Camping in January………………..
January sunset
Both Brian and I are self-employed and work most weekends so we plan well in advance to take some time off. A month ago we decided to go camping at the end of January. We had no idea then that the temperatures would be in the 60’s! We just got very lucky. We did remember one of the lessons we learned from past camping trips and that is to go during the week. So, here we are at Whithrow Springs State Park and we have the WHOLE place to ourselves (Benefit #1 of camping in the winter)!! We got here before lunch yesterday, it was about 60 degrees and sunny! We set up camp quickly. We opted not to put the screen house up because there are NO BUGS this time of year (Benefit #2 of winter camping). We ate some lunch and off on the trails we went. We hiked the War Eagle Creek Trail, it was a nice steep climb. We weren’t ready to be done when we got to the end so we picked up the Dogwood Trail and hiked it back to camp. (Benefit #3 of camping in winter – we did not see one other person on either trail!)
We had this all to ourselves!
It was about time for me to start the fire. Have I mentioned before how much I like making fires??? I do it all. I gather the wood, build the fire and keep it going the rest of the evening. (Benefit #4 of camping in winter – wood is everywhere!) While the fire was going and we were hanging out, I cut Brian’s hair. It is so much nicer to cut hair outside and not have it get everywhere. I like his hair shorter than he does but he is a good sport and lets me cut it the way I like it. He really doesn’t have much say when I am the one holding the scissors! Brian is in charge of the cooking and what a great meal we had. He grilled some fish and served it over pasta and broccoli. It was yummy. I never would have paired fish and pasta together but after the first time Brian fixed it for me I was hooked. Pasta, with a little butter and no sauce. It was so nice out that we chose to eat dinner outside sitting in front of the fire. We watched the moon rise and the stars come out as we were making our smore’s. We can’t go camping without smore’s!
Notice his short hair!
For our anniversary I got Brian an iPhone dock with a CD player. He had mentioned wanting to have some music while we are camping and we didn’t have an old fashioned ‘Boom Box’. He loves his new toy and he says I did a great job of picking out one with really good speakers.
For Christmas we both found new camping gadgets in our stockings. I got a new retractable clothes line and he got paper liners for the Dutch oven. We are having stew for dinner tonight made in the Dutch oven so we will try out the liners and see.
Using the new Dutch oven liners
Being the huge history buff that Brian is we decided to drive into town (the big city of Huntsville, Arkansas, pop. 2300) to see some Orval Faubus history. Orval Faubus is the former Governor of Arkansas. We stopped at the local Chamber of Commerce hoping to find something that would lead us somewhere. There was not one bit of information in there about a former governor! Even if he wasn’t very well liked, you would still think they would have something. We asked a couple of questions and the guy walked outside with us and pointed to the top of a hill. There sits a home that Orval Faubus had Fay Jones build for him. The man from the Chamber seemed to not want to be associated with the name Orval Faubus, which we found strange. We drove up the big hill. We saw the driveway that lead to the house. A car was driving down the driveway as we were driving past. I told Brian to drive back by, there was a gate, but it was open. The guy at the chamber told us a Memphis attorney bought the place and lives there part time. I figured since we just saw a car leaving either the guy who lives there just left or other people venture up to see the house. I told Brian to go for it. We drove up the driveway and saw a car in the porte-cochere and turned around and went back down. It couldn’t have been more than 90 seconds total! The gate that was open was now CLOSED with a chain!!! This is not an electric gate; it is an old fashioned chain link gate with a metal rod that goes in the middle through little holes to keep it closed. We just looked at each other in amazement………… What were we going to do? You could see the chain wrapped around it. There is NO WAY that someone could have come and closed that gate – we would have seen them or a vehicle or something! The gate was out of our site for about 30 seconds total!! I got out and thought I would try to do something. The chain was wrapped around the gate but the lock was not locked! I took off the lock and chain, opened the gate and Brian drove through. I carefully closed the gate back and wrapped the chain around it and left it just as we had found it. Very strange! All of this excitement got us hungry so we decided to eat lunch in town. We ate at “Granny’s”. The food was good, but all we could talk about was that gate! After we finished I asked Brian to drive back up to that driveway to see if the gate was still closed. By now, 45-60 minutes have gone by. The gate was wide open just like the way we saw it the first time we drove by! Strange happenings……
A week later and we still are puzzled!
