Friday, August 26, 2011

Well, That Was the Worst Camping Trip of My Life.

I had a hard time deciding on a title for this post.  Here were some contenders:

It Was the Best Worst of Times, it Was the Worst of Times
The Vacation That Wasn't
Camping Fail

Every August, Mike's extended family on his mom's side goes 100 km down a logging sand road which is known as the "Old Conklin Road" halfway between Lac La Biche and Fort McMurray.  We descend as a horde with our trailers, tents, quads, motorbikes and Rhino to pick wild blueberries, cranberries, fish, swim and ride the trails. This year there were about 25 of us I think.
View from camp while brushing my teeth.
On the day that we left for the bush, my 6 year old had already been sick for 5 days, which is almost a record for her, normally she's only sick 3 days max, regardless of the illness.  And the 3 year old had been sick for 3 days, but didn't seem that severely ill, so off we went.  I should never have assumed that we would get better instead of worse. 

It was when we stopped in Killam for lunch that I realized that we had a problem.  When told to get out of the vehicle, my 6 year old told us that she couldn't walk, which for her is an indication of fever.  Lo and behold, she had a fever of 38°.  We were 4 hours into our 10 drive and decided to just keep going, hoping that she would improve by the next day.  I mean really, how long could she possibly be sick?  By the time we arrived at camp, she had fallen into that dozed-out, fevered state that indicates that the illness has really taken hold.

I had had three days (before leaving) of a scratchy throat and one night of really bad aches, pains and some fever, but thought that I had made it through the worst of it.  I was so wrong.  During the first night there I got the worst sore throat I have ever had.  I felt like I had swallowed crushed glass and then drank gasoline that had been lit on fire.  I couldn't swallow my spit.  I spent most of the next three days laying on the bed in the trailer while my three year old played beside me.  Oh ya, did I mention that she was coughing and had an almost nightly fever by this time too?

Tuesday night was the breaking point.  The three year old started crying about her ear hurting and the six year old was not getting better in any way. Wednesday morning I headed south for Lac La Biche to the ER.  After a fairly short wait (2.5 hours), we were diagnosed and on our way to the pharmacy.  I have a throat infection, the 6 yr. old has a throat and chest infection and the 3 yr. old was deemed the sickest of us all by the doctor with a double ear infection.  We're all on various kinds of antibiotics which will hopefully get this under control before school starts next week.  When we were filling the prescription, the pharmacist looked at the strength of the drugs, our home address, asked why we were so far from home and suggested that maybe we should have stayed there.  I guess he was right.

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