Camping, Fishing, 4th of July, and $7.25 ...

Warning: Long post!!!
We finally made it on our first camping trip of the summer and it was GREAT!!! We took off Wed. afternoon and stayed through Sat. We celebrated the 4th of July in the cool mountains and had a lot of fun! All of us love everything about camping - the weather, the wildlife, the beauty of it all, the fishing, the time w/o phones, tv, etc., etc.!! Our family's favorite place to camp (and where we have been going for several years now) is in the White Mountains and we love to fish at Black River. We got there after dark (and bedtime for that matter) on Wed., so we just set up camp and went to bed. Thursday morning after breakfast Kolten and Morgan were playing/exploring outside when they found a horny toad. Oh the excitement! Then a little while later they found an elk shed - for those of you unsavvy with the animal kingdom terminology, that is not a house that elk live in or store their stuff, that is, they found a nice sized elk antler that had been shed by the elk. Did I make that plain enough? Yes, some animals like deer and elk, shed their horns/antlers and grow new ones. Anyway, they were pretty excited about that too, as was their proud dad!! So exciting and that was just the first morning!:) We loaded up and went fishing that day and had a good time. We caught a few and ended up keeping a dozen. Kolten had the best "one that got away story". He had caught a pretty nice sized trout- (we just catch Native trout and once in awhile a brown trout - I know you were excited about that bit of info, Jackie!!) one of the bigger ones that we had caught. He put it in a bucket of water instead of "stringing" it on the willow branch with the others. Well a little while later he wanted to look at it again - it was too tempting for him in that bucket. So he got it out to hold and look at. Well if you have ever felt a fish before (which I really don't like to!) they are really slippery and unfortunately this big guy saw his chance for freedom! He squirmed and slipped right out of Kolten's hand and then the next couple of minutes (which seemed like hours) Kolten fought to "catch" it again with his bare hands. Looking back we can now all laugh and see how funny it all was - but not at the time. Kolten literally dove to the ground after that fish - he had it - nope it slipped away - he grabbed it - it was gone again further in the river. Kolten was further in the river - chest down - then wading out - one last time I thought for sure he had it this time - he did, for a second then the fish got away for good this time! Oh the agony!! (Although the fish didn't see it that way!) It was quite upsetting for mom and son! I had been the closest by him and saw the whole thing. He was pretty upset and very sad! (Let's just say his face got a little wet, too, and not just from the river.):( So sad... but like I said now we are able to look back and laugh. He did catch some crawdads and another fish, so it wasn't all bad! Brad of course caught the most fish that day, but I caught a few, too. Morgan caught crawdads but didn't get her big catch till Friday. Brad spends a lot of his time helping us all out. Kolten will get the fish off the hooks and help Brad clean them. Kolten and Morgan will bait their hooks with the worms and cast and reel by themselves. Let's see who am I leaving out? Oh yeah, me ... well I like to give Kolten and Morgan the opportunity to bait my hook for me - you know service and all. Okay so I love fishing and I like to eat the fish, but I am still having trouble with the slimy, squirming, slippery worms and fish! I am getting better though. Kolten had a good time making fun of me and trying to make me do it myself by refusing to "serve" me!! He finally gave in when I asked nicely - or begged - or threatened! One day I will do it myself - just not anytime soon!
We went on a bike ride which was very bumpy and kinda difficult on the uphill part. I can't believe how much the altitude change makes you breathe so much heavier as if you were really out of shape - okay, so I really am out of shape, but I did make it back up the hill before anyone else. I thought Brad and I were racing so I put my all into it, but when I looked back he had stopped with Morgan. So I put my bike back, tried to breathe normally again and walked down to meet them. I ended up carrying Morgan's bike back while she walked with me. The road we chose was not the easiest route. But it was still fun!
