Eleven families spent the Fourth of July weekend at Cedar Grove, down in the bottom of Kings Canyon, where the walls go up and the Kings River runs cold and clear right past camp.
The centerpiece was fly fishing. With support from the National Park Foundation we brought instructors, gear, and enough patience to put a rod in the hands of anyone who wanted one, including a lot of people who had never held one before.
There was a practice session on a casting pond back in Oakland weeks earlier, so some of the kids arrived already knowing what a roll cast was supposed to look like.
Then they got to the actual river. Standing in moving water changes the whole thing.
Fish were caught. Several of them were the first fish anyone in that family had ever caught, held up in cupped hands for a photograph and then let go.
The rest of the weekend was river and shade and food. The water was the coldest thing any of us had felt in months and the kids got in anyway, repeatedly.
Evenings were the fire, the string lights, and a marshmallow argument that reliably breaks out about whether golden or on fire is the correct approach.
We broke camp on the last morning and stood in a circle before anyone drove out.
