Memorial Box Monday - The Camping Trip

We love to go camping. We bought a 28' travel trailer almost 10 yrs ago and try to go camping about once a month. However, for various reasons, we haven't been camping in almost a year. This story is about the last time we went camping. It was quite the trip; in fact, I told CP that if it had been our first camping trip, I would never go camping again.

Last May, I left work early on Thursday and we headed out for our long weekend around 3pm. We were all loaded up and headed down the road and had been gone about 1.5 hrs. One of the warning lights on the dashboard came on, but it wasn't of great concern so we kept going. However, about 10 min later, CP mentioned that the power steering went out. Houston, we have a problem. Can you imagine driving a Suburban hauling a 28' travel trailer with OUT power steering? Fortunately, CP used to drive long-haul tracter trailers and his first cab did NOT have power steering, so this didn't bother him too much. However, about 10 more min later, the A/C went out. OK, something is really wrong, but where are we? TWO MILES from an exit (on I-95!!!!!). We kept plugging along and FINALLY got to the exit where we pulled off.

God showed up as there was a truck repair shop literally 500 feet from the exit and we pulled in about 4:55pm. The guys at the shop came out and checked under the hood. They discovered a belt had broken, but it is not one that they carries. Fortunately, they were able to drive into town (did I mention this is a rural part of FL on I-95?) and get the part they needed. We spent about an hour wandering around the truck shop trying to keep the kids occupied. They got the belt replaced and we were on our way a little after 6:00pm.

We finally arrived at our destination, Alexander Springs, but it was after 8:00pm and dark. Here, we got the second surprise of our trip - no hookups. You see, we camp, but we don't exactly rough it. We always make sure we have water and electricity at our campsites because cooking in a microwave is AWESOME when you have four grumpy kids who are tired and hungry. This was not to be the case this night - except for GOD. Fortunately, the campground host DOES have electricity and they were very gracious and let me nuke our dinner in their microwave.

The next day (Friday), we headed down to the springs. The main reason we came was for the snorkeling. We had heard that most all of the springs in FL have tons of fish and are great for snorkeling. While walking down to the spring, we heard a loud C-R-A-A-A-C-C-C-K-K-K!!!!!! followed by a large BOOM!!!! We turned around and saw that a huge tree had fallen not 30 feet behind where we were standing and across the path we had just walked down. Once again, ONLY GOD and his perfect timing kept us from being negatively impacted by this event.

We spent the day snorkeling but unfortunately, didn't see but about 20 fish - quite disappointing. So, we decided that on Sat, we would go to Blue Springs where we KNOW there are a lot of fish as we have been there many times. We were enjoying Blue Springs and were headed back up to the spring head for another leisurely float down the run when we were stopped by emergency personnel. Later, we found out that a gentleman had been free-diving (no O2 tank and weights to keep him from floating up) into the spring head and apparently passed out and drowned. This particular event didn't exactly directly impact us, but we were thankful that God kept us safe on this day.

Finally, on Sunday, we decided to leave Alexander Springs and go to DeLeon Springs. We had been told of the wonderful Pour Your Own Pancake Sugar Mill Restaurant there and decided to treat ourselves. We had a wonderful breakfast, but another disappointing swim at the springs as once again, there were few fish. As a result, we decided to take a walk down one of the nature trails there. We all headed out, including my 78 yr old dad who has vision problems, for the trail. I wasn't paying close enough attention and didn't think about the fact that we weren't on a clearly marked path as we were cutting through grass and parking lots to get to the trail head. Unfortunately, Dad tripped over a railroad tie that was used to mark a parking area and fell.

Panic swept through me as a 70-something lady from our small group Bible Study had fallen and broken her hip just weeks earlier and then died after her surgery. All sorts of worst case scenarios raced through my head as I ran the 15ft back to Dad. Once again, GOD was there to catch Dad. When he stood up, the only evidence that he had fallen was a small scratch on the palm of his hand where he had caught himself on the way down!

We took our hike and then packed up and headed for home. Once again, Satan decided he wanted to challenge our faith again. On our drive home, the transmission in the Suburban decided that it did not want to leave 2nd gear. GOD was there and provided a rest area just about a mile down the road. CP was able to unhook the trailer and test just the Suburban, but there were no problems with the transmission. We made many phone calls even to our auto mechanic who just happened (NOT!) to answer the phone that day. We ended up decided to limp home in 2nd gear and had no problems doing so.

So, to remember this GOD-ordained trip, I am putting a small travel Trailer in our Memorial Box.