Realm of the Shadow Redux

A different (but good) retreat! It has been a long time since I have attended a church retreat that has been so relaxing and non-pressured. New Church Ministries out of Atlanta, IL is a relatively new church for the McLean/Atlanta and surrounding region. Our daughter and her husband attend there and invited us to go to the Church Retreat at the Circle Z ranch near Platsburg, MO. Circle Z Ranch is owned by the family of the pastor’s wife and is a truly lovely ranch with 3 lakes that are teeming with fish.

I took Friday off of work so we could caravan down with our daughter and son-in-law (Nikki and Tim Goggin). We left bright and early from Atlanta (around 4:30 a.m.) and took I-55 down to U.S. 36 at Springfield, IL, this took us to Hannible, MO (home of Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain) where we stopped to have breakfast at McDonalds. Breakfast was uneventful and we were soon on the road once again to run into 52 miles of road construction on U.S. 36. Tim of course was overjoyed by the prospect of being stuck behind a semi-trailer for almost the entire 52 miles of construction (we heard about this on the 2 way radios that he had purchased for the trip)! Finally we made our turn off on highway 35 then on down to highway 116 to Plattsburg. Once through Plattsburg we made our way along the backroads to the ranch along a gravel road (which we found out later that we did not have to take, thanks Ed!).

First impressions as we drove in was that this place was truly an exhibition of God’s natural wonders! It is a well-manicured landscape with a maintained lake that greets you as you first drive up. Of course we went to the first house we came upon only to find out that it was the rental house and that we needed to go up the hill to the “big house” on the top of the hill. That is where we met up with Deanna (the minister’s wife) and her mom and kids. So on to the island and setting up camp as we were the second campers onto the site (Scott and Deanna were there first of course). After setting up our tent and moving in I decided to start fishing. Within 30 minutes I had already caught 4 bass weighing around 1 to 2 pounds apiece. I think that this is when I officially fell in love with this lake!

After fishing a bit longer we were also visiting with Deana and decided we should go to Plattsburg and grab a bite to eat. We decided to go to 3 Amigos Mexican restaraunt. While on our way to the restaraunt we spied a Pizza Hut and before you know it we were in the parking lot. Tim had totally “forgot” about the mexican restaraunt and had decided on pasta from Pizza Hut. Of course I really don’t think Nikki, Jean or I really cared about missing 3 Amigos but we did give Tim a bit of a time about it all. Of course we missed the buffet by 10 minutes and they would not let us have it so we ended up ordering regular meals instead. Once we finished our meals we went to the local grocery store and purchased some food to go with our hotdogs for supper and headed back to the ranch.

Of course when we got back to the ranch it was time for more fishing to be had. Dick and Judy had showed up and started to fish. Dick hooked into a 13 pound Blue Catfish that he landed like a pro (with a wee bit of help from me as Dick has an injured shoulder but he had already done the hard work). Everyone was excited about Dick’s “Holstein Catfish” as it was called by Tim due to its unusual coloring.

Dick and Judy left shortly after his catch to go back to the hotel they were staying at.

Deanna had graciously offered us the keys to the pontoon boat so we were able to fish the entire lake and had great success in doing so once we figured out the trolling motor (at first we could not find the switch but soon had it figured out). We did pause in our fishing so Nikki, Jean and Tim could spend some time swimming in the lake. We also visited with some cows on the dam at the end of the lake.

Once we got back to the camp Scott (remember Scott? He’s the minister.) had returned from his golfing outing and some of the other campers started to show up. We fired up the cook fire (yes, we used fire starter and I cringed inside doing so) and fixed our hotdogs, beans and chips. Next was more fishing, socializing, and waiting on the other campers to show up, some of which we did not expect until quite late in the evening. Jean and I turned in fairly early (we had been up since about 2:45 that morning). We were expecting some storms so I made sure our tent was securely staked down. Woke up around 4 in the morning to high winds, rain, lightning and thunder. Looked around inside of the tent and decided that our tent was still secure and that we could go to sleep again. We did find out in the morning that not everyone was so lucky!

Tim and Nikki had woke up wet around 4:00 due to the high winds. Brie and Sam also had issues with the rain and their tent to the point that they had to pack up and move up to the big house. In doing so they ended up getting their car stuck (movie of the car extraction go to the New Church Ministries Facebook Towing Page). There were other varying degrees of wetness experienced by our fellow campers but no one let it dampen their spirits too much.

Breakfast was breakfast burritos (Kudos to Deanna for such a good job) and I think everyone ate their fill. Off we went to play in the water and fishou our hearts out. CAtching lots of little bass and some crappie as well. Ed caught a 5 pound bass (the largest bass of the weekend) which is his first big fish as he is a novice fisherman (beginners luck). I think everyone caught fish except for Kim who got skunked on Saturday. Around 10:30 we all piled into our cars and took off to Cabelas in Kansas City for a quick shopping spree. From Cabelas we went to Arthur Bryants BBQ which Scott loves. The food was fine but I thought that the sauces left something to be desired and I prefer Super Smokers BBQ out of Eureka, MO myself. After lunch it was back to camp and more fishing (had to catch supper).

Clint, Chip, Tim, and Scott cleaned all of the fish we had caught and Scott and I cooked them up on the fryer (Scott was frying, I was breading, Chip and Tim were emptying the finished product from the bowl). We had cole slaw, pasta salad, chips, muskmelon, watermelon, zuchinni bread, other fixings and of course…. fish! My hat is off to Scott for perfectly frying that fish, it was great.

After supper we all enjoyed some more recreation (ladderball, frisbee, fishing, swimming, uno) and got prepared to worship God in our service that evening. There were some minor issues with the sound system but those were overcome and the sermon was good. After the service we spend the rest of the evening playing cards and socializing.

Another restful night and woke to a light fog over the lake. Scott, his son Josiah (sp?) and myself were relaxing b y the fire at 6:00 a.m. before I went back to bed. Up again at 7:30 for a breakfast of biscuits and gravy by Deanna. Then the golfers (which I am not) took off for their Sunday morning golf tour. Me, I was off to fish some more but they just were not hitting as well as before for me. Kim finally started catching some fish though so at least one of us were happy LOL. This was the morning that everyone was packing up and getting ready to leave, it was also the morning of the worlds longest Uno game! This particular game lasted probably close to 2 hours or more and at one time it had Chip required to draw 14 cards! It also was the game in which Clint called Uno more than 8 times. Kim ended up being the winner of that particular game. Congrats to her!

Time to eat lunch (cold cuts) say our goodbyes and hit the road for the trip home. On our way home we decided to drop by Walt Disney’s hometown of Marceline, MO but decided not to stop at the museum. We stopped for supper at a chineses restaraunt in Springfield ,IL and made our way home about 9:00 p.m.

As I stated in the first part of this story, a very nice experience for a retreat, one that was focused not on pressuring anyone into attending a particular church but instead focused on just having a good time and some good fellowship with like-minded believers in God. Truly a nice way to celebrate our Lord and Saviour who gave His life for our salvation. Now for the rest of the pictures (and some repeats….)

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Tags: Family, Uncategorized, camping, vacation // Comments Off