I just had the BEST mini-vacation last weekend at a Squam Lake (New Hampshire) lakehouse with my college friend (and soon-to-be roommate) Luci and a couple other friends. It didn’t start off that smoothly, though…we arrived Saturday afternoon right in time to hit the lake for tubing. And that’s when disaster struck (literally).
Me and Luci on the boat, pre-injury!
Warning: do not read this paragraph if you would get squeamish reading about a minor injury! While speeding behind the boat on the tube, my friend Eric and I got caught in a massive wave that flipped our tube over. As we both fell into the water, Eric accidentally kneed me in the mouth, causing my front tooth to pierce through my bottom lip! Yikes!!! Thankfully, the pain was extremely short-lived even though there was quite a bit of bleeding. (And now, a couple days later, the wound is healing really well and I just have a small scar below my lip to show for the accident.)
So no more than 2 hours into my vacation, I was sidelined from further tubing, and I have to admit it was slightly uncomfortable to move my mouth for a few hours because of the wound (my friends kept trying to make me laugh by provoking me with such nonsense as “Annie, why so serious?!”). Womp womp! Not to worry, though — the rest of the weekend was amazing and more than made up for the accident (plus, I have a cool story to tell now). Read on for some highlights from my trip!
After tubing, Luci and I went kayaking in the lake. Here’s a picture of the gorgeous Squam Lake, apparently the 2nd largest lake in New Hampshire!
Dinner was a delicious feast of homemade burgers (magically stuffed with onions…part of a secret family recipe) and cheese & wine around a bonfire we created. I should mention I learned how to start a fire, too! Here I’m sitting with Geoff and Steven.
Around midnight, we took a raft out onto the lake and did some quality stargazing. Lucky for us, it was a new moon that night, so the stars were especially clear. I have seriously never seen so many stars in my life. We also saw a dozen or so shooting stars, and could even see the Milky Way! It was a beautiful experience. Obviously our cameras were not pro enough to capture the night sky, but this is approximately what it looked like in terms of number and clarity of stars (minus the psychedelic colors):
The next day, we all went out for waterskiing on the lake. It was my first time, and my goodness was it difficult for me to get started! I got up on my skiis successfully only once out of the four times I tried…and of course, then promptly fell. Check out the video below documenting my attempt (note the ironic “wow”)!
We filled the rest of the weekend jumping on a trampoline in the water, playing badminton, watching a hilariously bad 80’s movie (The Secret of My Success), paddling around the cove on surfboards, and visiting an awkward, yet somehow extremely popular, bar called The Mug.
So how do you enjoy a weekend vacation with a busted lip? Fill the time with enough fun activities to make the minor setback seem like nothing! And don’t forget to chew on the other side of the mouth until your lip heals :)
Me and Luci looking SUPER happy!