Aloha everyone,

We just got back from our July family camping trip. All told, six families plus one that just popped in for lunch.

We had a beautiful full moon last night that we enjoyed in front of a nice fire after the kids were put to sleep.

The food was great. We had three whole chickens roasted in a bed of coals from our camp fire, salad, fruit and rice for dinner the first night, plus s'mores for dessert. We had pancakes, bacon, fruit and breakfast MRE's for breakfast. The hot dogs cooked on the fire plus lunch MRE's for lunch. One of the families brought a couple of cases of MRE's for us to try. Then we started simmering chili on the fire from after lunch until dinner time. MMMMM! Delicious. Dinner was chili, rice, pasta salad, home made corn bread and fruit. Of course, the kids of all ages wanted s'mores for dessert again. Breakfast was pancake, eggs, bacon, Portuguese sausage and fruits.

And anywhere in between, we had instant noodles, fruit including chilled watermelon, home made cookies, more cookies, etc.

We had cowboy coffee for the adults as well as the obligatory cups of tea and hot chocolate for the kids. I can't remember what else we consumed.

The weather was hot and humid, cooling off only later into the night. We had some drive by showers too. They blew in hard and fast.

We continue to have pig sightings, but no real close encounters. Nothing closer than 30-40 feet. But I did recognize the pig that I had a run in with last time.

I tried out a traditional sling for the first time and realized how much I truly suck at it.

I spent some time with various groups of kids with fire making. They were mainly pyro's! But I did go over fire safety rules with them that they had to obey. Only fire mishap was when I was adding wood to one of the kids' fires, some kid took the moment I had my face near the fire to stir it up from opposite me. I breathed in a good lungful of smoke and ash and my sinuses and throat have been bothering me since.

And unfortunately, one of the guys cut himself with my ax. It rained hard this morning and our wood got soaked. So as we were getting ready for the fire, one of the dads was splitting wood and I was making feather sticks. As I was making feather stick, my fellow camping dad says to me, "I think I hurt myself." He was kind of clenching his fist. So I ask him, "Is it bad?" He replies, "Yeah, I think it is."

He almost took of the tip of his index finger. So we get him cleaned and patched and I sent him back to splitting logs. Actually, his wife drove him to the hospital. She did say after that the ER doctor said the bandage job was top notch. So I pat myself on the back and feel guilty doing so. He got stitched up and is resting on drugs but still in pain. And he did tell me, "Oh yeah, sure ax is pretty sharp!"

Anyway, I will try and post some pictures later. I was pretty busy so I didn't take any myself. I have to see what my wife and the other folks took.

Thanks for the sharing as I am now about 9 months behind on my camping schedule. I can't wait to see the pics when you have time to post them.

I don't know where is the islands you live, but I live in Kailua on Oahu, and I'll second the comment about the beautiful moon. I worked till 5am and my whole drive home from mililani I had a hard time keeping my eyes on the road instead of the moon. Glad you had a great camping trip!

Aloha Sventek,

We were at Ho'omaluhia in Kaneohe. Not too from from your home.

"...I think I hurt myself..."

How often have I said that myself?

Sounds like you had another of your fantastic trips, can't wait for the pics...

I always enjoy an opportunity to practice Wilderness First Aid when camping, I am glad to see I'm not alone!

I am never happy to have to render aid since it means someone got hurt, but I am happy it helped out.

I was surprised the doctor made the comment that it was wrapped up well. I was just trying to hurry up and slow the bleeding while keeping the flesh as together as possible.

One thing that I did learn was to rotate stock in and out of the first aid kit. The ice pack (the kind you break the inner bag and shake) totally failed. It appears I will be visiting the redflare store soon.

Hi, Aloha !!
what's the name/brand of this ice pack? Do you find it at RedFlare or Aeromedix ??

TIA

I should have put the smily face on my sarcastic remark about first aid, because none of us like folks hurt. Having said that, it seems like there's always some minimal kind of first aid needed on many trips unless we're not doing anything outdoors. Kids with us make mistakes, (unless they aren't trying) and hopefully learn from them with the small mistakes now. If they cut themselves with a pen knife as a kid, maybe some set of neurons in their noggin register something that keeps them from lopping off a finger/toe/foot when they are older with the axe? At least I hope that's how it works

About the instant ice packs, I have had the same thing happen, with ice packs that were in my vehicle FAK in particular. I don't know whether they heated up enough at some point to break down the inner divider between the chemicals, or froze in the winter and ruined them. I always have a few around, and never had them all fail, but, it's frustrating. I don't know what the storage conditions and shelf life are supposed to be for those things. Between sports and scouts, we go through enough to keep the stock in my kits rotated pretty regularly, unfortunately!

The ice pack that failed was not from redflare or aeromedix. It was a Johnson&Johnson.