Saturday, July 26, 2008

Home at LAST!




We went camping Thursday night. What an experience. Although Brian and I have talked about our desire to go camping since before we were married, we've actually only gone one other time-last summer when Brennan was 2. The trouble is getting time off of work. A few weeks ago I decided to just go with Brian's one weeknight off and camp that night only. So, off we went.

I hadn't planned ahead of time enough to make reservations, so I got the names of 4 relatively close campgrounds. After many, many delays we got to the first site and weren't impressed, so we moved on to the second location.

In between two lakes there's a road leading to two campgrounds. We headed for the further back one without thinking about how far 15 miles is on a winding road. Half an hour later we were past the supposed location and I was running out of gas to go much further without risking not making it back. We finally found the campground on our way back and stayed there. By the time we arrived, it was about 3 1/2 hours after leaving our house for a campground that was supposed to be up to about 45 min away!

The place was nice, but it was a struggle keeping Brennan from wandering off. That happened last year too. We also discovered many items I'd forgotten to pack. I'm still regretting not having bug spray. We didn't have enough firewood to last very long that night, and we hadn't packed any form of entertainment. So, Brian and I sat by the lantern at the tabel and played a few games of travel BINGO that was in my car, then headed to bed early (for us).

That night I will never forget. Asher kept waking up more and more frequently. Eventually neither the pacifier, nor nursing, nor a bottle, nor being held would help. He was crying at drastic levels and I was at my witts end worrying about disturbing the entire campground. So, at 2:25am I headed home with Asher for lack of any other conceivable options. Part way home I remembered that I'd left my housekey with my parents and I hadn't remembered to get Brian's before I left. Luckily I did borrow his wallet because I'd left mine at home and needed to stop for gas at 3:00am on the way home. At my parents house everyone was asleep of course and didn't hear my knocking. So, I went out and found a payphone, called my sister and had her unlock their door and went back and found my house key. Asher and I finally stumbled through our own door at 4:00am.

I have never loved my own bed so much!

I slept solidly until 7:00 when Asher woked up and we headed back out to the campsite. I had chosen the campgrounds because of their location on lakes or rivers. However, this campground I hadn't noticed was actually near a boat ramp, but not a swimming location. So, we left and hit another campground/park that supposedly did have a swimming area at the same lake. After getting on our suits and getting all ready, we were told (and saw for ourselves) that the water level was WAY too low. We could have jumped off some rocky cliffs if we'd wanted to swim, but with a 3 year old and 6 month old?... hardly!

At this point I was really discouraged. Almost nothing had gone right with this trip. In one last attempt we stopped at the original campground that we'd tried (the one we weren't impressed with) to see their day use swimming area. There was in fact a tiny little beach area at the river and we got a chance to get our feet wet. (Or in Brian's case, braved hypothermia for a macho underwater plunge.)

Despite the discouraging aspects, all worked out well enough and I think we'll try it again some time.

Another sad thing is that the backup batteries on our camera didn't work, so there aren't but a few pictures. I'll see what they are and hopefully post them some other time.

2 comments:

Sarah Hastings said...

That sounds like a pretty horrible experience and yet you are staying positive...impressive! I am ashamed to admit that we have never been camping with Anna, I just can't bring myself to do it. It seems like such a hassle, although I am sure she would enjoy herself. So way to be a wonder woman, camping with 2 kids!

Kelly said...

Quite an adventure!