My last few adventures of the summer...

Three things I've missed immensely:

1. Friends
2. Tennessee
3. Mountains

I was reunited with all of the above this past week, and it was awesome. (Also, I've noticed that "adventure" in any form is becoming my new favorite word...)

Darren's baseball team won state, so it was off to Lewisburg, TN, for the regional tournament. Lewisburg happens to be close to where Audrey and Mike are working camp for the summer. I was really excited because they're two of my best friends, and I was going to get to see them, right? Um, yeah, apparently, they decided that the one weekend I was going to be within 15 minutes of them would be an opportune time to go to Ohio. Thanks, guys.

Unfortunately, Darren's team didn't win their games, but they did play pretty awesomely, so I was still proud. Kristi came to see him play, too, so it was great to see her and to have someone to brave the heat with me! (For real, it should never be 100 degrees at 10:00 in the morning. Let's not try that again.) Her friend, Jeff, got bored in Murfreesboro, so being a flight instructor, he flew over to hang out with us for awhile. That evening, he took Kristi, Darren, and me up in his plane, which was pretty awesome! I had never been up in a small plane like that before, so it was cool to get to do that.

On Sunday, Kristi came to pick me up and I went to her house for a few days. Being us, we managed to have plenty of adventures crammed into a couple of days, and most of them involved the outdoors. Always a plus.

We went hiking, of course. We went to Abram's Creek, but it was super hot, so we didn't make it very far. We attempted to go down a side trail to see one of the Appalachian Trail shelters (just because), but it turned out you basically had to hike up the mountain to do so. We went about half a mile before deciding that it was entirely too hot to attempt anything more, so we turned around and went back towards the creek. Maybe in the fall. Anyway, we just waded in the creek for awhile, took a few pictures, then drove around for a little while. Typical us.

Later that evening, we dressed up a little more (the only time I looked halfway decent all week, I think) and we, along with Kristi's brother David, went to Pigeon Forge to see Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat! We got free tickets (typically $40) from Kristi's church, and even though none of us are particularly into that sort of thing, we didn't really have anything else to do, so we decided to go. Besides, my roommate has told me about a billion times how awesome it is, so I kind of wanted to see what the big deal was anyway. :) It ended up being a lot of fun (albeit slightly long towards the end...), so I was glad we decided to go.

On Tuesday, Kristi, David, and I went jet skiing with their friends Russell, Amy, and Kate. That was definitely fun, even though we only had one jet ski and weren't there all that long. It was just nice to be on the water, especially since I haven't even had the chance to go swimming this summer!

After finishing up at the lake, we went back to Kristi's house to pack up for a quick camping trip. We loaded up the truck and finally started making our way towards Cades Cove where our campsite was. (Kristi, of course, stayed true to form and packed 2 floats--never mind that our campsite was not near water.) It was around 10:30pm when we got there, so obviously, it was dark. However, Kristi, David, and I managed to set up our tent without a problem. As soon as we finished, David's friend Aaron got there. Perfect timing, I'm sure. The four of us played cards for awhile and then got ready for bed, since we were planning to get up before the sun.

We woke up at 5-something the next morning. Kristi and I ate Lucky Charms (very nutritious, of course) and finally managed to drag the guys out of bed and got them to eat, too. Then, around 6:30am, we got on our bikes and headed off to bike the 11-mile loop at Cades Cove! It was a perfect day to do something like that. It was early, so it wasn't hot, plus it was pretty cloudy. That made for some pretty awesome pictures. I've decided that, if I can't live in Colorado in the middle of the Rockies, I think I'll be happy to settle for the Smokies. Seriously, so gorgeous:

Is there any question as to why they're called the Great Smoky Mountains? Pictures totally don't do it justice. It was beautiful. When I see stuff like that, I can't help but be like, "Holy crap, God, You're amazing!!"

We did a few more random things during the week, and then yesterday, we decided to drive through Cleveland and hang out with Jon for a little while before heading to meet my parents. After driving around campus to see the random changes and sitting in the PCSU waiting for Jon to get off work, the three of us headed to Chick-fil-A for peach milkshakes (sooo good). Jon mentioned something about Will being back in town, so I texted him and he invited us to come over. We did, and after being there for about 5 minutes, Tuna* came down the stairs! We all thought he was at work, so that was definitely a nice surprise! I wasn't expecting to get to see either Will or Tuna, but I am so glad that I got to. I love those guys so much. It was sooo good to see them and hang out with them for awhile. It made me really glad that we'll all be reunited a little more long-term in just 2 weeks. YESSSS.

So yeah--definitely a good week! I can't believe I'll be going back to Lee just 2 weeks from today. I can't say I'm looking forward to classes and homework and such, but I am definitely excited to be with everyone again! This semester kind of has to be awesome. There is no way that junior year is allowed to be as lame as last year! The fact that I'll have an apartment, my brother will be there, and pretty much all of my friends will actually be on the same side of campus for once makes me really happy and excited and yeah, I pretty much can't wait. Okay, I'm done. Maybe I'll actually have a short post one of these days?
* Every now and then, it occurs to me what a ridiculous nickname Tuna is and what people who don't know him must think when I call him that. Oh well. It's pretty much impossible for me to look at him and think "Michael." It just doesn't work. He doesn't respond to it anyway.