The critter story!

Yesterday, you got the good part of our trip. Today, you'll get the bad.

We weren't in the cabin all that much, other than when we were sleeping. That's actually when the real adventure began. I slept with Chloe both nights, which is really an adventure all it's own! I tossed and turned a bit, and one of the times I was awake, I heard something out in the kitchen area. I can hear things when there's really nothing, and my imagination can really get me pretty freaked out, so I usually try not to wake Keith. This time, though, I knew I wasn't imagining what I was hearing. So, I woke him up and told him that I heard something, and that it sounded like a critter. He got up for me, and looked around, but of course the noise stopped. He's used to having to do this occasionally, and he was half asleep, so I don't think he thought it was anything. Plus, staying in a cabin in the woods, you can usually expect to hear things you might not at home. Anyway, we went back to bed, and Keith went back to sleep. I did not. I was awake on and off all night, still hearing the same noise. It was like something was in the kitchen, not just outside. When I have nights like that, I'm always so glad when morning comes!
Well, we got up and didn't see anything, so we just got on with our day. We were gone most of the day, but that night before bed, Keith finally heard the noise. I was glad that he knew it wasn't just my imagination, but not happy that it was, in fact, a critter. There was a mouse in the heating duct. (i'm sure it was not alone, but that's how i like to think of it.) It would climb up almost to the vent, and then jump up. You could actually see the mouse when it did this. It did this over and over and over. It was pretty loud, especially when it was quiet at night. At first, we started covering the vents in the kitchen and living room, until we realized that we were making it come closer to us in the bedrooms! That was almost my breaking point!! We seriously debated about waking the kids, and either heading home or getting a room in the hotel. We finally decided to just stick it out. We were heading home in the morning anyway, and there wasn't evidence that it had been in the kitchen the night before.
We didn't get much sleep that night. At one point, when we were actually resting, we woke up to the stupid critter trying to get into our room!! That is really not what you want to hear in the middle of the night.
In the morning, we packed up and left, and we didn't look back. We'll see if this experience changes our plans to visit different state parks. Maybe all we need is some time to forget the sound of that stupid little mouse jumping at the vents!
To the future residents of cabin 321, good luck. I really hope they get the critter out, otherwise it's going to smell bad in there!