Inks Lake State Park

On a whim last weekend we loaded up the trailer and headed out to Inks Lake, about 1 1/2 hours north of home to check out the site for YM's High Adventure. We were hoping to get a walk-up spot at the campground and explore. It was still very hot outside, but we had the AC in the trailer if it was too hot! We made it up there about 11am and were lucky enough to get one of the walk-up sites that can't be reserved. We had to wait a few minutes for the previous night's guests to clear out, but we were set up and ready to play in less than 30 minutes...gotta love trailer camping!! We headed to the lake to enjoy some cool swim time. We had Jagg with us and he enjoyed playing in the water with us. We were able to rent a two man kayak and took turns paddling around the lake exploring.

After a while we headed off to the cliffs at one end of the lake to check out the jumping spot we had heard about. It was a hit!! Austin and David arrived first via the kayak, while McKinley, Ethan, Evan and I met them over there with the suburban. It was a slippery trail over to the cliff jumping spot, but all 4 of the kids were brave and ventured over and up. I stayed in the kayak to photograph the events as they unfolded. Austin was the first to hurtle himself off the high cliff into the water. It was quite a thrill for him. Next thing we know, Evan is missing (now that's not really a surprise!!). We looked around frantically and find him shimmying up the cliff to the highest point. Shortly after we get him in our sights we see him get so brave and jump from the highest cliff!! Now usually Evan is all talk and seems like he'd be the one to do these things, but he gets chicken when it comes down to it. He has a history of being afraid of paddle boats!! So we were shocked that he just went up and jumped!! When he came to the surface his face was beaming and he continued to jump off every place that was safe for the next 1 1/2 hours. He must have logged 25 jumps!! Ethan got halfway up the cliffs and jumped a few times, but decided the rocks were too slippery for his comfort level going up. He commented that he liked jumping, but climbing up was scarey. And finally to top off the cliff jumping we discovered that our little princess is quite the daredevil too!

She asked Daddy to jump with her the first time and they did, and then she was off to all the small jumps she could find. Now remember that small jumps to adults are pretty big to 5 year olds!! She logged about 10 jumps and some time in the kayak with mom videoing the boys and pointing out the best shots. Here are a few videos that we took in the boat...not very clear, but you can get the point.

After cliff jumping it was back to camp for some shrimp and steak tin foil dinners (thanks to Chad for showing us this upscale tin foil dinner option) and chocolate raspberry cake (thanks to Grandad Smith's recipe). We still did some smores of course and were pretty tired from a long day. We were in sleepyland shortly after hitting the beds. A great night camping!!