Camping

As a “something totally different” for us to do, we went camping this past weekend. We only did an overnight because of logistics involving house sitting, mainly pet management. That said, we all had a blast, especially the kids, and we’ll be looking forward to doing it again some time. As a proxy for seriousness, we’ll probably start investigating a more appropriate tent for us to use for our future trips.

Things we learned from this trip in no particular order:

1. When camping with other families, it makes a world of difference when the families are all at similar stages of life. For instance, all the families here had pre-teen kids. Just as importantly, all of us had very similar child rearing expectations. When in close quarters for a protracted period of time, it’s important to have lots in common to minimize possibilities for getting on nerves.

2. Camping is all about periods of intense activity followed by periods of doing nothing. At least for adults. Meals are a good example as the food prep, serving and cleanup takes awhile. The kids tended to be an amoebic mass of activity, breaking up and reforming constantly over the course of the day. Ours were so exhausted when they finally went to bed, they didn’t have the energy to complain about sleeping outside in a tent or start wondering about which wild animals would be coming for them. No complaints here.

3. Make sure the tent is big enough for everyone, and make sure it is well ventilated. Without proper ventilation, the tent becomes a terrarium over the course of the night. We had to borrow a tent and it was big enough for 1 adult and our 2 kids. I slept in a smaller tent the boy has had for play. It was a rough night’s sleep, especially come morning when the air in the tent had become stifling.

4. Everyone pitched in where needed, there are no “assigned” jobs even though there is no shortage of jobs to be done. The whole experience really becomes an exercise in “community” with people pitching in as and where needed. Again, we had a great group as everyone pitched in with cooking, camp fire management, cleanup, child chaperoning and whatever else was required.

5. Kids equal laundry, and lots of it. That’s at the house under ideal conditions. When camping, conditions are ideal for kids to need new clothes every 5 minutes.

6. Kids love to get other kids in trouble for the slightest perceived infractions. Perhaps they are just bored with siblings, or perhaps it’s part of establishing a pecking order. Perhaps it’s something else entirely. It’s a good opportunity to force them to deal with situations on their own; or lose your sanity trying to play King Solomon.

7. For the amount of effort involved in packing and setting up, staying for one night isn’t enough. Probably staying 2 nights isn’t enough. It’s definitely an effort that should be amortized over a long weekend.

8. Portable tools are awesome. One of our fellow campers had a collapsible wood saw for cutting firewood. Several of us had multi-tools and all of them were used.

It didn’t rain, which made a big difference I’m sure. The weather in general was excellent, with a nice breeze providing cover from bugs during our stay. I never had to touch any bug spray. But then, the lass got enough bites to make up the difference.

Good times.