~ Silver Creek ~

On Friday last, Amy and I loaded into her automobile and "got away from it all". We traveled to a place called Silver Creek, which is near to the small town of Crouch, Idaho, about a two hour drive North of Boise. In between our witty banter focusing on the ridicule of science, we admired some scenery and got in some physical activity.

Here are some photographs that I snapped while seated in Amy's moving automobile.

It took us a small time to locate a camping spot suitable to the both of us. There was some confusion regarding whether we ought to camp at that which appeared to be the idea of spots, except for that it was along the creek and we had seen some signs which notified campers that they were not allowed to camp within 50 feet until June 1st of the creek. Amy and I were uncertain of the distance from our camp to the creek, it might have been 50 feet, but we decided that should a forest ranger question us, that we would deny having seen the sign. Deceit always, you know, being the correct plan of action.

After we arrived at our ideal camping location, Amy set up the tent while I gathered firewood. I do not know what it was like for Amy to set up the tent, but my firewood gathering was quite the adventure. I had to wander deep into the woods which seperated our camping ground from others. I triped and stumpled over ground debris, received whips to the face from low-dangling pine tree branches, got my feet wet in the waters of the flooded stream, all the while loading my arms with a large amount of branches and hauling them back to camp. That evening, we hopped onto our bicycles and went on a small toodle up the forest service road which connected all of the camping lots.

Then we returned to our camp, Amy started the fire, and we sat around drinking wine and making obvious observations about the scientific world around us, until we were so tired that it was time to go to bed.

We stumbled over to the outhouse for one last time and then got all bundly in the tent. Right about the time when I had perfected my bundly sleepingbag arrangement, I had to pee yet again. Fie, wine, fie! So I donned my attractive-and-not-at-all-dorky headlamp and ventured outside. I returned to the tent and slept soundly all through the downpour of the night. At some point around what I hypothesize was 6:00 a.m. or thereabouts, my bladder woke me up. I realized that the torrential downpour had stopped and decided that it was time for me to get up. I put on my clothing and navigated my way out of the tent to find a very foggy and moist morning. I was about fifteen feet away from the tent heading towards the outhouse when the torrential downpour began anew. Luckily, I was wearing my rainproof jacket, but I became very wet during the two minutes that it took me to travel to and from the outhouse and the tent. Despite being wide awake and wanting to seize the day, I returned myself to the tent and snuggled in my sleeping bag adjacent to a sleeping Amy and listened to the rain for several hours. Throughout most of this experience I was worried that we would have to call our camping adventure off.

At some point, I dozed off and had a dream about being the captain of a tugboat off the Baltic Sea. When I woke up, the rain had stopped. Amy and I emerged from the drenched tent and put together a breakfast and some thick french pressed coffee. I spent a good deal of time sitting alongside the creek staring at the water. Then we went on a stroll up another forest service road. It was during this walk when I informed Amy that due to my ability to theorize, I am a theorist. While I was talking about my theory-making, Amy and I became alarmed when we heard loud gunshots near to our persons. Considering that there were signs pretty much everywhere which indicated that the shooting of firearms was not a forest service approved activity in that area at that time of year, it was lame. We then proceeded to have a conversation, before returning to the conversation about how I am a theorist, about how we aren't really "gun people".

We returned to the camp, made some salads for lunch and headed out on a bike ride. We rode bicycles for about three hours, up and down the forest service roads. At the end of the ride, I had decided to ride up this road to a summit. But during this ride, I became alarmed yet again as the people with guns were at the summit playing some sort of gun game. I felt glad that I happen to have been wearing my construction orange jersey so that the gun-shooters would perhaps not mistake me for a deer or whatever they might have been trying to shoot. I made an effort to stay away from them and I quit my bicycling adventure sooner than I had wanted because of them. Fie, gun-shooters, fie.

I spent the rest of the day lounging near to the creek reading my book and admiring the beautiful scenery around me. I am one of those people who can be kind of awed my the natural beauty that can be found on the Earth and it is very enjoyable for me to sit back and just observe some nature. That evening, Amy and I made some delicious chilli to which we added chopped onions and loads of cheddar cheese. She built us another fire, which we sat around. We went to bed at a time suited for senior citizens and despite all promising circumstances, I was unable to attain sleep that night. I was much too cold. I spent the night shivering, with my muscles cramped and knotted with cold. I was kind of sleepy the next day. We left early in the day because we both had things that we had to do to get back to our lives, but yes, the camping trip was very nice.

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