Greenbrier

Over Columbus Day weekend, we decided to go camping one last time with Sue before the baby arrives. I was really looking forward to this trip. I was starting to feel less morning sickness so I could wear some of my camping t-shirts and enjoy some of the meals. I picked Greenbrier state park, located between Frederick and Hagerstown in Maryland. Just far enough away without having to worry about being in the middle of nowhere. I called the park ahead of time to ask about cell phone coverage and night time emergencies. They said that cell phones usually worked throughout the park, and that campers were given the code to the gates. It turned out that the gate to the campground was closed at all times – only campers and staff were allowed back in the camping loops. The main gate had the same code as the camping area and was closed at night. 

The campground had 4 camping loops. Cedar and Dogwood loops allowed pets and only Cedar loop had electric hook-ups. After waking up to a woman scolding her dog in our campsite the last time we went camping, I was willing to give up electricity for not having pets. The Birch loop was crowded when I booked, and it has an amphitheater located in the center of the loop. I guessed correctly that there would be some groups using the amphitheater that weekend, and decided it would be best to avoid that loop. The Ash loop was mostly handicapped sites that had tall fire rings and extra long picnic tables. Since most of the loop appeared to be handicapped sites, I didn’t feel guilty about booking one. The only sites that were close to the bathroom were also near the loop entrance. The nice thing about the online reservation system for Greenbrier was that it had pictures of all the sites, listed whether the site was level or not, and listed the approximate distance to the restrooms. I did the best I could and booked site 4. Without seeing the whole loop in person beforehand, I’d say I did pretty well.  It turned out that the whole loop was on a hill. Although most of the sites were leveled, the walk to the bathroom was only level for the 4 sites closest to the bathroom, and one of those was the camp host site. Our site was just below the camp host, so we had a slight incline. The site across from the camp host that I decided against had no privacy because it was surrounded on three sides by roads and thin trees. Since the reservation system didn’t show the walkway on the other side of the bathroom, I wasn’t sure what other sites would be considered close. It tuned out that the walkway on the other side of the loop encroached on one of sites, and the last site without an incline to the restroom was smaller than the rest.  

The handicapped picnic table was awesome.  We could fit a lot on equipment and food on the ends, and still have enough room to sit and eat. However the handicapped fire pit turned out to be not so great. The tall sides meant that heat was being radiated more upward instead of out at us. This coupled with the bad firewood made our first evening uncomfortable. 

The worst part of the weekend was the firewood on Friday night. Due to the emerald ash-borer infestations, firewood is not supposed to be transported across county lines. Greenbrier asks that firewood not be brought in at all. So when we checked-in, I purchased 6 bags for $33. Although the bags were smaller and more expensive than at other parks, I didn’t worry about it. After Sue arrived and we set up camp, it was time to light a fire. We opened a bag of firewood to find only wet bark planks. Sue eventually ripped open all 6 bags that night trying to find some decent dry pieces, but had no luck. Apparently whoever sold the wood to the park kept the good center pieces for himself or to sell to the rich neighbors, and sold all of the outer bark planks to the park. And since the park stored the wood in a shed, the jerk must have kept the bark planks out in the rain and sold them soaking wet to the park.  

The fire starters that I had brought must have picked up moisture in the garage during storage, because they felt damp and didn’t want to work very well either.  Leaving Aaron to keep an eye on the smoldering mess, Sue and I left the park and headed back toward the highway. We stopped at a small market, but they didn’t sell firewood and had no idea where to buy any. After driving around the gas stations with no luck, we headed back to the park. We tried to get a fire going all night without much luck. Instead the planks just smoldered. Even when we thought we had enough coals to cook with, we ended up eating lukewarm bratwursts. We even skipped bothering with s’mores. Sadly Friday night was the coldest of the weekend, and the fire wasn’t enough to keep warm.  We went to bed early.

Saturday morning Sue attempted to get another fire going. Since Sue had laid out the firewood around the ring, it was slightly drier than the night before, but the resulting fire still wasn’t enough to cook with. The camp host stopped by and we asked him where to get firewood. At first the camp host suggested that we take our remaining firewood back to the office and trade it in. I knew that all of our bags had been cut open, but I looked over to see how much wood we had left. My jaw dropped. We had 2-3 pieces left that had not been smoldered away. Thirty-three dollars worth of firewood smoldered away in a few hours with no output. Reluctantly the camp host gave us instructions to a grocery store. As soon as we finished our cold breakfast, Sue and I headed out. Luckily I took Aaron’s phone because the camp host left out a crucial step in the directions. When we finally pulled into the grocery store, there was a welcoming site: a huge display of bug-free kiln-dried firewood. The bags were huge and cost the same as the small park bags. Next to the firewood were boxes of “Enviro-logs.” These were supposed to be eco-friendly recycled pressed cardboard logs that burned hotter and longer than regular wood and produced high flames. They were also supposed to be safe for cooking, unlike similar log products. Of course a box of six logs was expensive at $18. But we figured we would only use one or two enviro-logs in each fire along with the regular logs.  Since it was October, we made an impulse buy of a giant Halloween spider. He looked great perched on top of Sue’s orange tent all weekend, and the other campers got a laugh when they walked by.

