Giossi Family High Adventure! Part I

What do you get when you combine the beautiful state of Maine, tent camping, a raging river and the Giossi Family? You got it - a High Adventure vacation. We had so much fun in Maine last year, that  it was a unanimous vote that we vacation there again. We just may make Maine the annual Giossi Family Summer Vacation.

We arrived in The Forks Maine on the afternoon of Monday August 20,2012.  The GPS claimed it was a 5 hour trip - but of course GPS's do not take into consideration the need for a 13 year old boy to empty his bladder every 1/2 hour. 

Once again we were in campsight #1 which is on the sparkling Kennebec River. The afternoon consisted of setting up camp, a short hike to Moxie Falls, dinner in the "Crabapple lodge", and of course a campfire later in the evening complete with S'Mores.

The grown-ups tent complete with tent poles (last year we forgot the tent poles and it was Dan VS Wild with rigging up the tent with rope and tree branches)

Zach and Bobby's (Bobby is Zach's friend that he got to invite on the trip this year) two-man tent.

Boys fishing in the river

We took a hike to Moxie Falls which is a 90 foot waterfall. We laughed and took lots of pictures.

We blew our air-mattresses up with a bicycle pump; which was a team effort and took a ridiculous amount of time. We needed rest for our big day on the river the next day.

After my first nights sleep in a tent, I was reminded why I limit my nights camping to 2. But no worries because we are so excited for our day on the river. We meet in the lodge for 8:30am are fitted for life jackets, watch numerous videos of rafts flipping over, and get quick safety instructions and lessons on how to paddle - after all it is a team effort.

We take a quick bus ride up the river and the excitement builds along the way. We can already tell we have a very cool river guide by the name of "Chip" 

The river is running at 4800 cubic feet per second. The sun is shining and this is going to be a good good day.

Yup - that's us getting swallowed up by the Kennebec River!

We rafted some big Class III - IV rapids and at the bottom of the river were able to do some swimming in the river. We rafted with Crabapple and highly recommend this family owned and operated company!

That evening we had more campfire and tent sleeping! I am now looking forward to a hotel room and a hot shower. Stay tuned for part 2 of the Giossi Family Vacation.