Wildlife

John and I went camping at Village Creek this weekend. We had so much fun. I can't wait to do it again!

We got a boat and went fishing. We checked out a couple of playgrounds. We romped up and down trails. We walked through the field in front of our camp at night and John was awed by the stars out in the country.

"Orion!" he yelled, "are you going to bed soon, too? What are you hunting?"

We were fishing off the bank of Lake Dunn at sunset. Everyone else was gone, and we were packing up to go.

"Arrrroooooo...." came from over the levee at one end of the lake.

"Arroooo oooooo ooooooo..." went the multiple responses.

Translation from coyote: "Whoooo, baby! Saturday night! Big moon! Par-tay!"

When we were setting up our tent the guy one campsite down from us came over and said "man, if you got garbage or food or anything you better put it in your car tonight. We had us some raccoons last night!"

And I thought to myself, oh, I'm getting me some raccoons tonight.

So anything we dropped at dinner that night went into the Jiffy-Pop pan.

(The Jiffy Pop popped in a very large and satisfying way, but apparently our fire was a little too hot for it. Most of it was scorched black.)

About ten minutes after we got in our tent for the night I heard some snuffling, grunting, lip-smacking sounds. I opened the tent door and John and I put our flashlights over by the plate of leftovers.

Raccoons everywhere! Fat, slow, contemptuous raccoons, eating and snuffling and climbing up on the table, looking for goodies. Our lights didn't bother them at all. When all the food was gone they gave us a blank look ("yeah, we ate it all. Now we're leaving.") and then waddled off into the woods.

Sometime past midnight I woke up and took John to the bathroom. After we settled back into our sleeping bags a chorus of coyotes went off on the ridges all around us. It sounded like there were hundreds of them. It was very cool and spooky and perfect for a cool spring night.

Not so fun: the three ticks I brought back with me.