with this photo. But, this is my first time taking photos:

This is also where we found out that we’d been taking Midas’s amazing posing abilities for granted. Mason can’t pose worth anything. I took loads of him and these were the best two:

Notice he’s not paying attention in either…oh well, he’s young yet.

Eric didn’t want to get his pants wet (can’t blame him) but kept forgetting to unroll them so he was walking around like this…Man-Capris?

Next we headed over to the game and tailgating. Unfortunately, I had chapters to read and an exam to study for so I ended up staying in the truck most of the time. After Mason knocked an older lady over, he was banished to the truck too – and depressed about it.

He whined and gazed out the windows until everyone left for the game and then he looked like this:

We slaughtered the Huskies 48-6 and I was very unimpressed with most of their fans. They were rude to us and sloppy drunk. Ugh.

Next we headed to the boys’ hotel room for me to shower quick, pitched our tent and then we went on a tour up to Copper Harbor. Unfortunately, my camera battery died so I missed some truly spectacular shots, but Eric got some….they’ll be up…sometime.

After a quick dinner at Subway we crossed the river to Hancock and got settled into our campsite:

It was a frigid night and I got up in the middle of it to pull on sweatpants, sweatshirt and socks (Eric voted only for socks) and then I slept a lot more soundly. Which means that we slept in to make up for the troubled first half of the night. Next morning we made breakfast (or Eric did) and packed up to leave. And therefore…on to Sunday.

This weekend Grand Valley State University Lakers played Michigan Tech Huskies in football. Originally, we were going to leave early Friday afternoon and get at least to the bridge, camp and then the rest of the way Saturday, go to the game and then camp Saturday night. Things didn’t go quite as planned. Midas’s surgery postponed everything and we didn’t leave Shelby until around 6:30 pm. We drove up to the bridge and then stopped for some photos. This was my first real excursion with my new camera and I was pretty psyched to try out some of the features.

My first ever attempt at a night shot:

Then I realized it was because I couldn’t hold still enough, long enough so I braced it and got this:

And then I found out how much I like benches:

Then we continued across for awhile until it started POURING and we were both too tired to stay awake. We parked the truck on the side of a very quiet road and slept for four hours there. It wasn’t too bad at all. Woke up and started out again. Drove for awhile, got tired and slept a tad longer and then finally we made it…ooops this is going to Saturday – stay tuned.

Friday

We had one busy weekend planned with constant running from one event to the next. Unfortunately (for me), I had class from 8 am to 1:50 pm on Friday. Originally, the plan was for Eric to be completely packed up, with the boys and pick me up downtown after my class and we’d head straight out to Imlay City for our Ultimate Air Games event. What actually happened was that Eric worked until 2 pm, I walked home from the bus stop and he was just starting to pack up when I got home. Needless to say, we were late. Very late. Ended up missing the Splash I had originally signed up for and having to compete in the last one of the evening. The good news? Mason jumped off the dock for the first time!! To read more, go to my Leapin’ Labs blog.

Saturday

We got up bright and early and packed up. I showered and we headed over to the UAD area of the fairgrounds. We only competed Mason in the semi-finals because the event was running considerably behind schedule and we wanted to leave plenty of time to get to the football game. Hours later we finally reach Ashland, Ohio to find out our camping registration was for a campground whose website said they were extremely close to Ashland, but was really three hours away. Finally found another campground to pitch our tent and rushed hurriedly through Subway for dinner and into the game. Half-way through the second quarter (I was freezing by this time) the game was postponed due to lightning being sighted for “no less than 30 minutes”. One and a half hours later, the game is called “No-Contest” and we head back to the campground. It was (and had been for awhile) raining again so we just packed up and headed home. Eric got pulled over going 84 mph and swerving all over the road (he was texting), but luckily, the cop gave us a warning and let us go. He drove the speed limit for the rest of the drive home. Stumbled into the house and into bed at about 2:30 am.

Sunday

Slept in pretty late, finally got up and unpacked the truck. We had to put up the EZ-Up and tent because they were still wet (this is the 6th time we’ve been camping this summer, and four of those times it rained). I did all the laundry, washed the sheets and re-made the bed. We watched Music and Lyrics (which was super-cute and really funny in a subtle way, not a dumb-boy-movie-embarrassing-disgusting way…if you know what I mean…not that I don’t enjoy some of those too). Then we loaded up the bikes and headed out to the Musketawa Trail. We rode another 12 miles, but this time my speedometer was in working order so I know more information. It took us a total of 57 minutes and 52 seconds to go 12.084 miles (with two stops because my seat is bent crooked since the accident ), my maximum speed was 18.3 mph, with an average of 12.5 mph. I burned 315.2 calories and 38.6 in fat (based on my weight/height). Overall, a lovely workout .