There's No Place Like Home

We are home from four days of camping at Johnson's Shut-In's State Park. It was a hot weekend. The temperatures were 95 with a heat index in the 1000's. Actually it was in the low one hundreds. We stayed inside during the heat of the day. It rained on Saturday night and it cooled off, so we walked all over and met lots of people. We still thought we were dying though after our morning walk. It was nice and cool inside, but you can't tell it by looking at us.

Daddy was excited to camp here because it is a brand new campground. The original campground was destroyed on December 14, 2005 when the Taum Sauk Reservoir collapsed and 1.3 million gallons of water swept through the park destroying it. They moved the campground to a new location. It is actually a few miles from the original site on a different road. They say that if the reservoir would fail again, the water would not reach the campground. Mama was still nervous though.

Here is a photo of the old campground. See the rocks. They look small from here, but they are boulders. These boulders were pushed down the hill by the force of the water and landed where the campground was. (Okay, we confess we took these photos on different days.)

See the space where there are no trees. There were trees there. They were swept away by the water, too.
These signs are all over the place.

Daddy says he seriously doubts if the sirens sounds that we would have enough time to make it up 200 steps before the water came. I probably could, but Mama couldn't. Mama is a klutz. She fell on her face this weekend. Yes, she did! We were walking along and the next thing I knew, Mama was eating dirt. It was embarrassing!

I'll share more photos tomorrow!

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Happy To Be Home

Fun Camping Weekend

We just got home from camping. We stayed at a park that was full of barking dogs. They were every where. It was hard for us to walk because all of these dogs were trying to get to us. We ended up taking a trail that was right outside our door and we walked through the woods and avoided those silly dogs. We camped there one other time but the dogs were not as bad that time.

We visited a state park yesterday that was damaged in 12/2005 when a reservoir broke. It carried boulders nearly a mile to the park. Luckily, the only people who were there when it happened were the superintendent, his wife and two children. The water swept them away, but they were all found alive. If it would have happened during camping season, it would have been a big disaster. Here are some photos of the boulders that ended up where the campground used to be.

This is Scout, Me and Daddy next to one of the boulders.

Here's our Jeep next to another one.


More of the boulders that were left behind by the rushing water. Can you imagine these boulders and over one billion gallons of water rushing at you?

If you are interested in learning more about it, here is a link Johnson Shut-Ins.
The campground has been moved to a new area and should be open next year. Daddy says we are going to camp there. Mama says "Why?" LOL

Mama and Scout stepped on a snake this weekend. They didn't even know it. Daddy had to tell them. Mama would have taken a photo if she would have thought about it, but she didn't.

Jack
A Very Tired Greyhound