Camp Smokey 2014

So here's how it all came about.  I had been thinking about Camp Smokey because for many years our church rented this campground for a churchwide retreat around the second weekend in August.  We went down on Friday evening and stayed through Sunday afternoon.  We usually watched a Disney movie on Friday night.  Saturday morning some in our group who were early risers fixed a big breakfast of bacon, eggs, biscuits and gravy.  Then we started our day with going to the water slide, games..including egg toss. We fixed a big lunch of chicken nuggets, tater tots, green beans, corn, etc.  Then the afternoon included the Horseshoe tournament, going to the river to catch crawdads and swing from the tree rope into the freezing river.  Then we had a weiner roast and smores.  Saturday evening we gathered in the rec building and watched a Christian film.  Sunday morning was donuts for breakfast and worship service in the rec building.  Lunch was leftovers and sandwiches.  Then time to clean up and head for home.  

Our kids grew up looking forward to Camp Smokey every summer.  I think Wendy was five when we started going there and she was 30 and  married with four children when we stopped going.

So...back to why we went there this year.  I wanted to take the grandkids down there, so I began calling around to find a cabin big enough to sleep Gary and I and Todd's family and Matt's family.  Well...fyi..you need to book these cabins sooner than the week before Labor Day.  Everything was either already rented or had a minimum of 3 nights stay.  So we decided to just go down Saturday and look around and play.  I called the Park Office to make sure there was a place to picnic and ask if we could walk around Camp Smokey and told him our story about going there so many years and wanting to take the grandkids.  He said there was no one there that weekend, so we could stay there if we wanted.....for $6 a person!    Really....the whole campground....dorms, kitchen, everything for $6 a person?  I asked the kids and they were for it.  Todd and Heather couldn't come down until Saturday, and Matt and Lindsay would be around 9:00 Friday night.  So Gary and I planned to take the grandkids down and the others could come when they could.  I told Cozy and asked if she and Steve would want to come and did she think Belinda and Roy would want to.  Well....the answer was yes.   Belinda said Erin was so excited to go and let the kids experience it.

So we ended up with Me and Gary, Jadon, Haven, Jude, Cael, Ava getting there first. Then  Belinda, Erin, Big Sister, Little Sister and Little Brother arriving shortly after.   Matt and Lindsay got there around 9:30 with Roy, Eli and Eleda pulling in about a half hour later.  The guys all slept in the "boys dorm" where they always used to stay.  Belinda, Erin and the girls all stayed in the "girls dorm", where Erin hoped to find her bunk with her name still on it.  Unfortunately they had painted all the bunks, so...no name.  But she knew which bunk it was. Lindsay, Ava and I stayed in the "staff dorm".  Steve, Cozy, and Charles arrived around 8:30 am Saturday moning and  Andy, Mindy and Elsie got there soon after and Todd and Heather arrived around noon.

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The Kitchen and cafeteria

It started raining in the early hours Saturday morning and this is what it looked like when we got up....so beautiful!

Sometimes we had our weiner roast in this fireplace.

We walked up and down these hills so many times going to our dorms and back to the kitchen.

Here we are at the river....crawdad catchin'....Sorry to say there is no more rope swing or anyplace to hang one...So sad  :(

They captured 63 crawdads...sounds like supper?
Alas, they were released back into the river for others to catch.

Roy's trained crawdad

And on to the water slide.........

What a wonderful weekend with our dear family and friends!  We shared memories of the years we spent here when our children were catching crawdads and going down the water slide like they are doing now with theirs.  We remembered the horseshoe tournaments and relay games and pillow fights on the log and the rope ladder and the egg toss.  

We also remembered when Wendy got saved at camp after watching a Christian film and that Steve was baptized in Roaring River.  We remembered the different guests who presented the Gospel either in drama, or preaching on Sunday morning and other youth and adults alike who made decisions to follow Jesus..  This was not only a retreat but an outreach and we brought lost or unchurched friends.  It was a time of sweet and refreshing fellowship and, I believe, was one of the things that brought our church closer together.

Thank you Charles Dixon, for starting this adventure and keeping it going for 25 years.  You have an unparalled legacy for so many of us with Camp Smokey and the Nativity Pageant.  I can't even describe what they have meant to our family.  Mostly because your whole purpose in both of these was to share Jesus and make Him real in the lives of others.  

Shall we go again next year??  I'm thinking YES!  But next year we need the Curt and Amanda Jones family and the Doug and Wendy Bischoff family to join the rest of us!