Camping And Rafting Trip

These are my feet. And this is the best view I've seen in a while.

This past weekend, Josh and I went camping with the Summer 2010 Focus Leadership Institute students and staff. What a great trip. Lorien had her first overnight away from mommy and we both did pretty well. :) We loaded up nine vehicles and headed out on Highway 24. A bit past Divide, we turned off on a dirt road. Twelve miles later, we ended up here:

The weather was absolutely perfect. It didn't get below 40 degrees at night, so it was plenty warm for sleeping outside.

The best feeling was rolling out my sleeping bag in the tent, laying back with my hands behind my head, and .... just lying there. For like a half-hour. Because there was nothing else I had to do.

Here is my favorite videographer with his camera, capturing the students as they enjoyed the sunset.

A unique FLI tradition: whenever we take the whole group camping, we put on a full gourmet Italian dinner with made-to-order pasta. The students are always wowed by this. And even though I am not surprised by it, I love it because it is really good food.

Here are some of our guys cooking up the orders.

The next day, I was on the breakfast crew. (We made breakfast burritos.) And then we went whitewater rafting on the Brown's Canyon leg of the Arkansas River. It was a beautiful day for rafting: warm air and high water. (Coooolllld water, too!) I think we wore the students out, because things were pretty quiet in my van on the way home.

Rafting through Zoom Flume. Josh and I are on the far left.