Ethan, Ehlana, Naomi, and Aiden:
This update is coming to you live from the Ridge River Valley Campground! We are here as part of a group of twelve campers with two counselors; and we need to move this along because we will need to split up into segregated tents soon.
First up, our counselors are Heather and Jordan – two college students working for the ranch for the summer and leading the camping adventures. Cody was with us for the rides today, and he and Christy will both work with us this week, but Heather and Jordan will be the only chaperones each night. There are eight fellow campers, and while we’ll offer more on them as we go along this week; let’s just name them tonight to keep this report shorter. At the teen end of the group, Peyton and Alicia are fifteen and best friends; they have their thirteen-year-old siblings, Trent and Darci with them; and they’re from Dayton, Ohio. Next up are brother and sister Nolan and Brooklyn from the Chicago area. They are fourteen and twelve respectively; and Brooklyn is getting along very well with Ehlana and Naomi. Rounding out our little posse are Grayson and Keith from Kansas City. They are best friends, twelve and going on twelve; and they seem to like Ehlana and Naomi a lot too – more than they like Aiden and me! ;^)
We do need to move this along, though, so let’s cover some of the details from our adventures today.
Two of us were up early to see Dad off on his week in the city. After doing that, we had an in-bed visit with Mom; eventually got going with Tai Chi by the river and a quick breakfast; and then we loaded up the minivan; picked up our best friends; and Mom took us out to the ranch. We were the first to arrive except for our counselors, so Cody put us to work on saddling horses and loading up pack horses with gear that included our own except for backpacks. There was no training for any of the campers because we all needed to at least be intermediate level to do this trip. Once everyone was ready, we hit the trails by mid-morning and rode for two hours – though the shortest distance to the campground at a walk is only about an hour. Once at the campground, we were shown how to picket and water the horses; we unloaded the pack horses; and set up our tents and gear in the area reserved for the ranch adventures. We were first to volunteer to help Heather and Jordan with making our first ‘camp’ meal, and while we had fun with that; we’ve also been assured that the campers will take turns with the cooking and clean-ups – just as we’ll each take care of our own horses and gear. After lunch, we had time to go for a swim in one of the campground pools; we followed that up with another trail ride – this time to the north-west of the campground; and then we stabled our horses for the night before returning to our campsite and having dinner. We were on the clean-up crew for that meal, so we had time to relax before eating; and joined in on the evening swim once we had the work finished. The campfire after the swim was awesome; and we can admit that we really impressed everyone around us with our quartet and musical skills. Jordan was especially-impressed because he is taking a music minor at college to go along with a major in education. I am not going to comment on how impressed the guy campers were with Ehlana and Naomi – especially when two of them didn’t even seem to notice that they weren’t just a musical duo!
There were campfire stories; we took turns introducing ourselves a bit better, and wound down the campfire with some random teen/tween chat time. Heather and Jordan are allowing us a last bit of quiet time in our tents ahead of lights out; and we’re basically split up into the groups we arrived with this morning. That’s sure to change as we all get to know each other better. Aiden and I are okay with that as long as Ehlana and Naomi don’t decide to replace us with any of the other guys! ;^)
We’ll let you know how that goes for all of us as we go along, but that’s all for tonight.
Until next time, this little blast from your near or distant past is written for you with love from Ethan Proctor and gang – junior Magi and Magi Masters of the Light!
