Camping Chaos!

Our Camping Adventure...

Ryan and I decided to go camping up Logan Canyon! We loaded up his jeep with our tent, air mattress, food, camping chairs, bug spray, and our bikes! We were ready, We headed up Saturday afternoon and made our way for the mountain. First, we went up to see Old Ephraims Grave (the HUGE grizzly bear that I had never heard about.)

After we left Old Eprhaims Grave, we decided to go "exploring" in Ryan's jeep. His jeep is awesome and can go pretty much anywhere in the mountains and so we were going on some pretty rough roads! We had been driving for about 3 hours when we reached the TOP of the mountain. We were by a cell tower and so it was crazy to be so far in the mountain and be able to have some service. It began getting dark when we reached the top and so we picked a campsite that was close by. Since we had been driving for so long, we were miles away from any other campers. We were completely alone! Kind of cool- kind of scary. On the way up there, Ryan realized he had left his gun at home and didn't really want us to be in the middle of the woods without a gun, but we figured all would be well!

We set up our tent, blew up our mattress, started our fire, and started making our tinfoil dinners! We were talking about how much fun we were having together. After we ate our tinfoil dinners which turned out deliciously, we both sat in silence as we were mesmerized by the fire. Suddenly we heard a rustling in the bushes of something walking. My eyes opened wide and looked at Ryan. I whispered "What was that?!" He wasn't sure but told me it was probably a small animal and not to be concerned. Flashbacks started in my mind of visiting Old Ephraim's Grave and envisioning his cousin still being alive in the woods, and remembering how Ryan was upset that he forgot his gun to "protect us, just in case." We sat there in silence except for the avid sound of my heartbeat, beating outside of my chest. I was trying to stay calm but really freaking out inside. As we sat there in silence for another 30 seconds, it came again. This time, louder and closer. It was no small animal, and it was coming towards us!! I looked at Ryan and he could tell I was about to have a heart attack! He calmly told me to get in his jeep. I began walking and soon sprinting towards his jeep. He came and got in and we turned on his brights. We could see nothing. But I knew IT was out there. Whatever it was. We stared out for another 10 minutes, our senses completely heightened waiting for IT. IT never came. Ryan asked me what I wanted to do then and I quickly assured him that I was NOT sleeping outside with IT. He laughed as he looked at our tent set up and our bed ready inside. We quickly moved the bedding into the back of the jeep, out out the fire, and settled for the night. We played UNO in the back of his jeep which made me feel better about things. After a few minutes of playing UNO, Ryan's screen in his jeep began flashing and I for sure thought that it was haunted or something. Ryan went to turn on his jeep and CLICK. dead. completely dead. We were in the middle of nowhere, far away, with IT outside of our jeep, alone for miles, no gun, and our jeep dead. This was turning into quite the adventure. We prayed that somehow his jeep would be able to magically charge itself overnight. We tried to get a few hours of sleep but woke up early to the dawn light coming into the windows. We tried his jeep again and no luck. We were stranded. We decided to go watch the sunrise which is something I don't do often since I'm not a morning person. While Ryan called his dad for advice I began to look at facebook on my phone. I saw a picture of our brother-in-law Jeff that he posted by Old Ephraim's Grave just the day before. I was hoping he was still in the canyon and could help us. Ryan called Jeff only to wake him up as he had been peacefully sleeping in his bed at home. He had gone up Friday night and returned home Saturday. Ryan explained the situation and luckily Jeff knew right where we were. Which was great, because I had NO idea where we were. It was about a 2 hour drive for Jeff and we didn't want him to come unless it was our only option. Ryan got on his bike and began down the rough roads in hope of finding any campers, or fourwheelers anywhere. He later returned with no luck of finding anyone. We then decided to call Jeff and have him come to the rescue. He told us it wouldn't quite take him two hours and he was right on his way. I finally felt some relief and we began to pick up camp. Aftert 2 hours had passed, we became concerned that maybe Jeff didn't really know where we were. After 2 1/2 hours we heard some fourwheelers coming up our way. It was the first people we had seen the entire time. Ryan rushed down to the road on his bike and asked the fourwheeler bunch if they had seen a white truck anywhere. They laughed and said "Yep, we found him right down the road a couple miles with a flat tire." This was just the best news we could have gotten until they said, "And his spare was flat too!" Luckily, the nice gentlemen had a air compresser with them and pumped up Jeff's spare tire after he destroyed his original tire trying to rescue us. Finally, jeff reached us and after having to drive through mud, water, and ruts in a 2 wheel drive truck (we barely made it in ryan's 4wd!) He got out in his white shirt and slacks (all ready for church) and jumped Ry's jeep. We also had to put our bikes in the back of his truck because our brand new bike rack broke on the way up  because of the roads. He was our hero! Seriously- what a guy! He even made it to church on time. We owe him big time.

Anways, isn't that just the most adventurous camping trip ever? We haven't been since but know to not forget the gun! (just in case) :) And... I still want to know what IT was. I guess we'll never know!