We cleaned up and put together a single backpack with some lunch and headed out for a hike around up the river. Jennifer told me of the various Girl Scout hikes she'd been on and how she'd earned all these merit badges. It didn't come as a surprise that one of them was for cooking.
It was about this time when she started telling me about one particular camp-out she had done where her troupe just so happened to be on the opposite side of the lake from a Boy Scout outing of some sort. The boys didn't know the girls were camping nearby and had all gone down to the lake for a swim, and the girls discovered they were skinny-dipping. I guess they watched the boys for over an hour before they got caught.
"It was so fun watching all these boys running around without any clothes on," she told me. "They were swimming and diving off of a rock really close to where we were peeking, so we really got to see a lot.
"One of the boys got an erection," she went on, "and was waving it all around, showing it off to the others. I don't know if he was gay or just enjoyed showing off his penis, but I thought it was really cool that he wasn't modest about it. He actually got up on the big rock to show off his hard penis. It was so cute, standing out straight as he bounced it around at the other guys. The other boys were all laughing and teasing him about it. Some made fun of how small it was, which I thought was kind of cruel. It was a heck of a lot bigger than any of the others, and it really looked big and sexy to me. The other girls thought so, too. That's when we got caught..."
Suddenly, she stopped and changed the subject.
"So, what happened when you got caught?" I asked, wondering why she changed the subject.
"Oh, nothing," she replied, going on with her new tangent.
My curiosity was killing me, but she didn't seem to want to discuss it. Considering how open she was about everything, I decided not to pursue it and hoped that she might tell me about it later.
While walking, we ran across a number of deer, one moose and hundreds of rabbits. We thought we saw a bear in the distance, but weren't highly motivated to chase it down. The weather was getting increasingly warm, and I soon removed my tee-shirt. We had a wonderful picnic lunch by another waterfall upstream quite a ways from our camp. Jennifer kept the conversation going constantly. She asked a lot about what I had done during the five years I was gone, but it was such a boring conversation we soon returned to her life.
After letting our stomachs settle, Jennifer got up and wandered over to the waterfall. I was just leaning against a tree enjoying the sweet smell of the foliage. It was a perfect day, on the warm side and a bit humid.
Jennifer didn't return right away so I started to wonder what happened to her. Lazily, I pulled myself back up onto my feet and wandered to the waterfall. As the spilling water came into view, my heart almost stopped in my chest. There, under the waterfall, was Jennifer, completely naked and playing with the water as it tumbled over the rocks and onto her head.
Almost immediately she saw me as I approached and waved. "Come on, Daddy!" she called. "Come join me for a nature shower! The water is so warm I can't believe it."
I continued to walk toward her wondering how to handle this one. "Oh, that's all right," I responded. "I think I'll just watch." Yeah, you dirty old lecherous man you! I just knew that I couldn't get naked in front of her, or she'd see what she was doing to me. I knew then, from her story of the boys in the lake, that she knew about erections and what caused them. I didn't want her to know that she gave her own father one. Of course it didn't occur to me that she'd already felt it on the drive up and seen it that morning through my underwear.
"Daaadddddyyyy!" she whined, "would you stop being so modest! I've seen boys naked before, and it's no big deal. Just relax. It's fun!"
I found a big rock and took my shoes and socks off. When my feet went into the water, I was surprised by how warm it was. There must have been a hot spring or something up river because the water felt like a heated pool. It was nice and warm, yet refreshing in the hot and humid air.
Suddenly, Jennifer, in all her naked glory, was beside me trying to drag me into the small pool under the waterfall.
"You've just gotta try it!" she pressured as she pulled on my arm.
She finally was able to get me standing on the shallow edge of the pool, but I still had my shorts on and didn't want them to get wet. I was really struggling with my erection, and having that naked, beautiful girl tugging on me didn't help. Jennifer finally gave up trying to drag me into the water and just jumped in. She splashed around just a few feet in front of me and continued to try and convince me to join her.
"I just don't understand you," she said almost to herself. "I don't understand people who are modest, especially when they have nice looking bodies. You know you have a nice looking body and shouldn't feel embarrassed or anything. Why are you so shy?"
"Well, you see, honey," I tried to explain, "it just wouldn't look right if I were to be swimming around naked with my own daughter."
She just looked at me for a second before saying, "Now that doesn't make any sense at all. I mean, for one thing, you should be more comfortable around family than strangers. For another, who's going to know? No one is going to see us. We're out here far away from everybody, so what others think doesn't matter."
God! What a logical mind she had - so innocent, too.
"Well, honey, you just don't understand," I continued.
"What don't I understand?" she asked as she came up to the shallow end at my feet and lay down, spreading her gorgeous body out on the sand in front of me. She was keeping her entire body just below the surface of the water, but it was completely visible to me through the clear water as I stood over her. It wasn't making this any easier to explain. "Explain it to me."
"What I'm trying to say is..." I really didn't know what I was trying to say, "...uh...this is really difficult for me."
"Why, Daddy?"
What a mean thing to do to me, but I couldn't blame her. It was completely innocent. I had to explain something.