My husband and I bought a pop-up camper a few weeks ago. A family from our church was selling theirs, only two years old, to buy a bigger camper to use while their young children still wanted to go camping with them. Good idea.
We have been tent campers forever. I like tent camping. I like cooking over the fire. I like snuggling into the sleeping bag and waking up all snuggly and warm on a crisp fall morning, ready to cook over the open fire and enjoy the great outdoors. Ok...beginning to sound like Thoreau a little, so I will quit on that.
As our daughters got older, we traded camping for hotels, and then reverted back to camping again. In fact the first time our second son-in-law met the family (and lots of our friends) was on a camping trip around Labor Day weekend. What a way to get to know everyone!
We hadn't camped for a while, actually since our grandson came along. We spent most of our weekends seeing him, watching him grow..until this weekend. His first camping trip.
Our new pop-up is going to be shared. We knew that from the first idea of buying it. Hilary (youngest daugher), Blaine (her husband), and Landon (our grandson) took the pop-up to Tippecanoe River State Park this afternoon. They are camping there with friends, actually Blaine's best man, his wife, and son.
We went to the park to join them for dinner (Bev makes wonderful chicken/rice soup each time we camp with them...absolutely delicious). It was very dark. There were very few campsites being used. Landon was enjoying the outdoors--kicking leaves, saying "HOT! HOT!" to the flames in the firering. The pop-up is roomy and looks comfortable. The space heater was running, plus the former owners tossed in their heated mattress pads with the camper since they had no use for them anymore. It should be snuggly warm in there tonight.
However....the bathrooms are closed. All of them. Locked. No facilities.
Now I like to camp. I like to cook over the fire. I don't mind getting dirty. I can sleep in my sweats and then wear them during the day. I can tolerate the showers at the campground.
But I cannot go without a bathroom. My husband said it wouldn't bother him at all. Blaine, Tony, and Brandon said the same thing. But me? No. I need a bathroom. It would be a VERY long night without one.
I am glad we are back home. It is warm. We have electricity and lights. I was able to finish The Scarlet Letter pod. But best of all...we have a bathroom! Yeah!
Haha! I loved reading this description of "not that into nature". When I caught a glimpse of the name I instantly thought of my parents saying the same thing. Surprisingly for about the same reasons, it all comes down to having the ability to stay clean. My parents nix going camping places that don’t have showers, bathrooms, or mirrors. When I lived in Oregon, I had a boyfriend that when camping almost year around. I only opted to go in the summer months when I didn’t need a below zero sleeping bag. However we never camped in places that were on the beaten path. We sought out the most secluded camping areas around Mt. Hoods’ Timothy Lake, Rock Creek Reservoir, and Harriet Lake. All places people never really considered as places to camp because the lack of facilities. My parents hardly ever went camping over night with us. They would come for the party and for the food but they hardly ever spent the night. However they loved to go camping with my aunt and uncle on the Oregon coast. I think it’s because they had a camper. The crowd I camped with, depending on the time of year, we were lucky to have tents some times. Camping in the bed of a pick-up, now that’s what I call roughing it!
ReplyDeleteI love going camping with my husband and three boys. We go out to Bowling Green every year to camp. I have never had the issue of not having a restroom but I have had the issue of a really dirty one. I now carry cleaning supplies on hand when we go camping. My husband makes fun of me because I make the boys go into the ladies (the little ones) where I can clean the showers before they use them. So far nobody has complained about that and in fact the other mothers laugh and say I do the same thing.
ReplyDeleteI like the tent camping over a camper. I use to have one and the kids always wanted to stay inside the camper to play video games or watch television. Thats not the only reason I just enjoy it more (full effect), well if I have my blow up mattress.
I remember a few years ago when we went out to Bowling Green to camp, it was intense. That was when all the tornadoes came through. I did end up in a hotel room that night. Thank goodness we decided to take our tent down earlier that day to move out to a more secluded area. The kicker for that camping trip was my husband lost our bank card :( and we had NO CASH. Our bank was a small bank that nobody knew existed in Kentucky. My dad had to wire us money. He is lucky I didn't throw him out with the tornadoes. ha joking..
Although I probably would have loved to have a camper when we all took our camping trip when I was 8 months pregnant. Somehow my blow up mattress got a hole it in. The jokes on that one didn't end for days. My husband always teased me when I was pregnant and when the air mattress deflated he looked at me and said, "I told you they had a weight restriction." Not to change the subject but I got him back when we later went to McDonalds. I was eating a big mack and he looked at me and said, "wow show that thing some mercy hog head." There was two older ladies setting next to him, so I whipped up some fake tears and rambled on about how he hurt my feelings. The looks he got were perfect. I laughed all the way back to the camp site.
I would have to agree that camping in the bed of a pick up is definately roughing it!!