You know its a great adventure when the cops show up

 A friend and I went camping this week in an attempt to catch the meteor shower, and we had two of our kids along. Camping is usually an adventure, though this was the first time in two years I have been camping. I loaded up my hybrid, and after a quick meet at Walmart to split a bag of ice, we began the 2+ hour drive to Hocking Hills.

I was happy with the drive, averaging 50 mpg with the car loaded. But the real err of adventure began as I came out of the roundabout near Logan, Ohio. My cell service went dead. I had the route already in the phone's memory, but I was cut off from civilization. I got to the State Park just a few minutes after my friend, and we soon began to get set up. Having chosen an electric site in case we needed to charge devices, we setup on opposite sides of the parking space, with a canopy put up between the cars. My friend promptly set up a pedestal fan using the electric, while the kids just played on the Nintendo switch my friend's son brought along. (I brought a battery-powered fan, so it's all fair...)

We left the kids and scoped out the John Glenn Astronomy park where we saw signs about needing passes, though we missed seeing that online before the trip. (And no cell service there...) but it was daytime and deserted. 

"10" Ten what?

We headed back into town (and cell service) and grabbed Taco Bell for Taco Tuesday, and returned to camp. With still some time to kill, we hiked down to Rose Lake in the park.

Maybe the view was better further down the trail...

We got back to camp as it got dark, and headed back to John Glenn, where we were turned away for not having a parking pass. We were annoyed since neither of us had seen anything about passes online, and we headed back towards the camp. Well, we turned a bit too early, and ended up in the parking lot for Old Man's Cave. Being empty and dark, we decide to watch from there. Camera out, blanket for the kids to sit on, and we started taking pictures.

I don't think I have ever seen so many stars.

For me, it was the first time I ever really got to see the Milky Way. I've seen pictures, but I always thought they were doctored or something. To actually see it though...  We were there a few minutes when a guy with a telescope showed up, and it was a fun impromptu thing.

After about two hours, the cops showed up. Well, a Park Ranger, but he had red and blue lights and was using them. We had missed a sign about the parking lot being closed at night, so we got kicked out of the parking lot. We got some pictures and saw some meteors, so mission accomplished I guess.

We made another attempt to get into John Glenn, and were successful this time. Comparatively, the view sucked. We hung out a few minutes and went back to camp.

We were up sort of early and began to break camp. We were there primarily for astronomy, and I feel like I missed a lot there. I'll have to head back for a few more days next time, there is a lot more there to see.

Like this thing that crawled onto my shirt.