Camping: Day 3

So we got off to a good start on Day 3...we took a little trip to McMinnville TN to visit the Cumberland Caverns. As you can hopefully see by the pictures, it was a beautiful place. The boys were really excited to go underground....I kept telling them it was the batcave where batman lives, but I'm not sure they believed me. Our tour guide was pretty good and told us a lot of stories about how the cave was found, that it was used to make Salt Peter (part of ammunition for gun powder) for the civil war. The boys didn't care much about that but they did enjoy climbing around in the cave. The only part they didn't like was the part where the tour guide turned off the lights and showed us what complete darkness was like. So dark you cannot even see your hand in front of your face. The darkness didn't last but for a moment but the boys were glad the lights came back on. Enjoy the photos...the ones of the jeep were from when we left the cave. They use those to drive into the cave for maintenance and such.



Leaving the Cave


Later in the day was a little rough....We think the boys were pretty wiped out from the cave and so were Mommy and Daddy. We got back to the cabin from our trip to the cave a little late so we had to be a little quick about getting our stuff out and set up the campsite....for real camping ;o). I ended up breaking one of the poles to our brand new, only used once tent...the good thing is, this part was repairable. When we got the tent completely set up, the boys decided to play inside, and who wouldn't...its a pretty cool tent and they've never been camping before. So as they are playing, Draven decides it would be pretty cool to zip up the divider between rooms and jump into it.....well, it only took one time and before we even knew what he was trying to do....RIPPP!! Big whole in the side of the tent....the brand new, only used one time, pretty expensive tent. Needless to say, Mommy and Daddy were pretty irate at the moment. We were all tired, I had just spent an hour getting the tent to cooperate, Jennifer had rushed to get everything out of the cabin, etc, etc...we all had a bit of a meltdown. We knew Draven did not do it on purpose and did not know that what he was doing was necessarily wrong, so we tried not to be too hard on him....it was a learning experience to say the least. We bought some Duck tape for Draven and me to repair the hole enough for the week, but longterm it is not really repairable and we will likely have to buy another tent. Aside from this misadventure, we had a fun day going to the cave and spending our first night outside.