What do beads have to do with camping?

In our weekend off from our tour of Arts and Crafts shows, Betty and I are exploring some of Western VA. We have been in and around the Shenandoah National park and its Skyline Drive and George Washington National Forest.
Betty doesn't want it to get out, she is terribly depressed because we are in a KOA campground. It is the nicest one (in our view) than most. Usually KOA comes in cuts down all the trees and paves the ground. This one still has trees and some squirrels that don't act like pets. We also have high-speed internet and for $2.75 I got cable, I'm going to watch George Stephanopoulos in a few minutes.

We have always tried to find not only free and or cheap campgrounds, but those away from other people. It’s why we backpacked all those years, looking for the out of the way places. Thursday night we found a National Forest Campground that was pretty nice - $10 a night. Two other sites were taken, one of which had 13 teens and young adults in it.
I thought they looked to be escaped children from the homicidal-maniac-teen group home. I expected to see some wearing t-shirts that read "Old people are best when buried deeply in the ground." As it turned out they started playing hide and seek through out the campground and they were kid of cute homicidal children.
In any event, Thursday night turned out well. The kids were quiet after 11PM or so.
Friday was a different matter. There was a group of small children in tents 3-9 years of age next door to us, they were with their Dad and Grandfather. They were little noisemakers but were in bed by 9. Across the road from the campground was a group of people camping in tents in a big parking lot at a trailhead. They were hooting and hollering loudly until midnight, but the worst from them was some guys yelling, presumably in a fight. It was very loud, for a long period of time and with threats of severe violence.

Keep in mind, Betty and I are in a solid walled camper, it stops a lot of the noise and provides some security. I can't imagine sleeping in a tent with small children, they couldn't have slept through it and I felt terrible for them.
In addition, around 9PM about six college-aged guys came in to a site near ours. The had a loud ATV which they proceeded to tool around the campground in the dark but only for a short time. After that they sat in their tent talking and laughing loudly till 2AM.
It seems more and more that college kids have no consideration for anyone around them. They will have loud boisterous fun at anyone's expense. Again, let me point out that our solid sided camper cuts the noise. Most other people were in tents, which stops no noise. They had to stay up or were woken continually by this crew.
It leaves a bad taste in my mouth for those less expensive campgrounds. It is too bad because if you are a young couple with kids and limited means that is what those federal campgrounds are for, instead you have to deal with miscreants. Probably the only place you should take your kids is a KOA and many do not allow tents, meaning an expenditure of many dollars for an RV.

More from this high paced jewelry tour later..

T