Patagonia Lake- A Lovely Trip with a Tragic End

We went camping with the Hays at Patagonia Lake! 

It is just over an hour drive from us, right north of the Mexican border. 

It was in the upper 90's, so I thought the cool water felt great. 

Elliot did not. 

"Why did you get me wet??"

He was not very happy with us. 

 They Hays borrowed an awesome inflatable raft that really made the day! 

Elliot liked slouching in his relatively dry corner.

Cute kiddos in a boat

Yes, he is a thumb sucker

Colby doing some power strokes

Me and my buddy Alice

Aaron and Colby off adventuring 

Trying to will Elliot into loving the water

It is super embarrassing when your mom snaps a picture of you holding hands with a cute girl

Chillin in our new 4-person tent

After the kiddos fell asleep, the Hays introduced us to a neat game called Citadels and then we did some iPhone-aided star gazing on the beach. 

The next morning we woke up, had breakfast burritos and s'mores, and walked along some of the nearby trails. 

Super archy bridge!

I like Robb and Alice in the background

After that, we got in a second round of swimming then headed home.

THAT'S WHEN DISASTER STRUCK. 

We were unpacking when we got home. My fingers shrink when I get cold, so I put my wedding ring in the zippered pocket of Aaron's swim trunks whenever we go swimming.

You can probably guess where this is going.

When we pulled the swim trunks out of our bag, the zipper was open. Aaron's ring was still inside the pocket, but mine was gone. We called the park rangers and had them look around our campsite, thinking that the ring might have fallen out when we had our swim suits hanging out to dry. Nothing. We decided to drive an hour back to look ourselves. We made friends with the new inhabitants of campsite 49 and looked everywhere that we had been that morning. I even waded out and looked in the shallow water where we had been sitting. Nothing. It is either at the bottom of the deep end of the lake where Aaron was swimming, or someone stole it. 

It was a bummer, but worse things can happen. We are going to tell our kids the saga of the Lost Patagonia Lake Wedding Ring and have them swim around and look for it whenever we go back. Who knows, maybe we will end up in one of those "Man Finds Lost Ring in Belly of Fish" headlines!