Good Ole Yellow River

(Editor’s note: Today’s Blog was written by Yellow River camping friends Mark & Jayne.  They wrote this Blog back in the Spring, but due to some computer glitches, and the fact we were Off Line all summer, the Blog finally appears today.  Thanks Mark & Jayne, I hope my home sick tears for Yellow River haven’t damaged my computer.)

Good Ole Yellow River
By Mark & Jayne

Hey Rex & Mary,

Hope you are doing well with the heat and mice.  No flooding in Des Moines this year so we have had time to go camping.  Just want to give you a little update on what is going on in your old stomping grounds. 

First a little news on us. 
Jayne was a victim of the lousy economy and was asked to take an early retirement from the newspaper business in August 2008.  She was thinking about retiring so it didn’t take her long to find the door after they gave her a pretty good severance package.

Mark was fortunate enough to break his fifth metatarsal bone in his right foot right after Thanksgiving last fall.  All he did was stand up while going to take a leak after some beers (might have eaten to much the day before because he had only had three beers).  For the non Drs. it is called a Jones fracture and is a tough bone to heal due to the lack of blood supply to that part of the foot.  He walked on it all weekend then went to the Doc here in Indianola on the next Monday, and was sent up to a foot guy in West Des Moines who looked at the x-rays and said he does surgery on Tuesday’s.  So we went back up there on Tuesday and when we came back home that night he was on crutches, had a big boot and some extra hardware in his foot which will stay there for  a lifetime. 

 It was a good thing that Jayne had retired as she was a trooper trough the ordeal, shoveling snow, warming up the truck in the morning, walking the dogs, getting Mark off to work with his crutches in the morning and otherwise taking care of Mark’s sorry ass.  Mark finally got off the crutches at the end of January and out of the boot soon after that.

Enough about us, here is what is happing at Yellow River.

We went up there in May for Mothers day weekend.  Grace & Charlie (the camp host & hostess who are in their 80’s) weren’t up there yet as Charlie was having problems with his legs.  

We did meet up with Grace & Charlie when we went up for a week at the end of June and had a nice dinner of baby back ribs brought up from the Indianola Fairway.  Here they are starting out. 





 

Jayne also made some cheesy potatoes that we cooked in the Dutch Oven.





Here is everything cooking.


 



 


 


 


 

Here is the result, all of us fat dumb and happy.



 


 

 
If you Guys are heading back this fall we have plans for Charlie’s  83^rd birthday on September 12^th.  We are going to bring up around a 24 lb. turkey to cook over the fire (Rex has helped with the beer support for that in past years) and we have a huge potluck there at Yellow River.  We will be up there until September 26^th/27^th.

Travel well our friends and stay cool and mouse free this summer.

The girls (our rat terriers) look forward to meeting Susie-Q or having her over for lunch as the main course.

Mark & Jayne