Kinzua Trip - Day 3

Considering that we were up a goof bit of the night, we slept in fairly late. After we had fed the boys, we swamped one of the canoes and heated lake water so that they could take a bath on shore. The Heathens thought it was great. The Hillbilly Hotel people just looked at us as though we were strange.

Then Dan and I decided that we wanted to wash as well. Both of us are a little big to bath in the little bit of water in the swamped canoe, so we waded out into the lake together. Throwing the soap back and forth between us, we washed in the lake. We even washed our hair. I know we looked like a couple of hippies. And the Hillbilly Hotel people quite attempting to hide their stares.

Once we were all clean, we put the boys into one canoe and paddled back to the boat launch to head into town for ice cream and a new tent. It was such an overcast day that I was afraid to try it with the raining tent one more night.

Once we were back at the boat launch, we tied the canoe to the top of the truck and headed into town. We still had very little gas and were planning to stop at the first gas station. About 5 miles from the boat launch, the canoe escaped from its ropes. It flipped off the top of the truck, and, landing on it's bottom, slid down the road beside us. No harm done, the Asst. Zookeeper jumped out of the truck to reattach the canoe. About 5 minutes into this process, he gets a panicked look on his face and yells, "Turn off the truck!" We had left it on while we were putting the canoe back on!

We made it into town without any further trouble. We went to KMart and purchased a new tent. Then we stopped at Dairy Queen for ice cream. We also checked on the boy who'd been hit by a car the day before (his older brother worked at DQ). Scrapped and bruised with a minor concussion but otherwise, good. And then we stopped for gas.

Back out to Roper's Hollow we went and we paddled the 5 miles back out to Hooksbrook. When we arrived back at camp, all that was left of the Hillbilly Hotel was one couple. They made small talk as we paddled past. The Asst. Zookeeper and the Heathens paddled past a bit later to gather firewood again, at which point they asked what we had been burning the night before.

Dan explained about the stump. The lady commented that she had wondered if it was incense. The Asst. Zookeeper responded that incense was only burned for cleansing and that there was no reason to burn it at the lake. :) He also stated that since they had made no effort to abide by quiet time hours, he hadn't worried about the smoke after we realized that it smelled. It was a very pleasant conversation!

Later that night, I took one of the Heathens to the bathroom. As we walked over the hill, I could hear a very loud group further down the shore. Where we were camped, we couldn't hear them. But the couple left from the Hillbilly Hotel could - paybacks are sweet!