My Life As A Gypsy

I took last Thursday and Friday off so we could take a family camping trip - we figured that waiting until after Labor Day would thin the crowds somewhat - but it was not so much a camping trip as a taste of the nomadic lifestyle.

(I should warn you that this will likely be a fairly long entry.)

Thursday we left for Montana D'Oro State Park and the associated campground after picking the kids up from preschool. The back of the family SUV was packed to the roof with food, camp gear, firewood, water (no piped water at Montana D'Oro) and assorted accoutrement. The roof of the vehicle held a car-top carrier stuffed with luggage and sleeping bags, and the tent was bungee corded to the front of that. We were loaded.

We pulled into the campground at about 4:45 and did a quick loop to pick a site. While the state park is quite striking, the campground is no great shakes - but we settled on a spot that seemed to be pretty far from the "party" looking types and close to a bathroom. As we got out of the car we noticed that while the campground itself was mostly clear of vegetation, the hillside surrounding it was liberally sprinkled with poison oak. Nice. "Kids, don't touch any plants without asking mommy or daddy first..."

We set up camp and I started working on the fire. It was fairly cold already, and the sun was still up - somewhere behind that marine layer of clouds, anyway. Claire and Cam were both starting to sniffle pretty heartily, and during dinner Claire made it known that she really just wanted to go to bed. Katy and I exchanged parental glances, and she hustled them off to the tent - it was still light enough out for me to read without a lantern, and both kids wanted to be in bed. Not a good sign.

Friday morning dawned cold and cheerless. I chopped up some more wood to get some small pieces to start another fire and Katy lamented our lack of really warm clothes for the kids. Like warm coats, hats, and mittens.

(Let me just point out that the work of chopping big pieces of wood into little pieces of wood seems to warm you up enough that you no longer really need a campfire.)

Claire had improved overnight but Katy began to wonder out loud if we should seek a warmer climate. Both the kids had little icicle fingers and cold cheeks in spite of their statements that they were "not cold!" In the end we decided to call our friends that were coming up to meet us to see what kind of warm clothes they might be able to bring. They were also cold-weather gear challenged, and so they agreed we should instead meet them at the campground we had camped at recently, on Mt. Pinos in northern Los Angeles county.

So we broke camp, and I packed the car for the second time in two days. We had burned a little firewood so I had a little more room to work with, but not much. I was looking forward to the opportunity to burn the rest, and eat some of the food, so I would have a little more space in the back.

We had left our maps sitting on the dining room table - a classic blunder - and so ended up taking the Safe Route, rather than the direct route, to Mt. Pinos and our new campground. We finally arrived after four hours of travel, found our friends and the campsite they had picked, and once again started setting up camp. The only drawback here was a forest-wide ban on campfires - even in developed campsites. It looked like I would be bringing all that wood right back home.

I should mention that the drive across to I-5 on California 166 was really pretty - classic rolling hills dotted with coastal oaks, giving way to cattle ranches, farms, and small towns that reminded me of similar places in Oklahoma, where I grew up. (I found myself humming the theme to "The Magnificent Seven" as we drove along.) It's worth checking out if you are looking for a nice drive and you aren't in a big hurry to get somewhere. (I know - fat chance of that.)

Well, anyway, we got things set up and settled in to enjoy the remaining two days of our trip. The kids were playing nicely and we got a little time to sit and have an adult beverage and shoot the breeze. After dinner we all started making noises about turning in - nobody really wanted to sit around an empty fire pit (or even a propane lantern) and chat. We got the kids to bed and everybody went to sleep.

A few hours later, I woke up to Claire coughing like a seal pup - all congested and full of cold. It was around midnight, and at that moment I knew I would be packing the car for the third time in three days soon enough.

It was nice to get home early enough to get things unpacked and cleaned up before having to rush off to work tomorrow, and the kids both told us they had fun camping - but it was not one of our more successful trips. Funny thing, though, is it's got me psyched up for next camping trip - with my friend Doug to Kings Canyon in a couple weeks.