Feb 21 – Feb 24, 2013
I’m a little behind on my blogging, so I’m
going to try and play catch up!
Meghann and I decided to attend the BOW camp thru the DNR for the winter
session since we had so much fun doing it last year during the summer. Thursday, February 21, Meghann and I
met up at our mom’s house to make the trek to the U.P. The plan was to make it to Munising and
stay the night there, where the next morning, before BOW registration started,
we had planned on meeting up with a few other BOW girls in Chatham to explore
the Eben Ice Caves. The drive to
the U.P. was no problem, even though Meghann was freaked out about crossing the
bridge. About 2 days prior to us
driving up north, the U.P had gotten dumped on with snow. As we made our way along the south
shore of the U.P. and then jogged up to 28, we saw a ton of snowmobilers. It seemed like there were more people
in the U.P. for the snow then I had ever seen in the summer. We made it to our hotel in Munising
around midnight and as we were checking in we talked a little bit to the girls
at the front desk. They were
saying how we were lucky to have made it that far because for the previous two
days all the main roads were closed.
They said that the snow gets so bad that the police will ticket anyone
trying to drive because what happens is people end up getting stuck and just
abandoning their cars in the road.
Then the plows come thru and smash into the cars because they are buried
under so much snow and they can’t be seen by the plow drivers. I have to say, I thought I knew all
about lake effect snow, but until I saw how much snow was up there, I had no
clue what real lake effect snow was!
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| Entryway in our Hotel in Munising |
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| snowmobilers parked outside the hotel |
When it was time to hike back, we decided
to take the trail that goes up and around the top of the ice caves. It didn’t seem like a big deal, but
there was this one woman who wasn’t really dressed properly (she hiked in her
UGG boots if that tells you anything) and she was not all that physically in
shape. She tried and tried to climb
the hill to hike over the top of the caves but she just could not pull herself
up. Three of us even tried to get
under her and push and pull her up but she just wouldn’t budge. I felt kind of bad for her, but a
couple of the other ladies climbed down and walked back with her following the
trail we came in on.
When we got back to our cars, we all just
took off separately to make our way up to Big Bear. By this time it had started snowing again and the roads were
getting bad. But, we made it to
Big Bay with no problems, got our rooms and signed in for the weekend. We had some time to kill before dinner
so Meghann and I decided to walk the path down to the shores of Lake Superior. We got about 3 steps and realized why
everyone at camp had their own snow shoes. We were instantly up to our thighs in snow. Basically, if the path wasn’t plowed
you might as well forget about walking across any snow because it was too deep
to walk across! So, we asked one
of the instructors if we could borrow a couple of pairs of snowshoes to walk
down to the lake with. After
snowshoeing for a while, we headed back up for dinner and just to relax for the
night.
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| Meghann was knee deep in snow |
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| Frozen Lake Superior |
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| Fireplace in the Big House |
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| Set-up for our camp dinner |
The next day we were only scheduled to do 2
classes. I was doing quinzee
building while Meghann was doing Self Defense. Quinzees are basically igloos, but there is an actual
science behind building them. The
first thing we did was pair up and then choose a spot to build. Once we chose a spot, we had to dig a
hole in the snow as big as the size of the little igloo that we wanted. Once we dug out all the snow, then we
had to shovel all the snow back into the hole and pile more on top to make a
mound. At first I thought our instructor
was full of it, but she said that moving the snow around will cause it to
become rock hard. Once my partner
and I were done with all the shoveling, our instructor asked us if we could
help out other pairs to shovel. At
this point, we had probably shoveled a good hour, but I said I would help other
teams. The instructor put me with this
mother/daughter pair to help them.
They both were grossly overweight, huffing and puffing, chugging water
and sitting down to ‘rest’ every 5 minutes. Not surprisingly, they had barely shoveled any snow. So, me and another girl basically
shoveled all the snow for their quinzee.
After we built up our pile of snow, we went inside to rest and wait for
the snow to harden. After about an
hour, we went back outside to dig out the quinzee. Sure enough, the snow was rock hard and we used these little
shovels to tunnel into the snow pile.
Since really only one person could tunnel at a time, we took turns
getting into the hole and continue to dig it out. It was a little claustrophobic, but once we had it completed
it was actually quite warm in there.
Some of the people had planned on spending the night in them. I thought I would spend the night in
one too, but the thought of having to walk in the cold, in the middle of the
night to pee, quickly changed my mind.
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| Our pile of snow |
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| Me inside the quinzee |
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| Me in the quinzee |
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| Meghann in the quinzee |
After we finished the quinzee’s, Meghann and
I met up for lunch. Once lunch was
finished, we headed over to do our dog sledding class. The lady teaching the class trains dogs
for sledding and has her own team of dogs. She showed us all about the sled and the harnesses and the
commands to use. Once we had our
lesson, she hooked up 4 dogs and each let us drive the sled with her riding in
the front basket of the sled. At
first I thought there is no way these 4 dogs can be that fast, but when it was
my turn and I gave the “Hike” command to go, they took off like a bullet! Just the four dogs together were
incredibly strong and fast. At one
point, she did switch out the dogs, but she always kept the sled at a 4-dog
team. And, the crazy thing was
these dogs were around 10 years old!
