I’m sitting here in my car, at a gorgeous camping site, right off a beautiful lake.
My computer is charging, as is my phone, which gives me the perfect time to write about what has started off as our least successful camping trip so far. Oh well. Or at least the one full of unexpected surprises.
First off, I didn’t plan for this camping trip well. This was kind of a last minute thing I threw together. A friend of mine hired me to do a foraging class in this area next week, and to do so I needed to come and check out the area first, so I got paid extra money to do that, and that extra money covers the gas and time to come here. I figured that if I was anyhow making this 2 hour drive, I might as well turn it into a fun trip for my kids and go camping with them. Their grandmother has taken them camping in this area, but on the other side of the lake, with very different camping conditions, as we soon learned, but this was my first time taking them. It was also my first time going camping having a smaller car after we downsized from a minivan to a Kia Soul 5 seater.
Because it was last minute, it was also the same date that my second son, Ike, was in a 3 day sleep away camp for his cyber computer course program. Lee also works in a city about an hour and a half from our house by public transportation, but has a car of his own. (That he bought in cash and pays for entirely on his own at 17.) He often takes off Tuesday, and our camping trip was Moday and Tuesday, so he drove to work when he usually takes public transit, and left a little early to join us.
Because of various reasons, I only started shopping for and packing for the camping trip the morning of it, and since my two older kids weren’t home to help, and it was the first time in years I was the only adult planning a camping trip, there were quite a few things I forgot to bring that I’d planned on bringing, but didn’t make it into the car. Things like tongs, bowls, regular disposable cups, (I brought 4 hot cups), plates, skewers, ketchup, etc… We also started packing and realized we only had 2 tents instead of the 3 I thought we had, so that was a fun surprise. It was ok, since I had a camping cot and was fine sleeping under the stars.
Something I did remember to bring was things to enable us to blow up our air mattresses and charge my computer. I sometimes leave the house, needing to use the computer, and it dies, and the only place I have to charge it is the car, but how do you charge a computer in the car? So I bought an adapter? converter? that plugs into the cigarette lighter in the car and lets you plug regular American plugs into it. This works for my computer since I bought it in the US and use it in our local plugs (European type) with an adapter. Then there was the pump for the mattresses. We have two, and I could only find one that plugs into the wall, not into the car. I could use the car outlet adapter? converter? only it was with an EU plug. Fortunately, I found the adapters I bought for my son’s trip to the US last year to be able to plug the pump into the car adapter into the cigarette lighter. It just took a long time once we arrived to find the adapters, well after we set up our tents.
Setting up our tents was a huge production since there was incredible wind. We had to weigh down the tents from the inside with heavy things like our cooler, bags, etc… and even then they threatened to blow away in the heavy wind. The wind made the kids miserable last night, and their misery rubbed off on me unfortunately.
Food was also a bit of a story. I forgot the salami I bought for sandwiches on the drive, so we stopped for pizza and smoothies along the way.
But I forgot to mention the first thing that caused drama, even before our trip really started.
After I’d gone grocery shopping for the trip, I left the things on the floor, including the disposable grill… and I walked into it, split my foot, and started bleeding heavily. I put lots of pressure on it to stop the bleeding, and then once it stopped, I put on steri strips, which are like butterfly bandages, one step below needing stitches…
When we got into the car to start driving, I got down the road and realized my shoe felt very wet, looked inside my shoe and saw my foot was covered in blood… so I turned around and went straight to the local clinic, where our trip started with me getting two stitches in my foot. And instructions not to go in the water. Boo.
Anyhow, because of all the drama, we arrived at the camp ground a lot later than originally planned, so needed to set up the tent in the dark and wind.
Once they were set up, I started the grill, which was a story as well because of the wind. It lit up beautifully, but so many sparks and little bits of charcoal flew out because of the wind, that we were left with only half the charcoal I originally put in, which made it harder to cook the chicken once our hot dogs were cooked. I ended up adding more charcoal to it and was finally able to cook the chicken. (But it seems someone forgot to close the cooler last night after getting drinks out, because the chicken this morning is gone, probably thanks to a wandering animal.)
Since I couldnt find the ketchup, we had pickles in the buns with the hot dogs, to give extra flavor.
Once we finished eating and needed the bathrooms, we discovered that the bathrooms were far from ideal, and my girls begged me to drive them to a nearby gas station to use a bathroom there. So we did (and I discovered that the camp ground, which you pay about $1.25 hourly per car, didn’t charge me at all, probably because of our disability parking pass, which makes this camping free for us) and found two gas stations, both locked up for the night. So eventually the girls did agree to use the camp ground’s bathroom.
Though officially illegal to play music, since this is designated a quiet beach, there were two groups camping nearby, blasting music late into the night, despite my requests to lower the volume, which kept my girls up.
Fortunately, I brought melatonin, and we all were able to sleep, even if we woke up at 6:30 or so.
It is gorgeous this morning overlooking the lake. And, of course, no wind. That was just a treat for last night.
My kids changed into the bathing suits and hopped into the lake. Despite there being no lifeguard, I wasn’t too worried, since there were bouys all around, so no way to be swept out, but after a little bit they were told to get out of the water.
Oh well.
We have a fun day planned for today. First we are going to check out and find a place to forage for our class next week, and then we are going canoeing. I can’t wait.
I love that the only expense of this camping trip thus far was the food, since the gas was covered by the extra fee for my foraging class next week.
Have you gone camping? What was the most eventful camping trip you’ve been on so far?
One Response
Thank you for this interesting post! I hope the rest of your stay, and your foraging class, are/were very enjoyable!