My Family's First Camping Trip. pt6

I had gotten settled into my bag as was drifting off when all of a sudden my wife sat bolt up right and started shaking me back awake. I, grumbled that I was awake and that she could stop with the earthquake impersonation. She stopped shaking me and asked me, in a hushed voice, "Did I hear someone mention bears?"

I sighed and told her that I had hoped she wouldn't hear about that but yeah there was a family of black bears, 5 in total, in the area and that I had see one of them walking on the road towards the upper part of the lake. At this point my wife went into hyper listening mode and was starting to get herself all worked up. I started heading off this freight train by explaining that it was very unlikely we would have a run in tonight. Her head whipped around fast enough to make my neck hurt and asked me how I could be so sure of that. I told her that I had made sure our food was stored properly and that our trash had either been burned or disposed of in the bear proof trashcans. I then went on to remind her of all the people around us, most of whom were still awake and partying, as well as the fact that I'd heard that the fish and wildlife person had came through to try and get the bears to move along to better foraging grounds.

While she was still worried she started calming down again, especially when I told her that we'd have about as good a chance of getting attacked by a bear as we did of the lake suddenly rising and flooding us out, especially since we didn't have any food or anything else that might attract the bears. It was also at this point that I pointed out where the guns were and that she had bear spray under her pillow. This calmed her down to a more normal level and even allowed her to joke about it a little. After a few more minutes she settled back into her bag and fell asleep while I laid back wondering if something else might come up. A few minutes later I realized that she was good and asleep so I let myself drift off again.

I was awoken a couple of hours later thanks to a foot landing on hand. Oh yeah that was a great way to wake up but it happens. After I jerked my injured hand away from the offending foot I looked up to see my wife trying to climb back into bed. I asked her what was going on and she replied that she had just taken the second child to the bathroom. If I wasn't awake before I was now, especially when I noticed that she was still holding the shotgun. I looked at her and asked if there was any problems and she said that other than having to walk to the port a john with the little one that nothing went wrong. She put the shotgun back where I had placed it and climbed back into the bag. It was then that I realized she was shivering. I asked her about it and she told me that it had gotten rather cold outside, especially with the breeze coming off the lake. I told her to keep her clothes on and to wrap up as tightly as she could in the bag and she'd be warm and toasty in no time.

She grunted something about never feeling her butt again but did do as I had suggested. It wasn't long before sleep claimed her once more. I looked around to make sure everything was still where it should be and did a double take at the baby because I thought I saw the blankets slipping off of her. It was just my imagination though as the baby was nicely wrapped up good and toasty. At that I laid my head back down to get a little more sleep, all the while keeping an ear open....just in case.

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