by Angela Rednour

Created on: April 19, 2008

A Camping Trip

A breeze stirred the leaves in the cool, morning mountain air, soft streaks of light trickled in between the trees and there were cars parked all along the dirt road, that marked out the campgrounds. The largest of these was camping area number thirty two.

It was a corner lot and was the closest area to the small, shallow stream that wove is way down the mountain. A big red pickup truck was parked in front of the coveted camping area. There was an open shell on the back, along with the tail gate. I big blue tarp, attached to the top of the shell, hung down over the entrance at an angle and was anchored to the ground with metal stakes.

Inside the truck were a man and his daughter. This was their eighth straight day of camping and the man was already awake. He sat looking tiredly out the window hoping to see the deer that had come to drink from the stream every morning. After a few minutes he saw them. A bull, two does and a fawn, he leaned over to his daughter and shook her lightly. "Bethany, wake up, the deer are here!" He whispered excitedly. The response from his thirteen year old daughter was a groan as she rolled over on her side to escape her father's grasp.

An hour later, Bethany Ann Stevens, crawled out from the truck and into the chilly morning air. She went to warm herself by the fire and found her father making breakfast. "Pancakes again?" She moaned. "You need to learn how to cook something else!"

Her father chuckled. "What, you don't like my cooking?"

Beth grunted her response and stood staring curiously up into one of the trees.
"I guess we left the marshmallows out last night." She said, still looking up at the tree. Her father followed her gaze. An almost empty bag of marshmallows was hanging over a limb about ten or fifteen feet up.

"Yup, George must have taken 'em" he said and laughed.

George' was a fat chipmunk that seemed to be following them. They saw him on their hiking trips and he hung around their camp ground popping out from under bushes and scurrying up trees, watching the two as they camped. He was especially friendly when they were eating.

Beth was not entirely convinced they were seeing the same animal every time and thought her father was going crazy because he truly believed it was the same one. She rather liked the idea of befriending a wild animal though and so played along.

"Breakfasts' ready." He told her. She sighed and looked at the pile of steaming pancakes on the table with disgust.

"I don't think

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