Sunday, September 23, 2007

Four pounds of licorice and a new hat

This weekend was parents weekend at Luther College in Decorah IA.

We went down to see Ben. I ran up to St. Paul after work on Friday and picked up his girlfriend, Jamie, then ran home and finished loading up the camper. We were off!

Arrived in Decorah around 8:30 pm. The Pulpit Rock campground, right in Decorah, was FULL! We had stayed there last year and enjoyed our stay, so we planned to be there this year, too. Unfortunately, they don't take reservations, so we were out of luck.

They gave us a few options we could check out. Several of them involved parking lots with hookups (yuck!). One option was even parking overnite in the WalMart parking lot. The option we chose was 12 miles away in Bluffton, IA.

So, off we trucked in the dark. We got to tiny little Bluffton down a winding gravel road. (Yes, it turned out there was also a paved county road, but we didn't know that on Friday night!) We got a spot, settled in, and spent some time with Ben.

Saturday morning, the puppy woke me early and I took the dogs out for a long walk. (hey, I walked by Craft's Jacob sheep - 3 little pastures full of Jacob sheep, all very interested in who was walking along their road in the early morning - but I didn't have my camera!!! will I learn???) Paul woke up and met us with a cup of hot coffee, and we explored the campground a bit more. We discovered there was a loop of the campground that ran right along the river. So, we moved. We got a gorgeous site right on the river bank, well away from any other campers. Our own private paradise, and a coffee spot we didn't have to walk to!

Ben and Jamie came over around noon. We had a quick lunch, then crowded into his little jeep wrangler and headed back into Decorah to do two quick geocaches. Decorah has beautiful parks and lots of cool hiking and biking trails. Ben took us up to Dunning Springs, another beautiful place, but full of people on this warm fall afternoon on parent weekend. We went up to see his room, now that he's settled in, and found it to be quite presentable. He built his own lofted bed, and did a great job.


We returned to the campground and he opened some presents (his 20th birthday is this coming Friday) while we grilled dinner. When he opened this one he said "OOOOH, four pounds of licorice and a new hat!" Ben loooooves hats. After dinner we headed back to Decorah for a parents weekend concert. Ben sings in the Cathedral Choir. Then we went back to the campground for a campfire. Ben, Jamie, and the Girl of the House made us banana boats in the fire. YUM!



This morning we went for a long walk with the dogs, had our fabulous camp breakfast and got ready to leave. We picked up Jamie at Luther, and drove north. We didn't get a chance to see Ben today, he was working at the college buffet, serving. It was so good to spend some time with him this weekend.



After I returned Jamie to her home, Paul and I sat on the deck and had a bottle of wine. A dandy end to a lovely, yet busy, weekend.





(I finished the GotH's socks with all this driving to Iowa. Started another pair on the way home - more on those later this week.)






1 comment:

coleen~ said...

sounds like a wonderful weekend. Love the pix of ben & jamie! Take care & give our love to everyone!