Saturday afternoon we headed to the nature center to hear a talk on black bears. During the bear talk, the naturalist said that a huge male black bear had been spotted on the Appalachian trial nearby, which put the park in its territory. So I worried all weekend that we would have a bear visitor, because campers kept doing their dishes at the water pump next to our site. That was another small annoyance. Other than forbidding people to do their dishes in the bathroom, there was no other guidance and nowhere to dump dirty wash water. Some campers sat at the water pump and let it run while washing their dishes and leaving food and soap wherever it fell and ran down the road. Other campers came to the pump and filled a bucket, but then set up at the empty site across from us to wash. They dumped the dirty water in the grass there when they were finished. Luckily the bears stayed away, even on Sunday night when the camp area was mostly deserted.

With the enviro-logs and kiln-dry firewood, we were in business. In fact, our campfire was so hot on Saturday night, we had to douse the embers with water before going to bed. Despite our efforts, the coals were still hot the next morning! Sunday morning’s fire meant bacon for breakfast!

Now that we had a fire, we had to carefully plan our day so as not to be stuck tending a fire when we wanted to do something else. At some point Sue and I ran to the store to get more firewood and enviro-logs, leaving Aaron to tend the fire again. Eventually we let the fire die out that afternoon, grabbed our hiking poles, and found a trail. The hike wasn’t great. Maryland parks are a little stingy with their maps. I had to pay $3.00 for the hiking trail map. I assumed that meant the trail guide was accurate. I mapped out a loop from several intersecting trails that would allow us a gradual ascent with a slightly steeper descent. Unfortunately the map was not accurate and we started from the wrong trailhead. When we got to the first intersection, I had a hard time seeing the error. Luckily Sue kept suggesting we had started at the other trailhead, and eventually I put all the pieces together and realized she was correct. So we had hiked the hard part I had wanted to avoid. No matter, we could still continue the hike and loop around. We started up the yellow trail that seemed to degrade into an empty, rocky, creek bed. But we were still following the yellow blazes, so we continued onward. Sue warned us to watch for snakes sunning themselves on the rocks. Before long, we came to a stop. A sign was posted in the middle of the trail saying that the remainder of the trail was closed for habitat restoration. I was not amused. If you’re going to charge me $3 for a crappy trail map, I think you should tell me which trails are closed. Or if you are too lazy to open your mouth, at least have a sign posted at the office. So we turned around, and took the other section of the trail that we had intended to start from. All the while back, I thought about how dangerous it could have been to leave the trail unmarked as closed. What if it was closed near the end of the loop and I had an emergency and didn’t have enough time or energy to hike all the way back the way we came? I like a little adventure, but now that I’m pregnant, I am becoming more aware of dangerous scenarios. Of course, we made it back fine. The trail ended to the right of the RV dump station. The map showed that it should have started to the left of the dump station. I didn’t see any sign post indicating the trailhead, and looking back at the tree line we couldn’t see the trail at all.

Since our hike was cut short, we wandered down to the beach. Although a RC battleship boat race was scheduled for the weekend, it looked like we had missed the whole thing. We took the trail back to the campsite and watched many of our neighbors pack up camp.

I had a lot of weird and vivid dreams that weekend. I even had a nightmare that woke me up for a bathroom break in the middle of the night. I remember walking to and from the bathroom in the dark, scared that something was going to get me. Unfortunately, that weekend was when I started to make 2 bathroom trips per night instead of just one. But the skies were beautifully clear at night. So when I wasn’t scared that something was going to get me, I actually didn’t mind the trips, and enjoyed looking up at the stars as I walked.

Despite the wet firewood, the worry of bears or nightmares, and the closed hiking trail, we actually had a great time. Oh, and I haven’t even mentioned the plague of stinkbugs when the weather warmed up. But everything else was great – the company, the food, and the weather.  We relaxed a lot and I took a ridiculous amount of pictures just of the fire…

Additional camping pictures can be found here: http://hooppics.shutterfly.com/12279 

And additional campfire pictures can be found here: http://hooppics.shutterfly.com/12170