We asked her, if these dogs are this strong and fast, then how strong
are younger dogs? She said that
when she trains the younger dogs, she cannot use the mechanical brake on the
sled to stop them. She has to
train them with an ATV so that she can stop them because they are so strong
they will just keep going for miles without getting tired. The other funny thing about the dogs is
that they all did not look like Siberian Huskies like I had imagined they would
(only one of the dogs actually did).
Most of the dogs looked like a rag-tag, miss-matched bunch of
mutts. We asked the lady about it,
and she said that sledding dogs are bred for strength and speed, so their looks
go by the wayside. Lol.
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| We all love the dogs! |
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| Me and the sledding puppies |
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| Meghann getting ready to sled |
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| Me driving the dog sled |
After we our dog sledding class, we had
dinner and then we had some downtime.
Meghann and I were beat from being outside in the cold all day, so we
sat by the inside fire, read, and then went to bed early like old ladies.
The next morning, we had one last
class: back country skiing. As we are sitting there waiting with
our instructor for all the people to show up, in walks the mother/daughter duo
that I had dealt with in my quinzee class. I had told Meghann all about them earlier, and she knew as
soon as they walked in that these two were the ones I had been bitching
about. The first part of our class
was just learning about the different kinds of skis and equipment that you can
get. The back country skis are
basically a cross between cross-country skiing and downhill skiing. So, after our lesson, we all got boots
and skis and prepared to hit the trails.
Of course, the mother/daughter duo was loud and exclaiming how they
couldn’t get their boots on, and how they needed special sized boots and on and
on and on. Everyone in the class
was ready to go and we had to wait for these two bumbling idiots. Anyways, once they were ready we hit
the trails. Me, Meghann and these
two girls didn’t think we had to wait for everyone, so we went rogue and skied
ahead of everyone. We were having
fun until we heard our instructor yell for us to wait up. We waited forever, but the rest of the
class finally caught up. Again,
not surprisingly, the mother/daughter duo could not keep up and they kept falling
over and had to be helped up. As a
side note, I know that these classes are for beginners, but these two had zero
physical abilities. If we were
having a contest of sitting on the couch and pushing buttons on a remote, then
they for sure would win.
Anywho, we all kept skiing together thru
the woods, following trails and breaking new trails. At one point, the daughter fell again and couldn’t get
up. The instructor explained to
her how to position herself and use her poles to help push herself up. It was like watching a beached whale
try to roll over in the sand.
Finally, the instructor gave up and gave her a hand to help pull her
up. She wasn’t really helping
herself at all, so much so that the guy finally took off his skis, got under
her arms in a bear-hug fashion, and lifted her up to her feet with a lot of
grunts and groans. I hope the poor
guy didn’t pull his back out!
After that nonsense, the instructor decided
to have us try some downhill maneuvers with our skis. We did a little hill at first, then some people chose to do
a bigger hill. I decided to try
the bigger hill. Unfortunately,
about halfway down I lost control, did a magnificent pirouette, skis and all, and landed face first in a huge drift
of snow. When I got up, I got a
few cheers from the top of the hill exclaiming how great of a landing I
did. That was the end of downhill
skiing for me!
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| Ice on Lake Superior |
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| Lighthouse at Big Bay |
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| Boat track thru the ice seen as we cross the Mighty Mac |
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| Ice formation in Mackinac City |
After our last class, we just ate a quick
lunch and packed up to head back down state. We stopped briefly in Mackinaw City to buy fudge and
pasties. The drive home was pretty
eventless and we made it back to mom’s house that evening.
May 31 – June 2nd, 2013
Before we knew it, it was time for the
summer BOW session again. This BOW
was probably going to be our last for a while since Meghann is due in November. Once again, we planned to meet at mom’s
house, drive up to Marquette Thursday, spend the night, and then check in at
Big Bay on May 31st around noon. The drive up went smoothly, and we made it to camp and
checked in with no problems. At
this point, we are seasoned veterans at BOW, so we just had lunch and hung out
until our first class which was outdoor first-aid. That class was more interesting than I thought it would
be. The instructor talked about
having an ‘emergency pack’ with all the essentials ready if you go out on a day
hike. This kind of emergency pack
was exactly like the Doomsday Preppers pack I had made for Meghann last
Christmas, since she loves to watch that show and panic about the pending
apocalyptic collapse of our society (which, by the way, she was not thrilled
that I told everyone in class about).
After going over emergency supplies, our instructor talked about
securing injuries and showed us a few knots.
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| Meg being a "victim" and getting an arm sling |
Me, being left-handed and the uncoordinated black sheep of
the family, could not get the hang of these dang knots because everything I do
is backwards from what everyone else does.
Meghann, however, being the super star of the family, quickly
mastered all the knots that our instructor was showing us.
I think she was able to weave a hammock
by the end of our lesson.
