Getting Into The Great Outdoors (Our 1st Adventure)

Post 2 in this series of amateur camping.  

Not Every Day is Sunshine and Unicorns

Two weeks prior to the first camping trip... that is when I booked our site.  We had scouted out W. Kerr Scott located in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina.  Immediately, we fell in love with the location and scenic views.  It was a no brainer we wanted to camp here.

I thought I had paid close attention to the weather. Part of camping in anything but an RV is having great weather to enjoy what is outside. At the time of booking the weather projections were for unseasonably cool July temperatures.  There was no mention of rain.

However, that was two weeks out.  Sad for us that meteorologists are not really psychics.  Ms. Cleo where ya at, girl?

I prepped for the trip Friday morning.  I made one and a half dozen blueberry muffins and two dozen chocolate chip cookies.  A quick Walmart run for my crack coffee addiction was pertinent.  {Guys, I have to have my coffee a minimum of two times a day if not four times a day.  Don't judge!}  I purchased an $8 basic pot to keep in the camper.

Meticulously, I went over everything I had to pack.

I made sure that we had all the grilling and grocery staples:

*Grill & Charcoal

*Grilling utensils

*Meats for grilling

*Condiments

*Disposable utensils and plates

*Beverages

*Sides

*Breads

Since it is a camper I also had to get the linens in order:

*Two sheet sets

*Blankets

*Pillows for the beds

*Towels and wash cloths for the bath house

*Toiletries

This wasn't a nudist camping colony so I packed four changes for each kid and two for the adults.  The plan was to be in our bathing suits the majority of the time we were there.

With that being said I had packed swim beach items like:

*Sand shovel and pail

*Puddle Jumper for the little guy

*Two camp chairs that we could easily tote to the beach or just set up outside the camper were also a necessity and packed

*The stroller for small human cruising was packed

*SPF, bug spray, and of course beach towels

A few fun things were thrown in like my book, a DVD player for when the kids were too restless to deal with, and of course the camera.

Lastly, tennis shoes for lots of walking and hopefully some good hiking.

And the sky became gray and clouds began to cry....

Friday it rained.  Friday it became cool.  Friday could have been the start of October for all I know.

Our goal was to be on the road by 6:45 PM.  My husband works until six each day and this event would not call for an early departure from work.  It just was not far enough away to warrant him leaving even ten minutes early from work. Plus, my oldest has tumble and cheer on Fridays and that is one thing that girl is not going to miss!

As we drove the up the highway I mentioned to my lovely spouse that "earlier in the day I had heard that this was the weather for the weekend,".  He quickly shot that down and said only a 30% chance of rain was forecasted for Saturday.  Mmm hmm.

Roughly forty minutes later we arrived to our campsite and quickly began the wet and dreary set up of the camper.  It didn't take very long to get her up and stable.  Considering this was only our third time completing this task and it took 15 minutes to do it. I was impressed!  Since Mother Nature was having a cleansing event the kids had to sit in the car while we set up.  They weren't too thrilled about that.

I'm going to be very truthful and admit something. As I prepped the inside of the camper I realized this style of camping is ONLY good for people who can spend the entire daylight and twilight period outside.  When you have a nearly two year old a pop up camper is not the way to go if the weather is wet.

As I was trying to figure out ways to neatly store everything I was silently losing it.

I like organization, cleanliness, and neatness.  Those are three things you have to throw out the window when you have young children plus bad weather and have yet to devise a plan of structure for how you will store everything in your very small camper.

Eventually, I gave up.  The kids were unleashed from their seats.  It was on.

----

There was no way we were staying inside.  After a few minutes in the camper we pulled out the stroller and took off to check out the now darkened campground.

The sky temporarily plugged it's leaking and we walked around checking out campsites, campers, and people.

It really is a nice place.  All the people were cordial and in all honesty you've never seen a cleaner more well maintained place.

I wish I would have had my camera on me for that initial stroll because the site of the lake at dusk was simply gorgeous.

When we returned to our little pad we slept.  Or tried to.

Tomorrow:  I Got A Car.