I’m back.

I went camping. Not backpacking, but car camping.

Car camping is so different. We had so much stuff. A big old stove, a propane lantern, a cooler, camp chairs! The funny thing is, compared to the other car campers we were roughing it. We hardly had any stuff compared to most of them. But when you compare it to backpacking, we were living like kings.

Shutter and I took his kid and my younger child out for an overnight camping trip. We had fun, but I have to admit I prefer camping with out the kids. I’m a jerk like that I guess. Don’t get me wrong, I had a good time and I’ll do it again.

Chasing kids around saying, “keep your hat on, keep your gloves on, don’t touch that” isn’t exactly a vacation for me. But I didn’t take my kid camping so I could get a vacation. My parents took us camping every year. I must ahve been about six months old on my first camping trip. Looking back on it, I suppose that economics had a lot to do with it. It is a hell of lot cheaper to go camping than go to Disneyland.

The result was that I (and my brothers too, I think) grew up with an appreciation for the outdoors. Many of my fondest childhood memories revolve around being out in the woods in the Adirondacks or the Blue Ridge Mountains. We would explore the woods near the campsite. I imagined that I was an explorer walking through woods that no one had ever set foot in before. There is something primal and satisfying about sitting around campfire at night.

The point, I suppose, is that I learned these things while camping with my parents. I feel a deep responsibility to take my kids out so that they can have the same opportunity.

To put it more simply, while backpacking is more enjoyable for me, I need to take my kids out to the woods so that they have the chance to learn to love it like I do. And I think they will.

As for this trip, it was a pretty typical camping trip ( except maybe colder than you would have expected in April.) We went for a walk. The kids “discovered” an amphitheater in the woods, a creek an d a pond complete with frog eggs.

We had hot dogs for dinner and S’mores for dessert. Only after feeding them the gooey combination of marshmallow and chocolate did it occur to me that the tradition of giving kids S’mores and then expecting them to be able to lay down and go to sleep is a bit stupid. But we must have worn them out enough, cause they went to sleep with out incident. We buried them in sleeping bags and blankets to keep them warm.

Having put the kids down, Shutter and I finally got a chance to sit down and relax. The temperature continued to drop, be we we dressed warmly and we built the fire up to a nice warm blaze. We sat and talked and laughed till midnight or so.

We woke up and ate a hearty camping breakfast of eggs, pancakes and bacon. And then set ourselves to the task of breaking camp. It is so much easier to break camp when you are backpacking.

We rounded out the morning by taking a fairly long walk up the Appalachian Trail. We walked to the point that is the “official” half way point on the trail. And then we headed home.

I think that it was a successful trip by any measure.

And better yet, I get to go backpacking next weekend.