After
our knot-making lesson, our instructor wanted to show us some maneuvers to be
able to carry someone in an emergency.
When he asked for a volunteer, this very heavy set woman jumped up and said
that she would be the ‘victim’ that he would carry.
I could see the look of horror in his face thinking that he
was going to have to carry this woman.
Being quick on his feet, he says, “ok great you can help me do some
2-person carries, now we need a third person to carry.
How about you”.
And he points right at me.
So, for the next 15 minutes or so, I
became the injured party that he and this other woman carried in different
positions.
Then, he used me to
demonstrate single-person carries.
I wonder if that lady ever put 2 and 2 together to realize that he did
not want to haul her fat ass around!
Since we only had the one class Friday
afternoon, we went to dinner and then just chilled out the rest of the
evening. The next morning at 9am,
we had our rifle class. They had
warned us that the tics were really bad in the area, but I had no idea just how
bad they were. Just walking to our
class that morning, Meghann and I were shaking tics off of our clothes. Oh, and just a side note, the night
before one of our roomies was in the bathroom asking if any of us had
tweezers. I dug out a pair and
went to give them to her. She had
a very small tick on the top of her boob.
Since she couldn’t get it, I told her I would help her get it off. We got it off and she apologized a
bunch and said she was sorry I had to help her when she was naked. I didn’t think it was a big deal, but
it was kind of funny. Anyway, back
to rifle class…. During our class
we had the chance to shoot a couple different kinds of rifles and ammunition. Most of the ammunition seemed pretty
standard, but we got to shoot 30-06 ammo, which was incredibly strong. Shooting it actually made my whole body
recoil back! And once again, super
star Meghann was able to make bulls-eyes with every bullet she shot. I think she was even able to shoot
patterns and pictures into the target!
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| Meghann and her perfect target |
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| Me and my crappy target |
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| The arsenal of weapons we used |
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| The 30-06 I shot |
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| Meghann prepping to shoot |
After our noon classes ended, we met up for
lunch and then headed out for our second class of the day which was
archery.
The only trouble we had
in class was that we had a large number of left-handed girls and not enough
left-handed bows.
That was no
problem for Miss Meghann though, she just says, “I’ll just shoot right-handed
then”, and proceeded to shoot as well right-handed as she did left-handed.
I tried to follow suite, but of course when
I tried to shoot right-handed I couldn’t even pull back the arrow.
And all the while my right arm is
behaving as if I have no control over it, Meghann is shooting arrows like Robin
Hood right through my arrows.
Figures.
Super star once
again!
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| Our archery instructor |
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| Hunger Games here we come! |
After our archery class, we were waiting
outside of the cafeteria for dinner to start and a couple of girls from one of
the local outdoor gear stores asked Meghann and I if we wanted to be in the
fashion show after dinner. Meghann
declined since she thought that a pregnant model wouldn’t look good, even
though both girls thought it would be great if she did it. So, I accepted the offer to model
instead. After dinner, Meghann and
I headed over to the auditorium where the fashion show was going to
happen. The girls that were
running the show asked me what I wanted to wear. Most of the other ‘models’ were just picking what they
wanted to wear, but I told the girls that they could put me in whatever they
wanted. They were super excited,
so I had to wear a full on wet suit, booties, and a life vet to represent
kayakers. That was my first outfit. The second outfit was a biker outfit
with shoes, helmet, shorts and shirt.
The last outfit was a dress.
An actual dress. I don’t
think I’ve worn a dress since 2006.
Anyways, the fashion show was pretty fun. When it was our turn to go out on stage in our outfit, one
of the girls would tell us when it was our turn to go and the other girl would
do an explanation of our outfit.
And when we were out on stage, it was our time to walk around, pose and
just act silly while they explained the outfit. Overall it was a blast and I’m glad I did it even though I
had to wear a dress!
After the show, we had some down time for
the evening. Meghann chose to stay
in the room, read and chat with our roommates and I headed over to the sauna
for a bit and a swim in the indoor pool.
After I sweated about 20 pounds off, I headed back and went to bed.
The next morning we had our last class,
Kayaking. The entire weekend up in
Big Bay had been cool but fairly decent.
Of course during our last class that would take place on the water it
was freezing, windy, and kind of rainy.
We had a meeting point where we would get a ride from one of the other
instructors to the launch site where we would start kayaking. After we all pile into the van and
drive away, I realize that there wasn’t enough room for Meghann and she was
left behind in the rain. What a
great sister I am, leaving my pregnant sister in rain. Shortly after we had left, another van
came and picked her up so she didn’t have to wait too long! Once we got to the launch site, we had
a short lesson about kayaking and then we picked our kayaks and went out onto
the lake. We tooled around the
lake for an hour or so, the instructors having us practice different
things. It was pretty fun, but
after an hour or so I was freezing and we were all ready to pack it in. We head back to the landing, packed up
the kayaks and piled in the vans to go back to camp.
After our class, we just had some closing
announcements, then we packed up our things and headed back downstate. Of course, we had to stop in Mackinaw
to fill up on fudge and pasties on the way. :)
