A mug of fresh-brewed coffee in hand and someone else cooking breakfast at the campsite: the perfect recipe for planning the next adventure.
Or an I-told-you-so, in-print and on-line humiliation that will live until I die.
Which could be, well, as soon as Wednesday night.
The premise, as sketched on a grease-infused paper plate, is fairly simple. Complete the Maryland Park Service's Park Quest—a free popular summer-long activity that has attracted 750 families this year—in one week. That's 24 parks, stretching from Deep Creek Lake in Western Maryland to Assateague Island on the Atlantic Coast, in seven days.
I'll blog about it at the end of each day.
Park Quest is part-hike, part-scavenger hunt, part-geocache, with a little history and geography lesson sprinkled on top for good measure.
The theme for this year's event is, Where a Family Becomes a Team. Teams must include at least one adult and one child 16 years of age or younger, but can be as large as 10 people to include extended family. Teams must complete at least 10 Quests by Sept. 6 to be eligible for the Park Quest Finale on Sept. 11 at the Hammerman Area of Gunpowder Falls State Park, where they could win camping gear, kayaks and vacation packages.
Park Quest, modeled on a similar Connecticut program and brought here in 2008 by park service managers Gary Adelhardt and John Ohler, started with a half-dozen Eastern Shore parks and about 100 families participating. Last year, officials attracted 300 families with a Quest that included 14 parks spread across the state.
This year, 24 parks are participating. With no advertising or marketing budget, Park Quest reached its limit of 750 families in a little over one day.
But enough about the contest. Let's get back to my dopey idea.
In the hands of Jim Cantore or the Discovery channel, this thing would probably be called, Date with Disaster, or GRIZZLY!!!! My husband, who arrived for coffee too late to save me from myself, suggested dubbing the project, "It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time."
And it did. It still does, although a little less so with about 72 hours to go before the boots hit the first trail. But we're going to call it Park Quest 24/7.
This isn't the first time I've decided it would be "fun" to attempt an outdoor time trial, to pick a challenge and play beat the clock.
I have fished across Maryland in 24 hours with Angel Bolinger, a state fisheries biologist, and a cast of helpful guides and local experts. I have hiked the Grand Canyon, rim to rim, in a single day with my husband. Photographer Monica Lopossay and I chronicled the sights and sounds at six of the Orioles minor-league teams in six days. And with good friend Ernie Imhoff and my husband, I tackled the highest point in each of the six New England states in six days—the New England Six Pack.
So how bad can 24 parks in seven days really be?
Well, in the first place, Park Quest requires participants to complete a test at each park to get their passport stamped and get credit for the stop. Also, some Quests involve physical effort, such as paddling a canoe. One park, St. Clement's Island, is reachable only by ferry boat and only on Sunday.
Finally, there's the distance. It's not simply driving from the state's western-most reaches to its eastern-most spot, wearying but doable in a single day, for sure. It's connecting the dots, bunching the parks in clusters of three and four, working quickly and being done before the park gates lock me inside.
The logistics of this sucker are a little intimidating. But how bad can it be?
This season's Orioles bad. All About Steve bad. New Coke bad. William Bendix as Babe Ruth bad.
What do I have going in my favor?
Well, I know some of these parks already and spent a day Questing with some families two years ago. I have printed out the Quest worksheets and scanned them for trick questions and potential time-sucking delays. I have read the Facebook comments of Park Quest teams this year and gleaned helpful nuggets from them.
Most importantly, I'm pretty sure Maryland Parks Service folks won't let me die out there because that would be bad for business.
I'll start Wednesday at Swallow Falls in Garrett County and make my way east, ending on July 13 at Assateague and the Atlantic.
A former editor, Bruce Friedland, used to ask me: "What's the conceit of this story?," which is the old-fashioned way to inquire about the premise.
The answer has always been: "I'm old and out of shape, it gets me out of the office and it's good for a laugh."
And, I might add, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Follow along on my Outdoors Girl blog on the Sun website.