Friday we fished for a little while. We had run out of worms, so we were all just using spinners at this point, which is harder for me and Morgan. (Kolten was more into catching crawdads at this point.) Morgan and I kept Brad busy getting our hooks unstuck - everywhere. We had lots of bites, caught 3 or 4 and threw them back. Morgan (as I mentioned will cast and reel all by herself, which makes her dad beam with pride!) had the first "big" catch of the day. She said "I think I got a fish" and started reeling it in. We could tell she had something and it was pretty heavy - Brad ended up helping her a little, because it was so heavy - she finally reeled in - a rock!!! She had hooked onto this nice sized rock and it stayed on her hook till she got it in! We all laughed so hard - it was so funny to see the looks on their faces when they saw the rock. We have never seen anything happen like that before! We're thinking of having it mounted!! She also caught a fish by herself, too and was pretty excited about that. She is a fun fisher-girl - fun to watch and fun to fish with! Kolten is fun, too - especially picturing the "great escape" - as I said, we can laugh about it now!!!
What fun! We saw a bunch of wildlife this trip - we always see elk and deer, but this time along with a ton of elk and deer, we saw antelope, big horn sheep - up close - right off the road, turkeys, a bobcat and a coyote. That is one of our favorite parts of camping - the drives in the evening to see the animals. Although we saw the antelope, big horn sheep (two times) and turkeys in the day as we were driving to and from fishing. The elk, sheep and antelope all had their babies with them, so that was pretty cool, too.
So you might be wondering where the $7.25 comes in. Well I earned it!! The first time I have ever earned any money while camping. When Brad's dad has been fishing with us he always offers a dollar to the first person to catch a fish. Last year or the year before Morgan got it. So I decided we needed to carry on the tradition, so I told everyone Brad would give a dollar to the person who caught the first fish. (Brad just loves my ideas!) Well guess who caught the first fish, yup, yours truly! There's $1.00. Of course Morgan did not think this was fair anymore since she didn't get the dollar so Brad gave her a quarter for the first rock that was caught and I think about 12 cents for her fish. Nice dad - I guess that is what he had in his pocket at the time. Anyway, she was thrilled. So back to my entrepreneurship!! I earned a quarter for seeing the first wildlife (I don't even remember now what the 25 cents was for - it was such piddly change, I guess I didn't care!). One night Brad offered a dollar to the first one that saw the first deer or elk on our drive. Cha - ching, yes, me again, I saw a lone doe worth a buck!:) (This is getting really bizarre since Brad is always the first one to spot anything. I have come to realize as much as he can see through the trees or across the meadows he must not really be seeing the road in front of him. So usually I am helping him by watching the road - he somehow manages to keep us on the road and find antelope or elk "specks" far away. I guess it's just a gift!) Well I am feeling kinda cocky, because like I said Brad is always the first one to spot anything, so I might of said something about how good I was or how much money he owed me or something, because he upped the anty. He announced $5 for the first one to see a bull elk. I figured I was done in at this point - we had seen a lot of cows, but no bulls and if there was one to see, Brad would find it. Well, I guess I was wrong again! It was getting dark and unfortunately we had left the spotlight in the trailer, so we were about done looking. I just happened to see a lone elk and of course happily shouted it out so everyone would know I saw it first!:) Then as we got closer we realized it was a nice sized bull - oh how I wish we'd had the spotlight or something. By the time Kolten found the binoculars to give to Brad it had walked up in the trees and we couldn't see it anymore. Five more dollars for a nice bull!! So there it is, my $7.25! Lest you think we are a gambling family, or that Brad is made of money or extremely generous with it, it was all in fun - I have yet to see a quarter let alone $7, and probably never will! That's the good thing about Grandpa offering, he really pays up - I guess Brad is all talk!! Oh well, who needs the money when I have the bragging rights for at least a couple of weeks!!:)
So that was the highlights of our trip - FUN!!! We got rained on, found abnormally large Dandelion type flowers (you know - the kind you "blow"), lauged a lot, watched fireworks in Showlow, ate fish for dinner (even Morgan ate it this time!), and had a great relaxing time! We all can't wait to go again!!!