CHEA 2011: Leaving camp (May 25) — The foreshadowing stops HERE!

We awoke in the middle of the night hearing a familiar sound. It was the sound of rain. We recognized it would add a few complications to breaking camp.

In keeping with our recent trend, the first order of business was keeping the cameras dry so that photo-documenting was unhampered...



Complication number 1: The shoes and boots we left outside the tent were filled with water.


Daddy cooked breakfast for the backup packup crew.


Complication number two: The tent contents were pretty dry, but we needed to remove them to the pretty dry bus through the very wet rain.



Complication number three: Should we wear the waterlogged boots, or not? Since they did not seem to accomplish one of their most important purposes (keeping feet dry), the packup crew opted to embrace the precipitation, from the tops of their heads to the toes on their feet.


Daddy's umbrella, normally reserved for opening up and tossing in the air on sunny days, actually came in handy. Hey, it sheds water!


Complication number four: That feeling you get as your thankfulness for dry clothing gives way to your thankfulness for extra dry clothing in your duffle bag.


What can you do but smile?


Complication number five: As the morning wore on, we realized that the rain was not letting up but increasing. The tent was almost completely dry...until we had to uncover it and pack it up.


Each raindrop further un-dried the tent...


We happily loaded up, ever so careful to keep the wet stuff away from the dry stuff, and headed for the conference. As we drove, we formulated plans to unload the dry stuff over the wet stuff...