Five kids from Ethiopia, pelting down a gravel path in Canada. Sport hadn’t seen two of them since we parted in the Toronto airport almost two years ago. It was glorious.
I never did take a picture of the car loaded up for our camping trip. Once I realized that the bike rack wouldn’t hold Sport’s bike, it just wasn’t as impressive.
But look! I got home today and someone else had kindly taken a photo of my car and mailed it to me.
YES, THAT IS A BLOODY PHOTO RADAR TICKET.
Apparently I was doing 60 in a 50 zone. Fair enough, except that I could have sworn that street was 60 the entire way. It’s definitely 60 in the section near where I used to live. I’m totally going out for a drive to find the sign that lowers it to 50, IF SUCH A SIGN EVEN EXISTS. (Ok, I know it must exist, but damn, $190?)
We’re home for a grand total of about 18 hours before the next leg of our roadtrip. Sorry, no pictures yet, since I’m not entirely sure where the camera is. And there probably won’t be many even once I find it, since it is hard to hold a camera in the middle of a FREAKING MONSOON. First of all, I’d just like to say thank GOD I bought that screenhouse. Second, I’m never tenting again, so I can cut someone a really good deal on a slightly used one.
Yeah, so it rained. Not all the time, but when it did, it was torrential. My trusty and much loved Eureka tent, which has survived many a thunderstorm intact, finally failed me – although I think any tent would have done the same when surrounded by a two or three inch deep lake. And once everything is soaked and covered in sand, tenting really starts to lose its charm.
It was sunny when we got home (of course) so I pulled out all our stuff to start trying to dry it out. Set up the tent, draped tarps on the fence, etc. Half an hour later? Thunderstorm. I can’t even get the inside of the car dried out at this rate. So the tenting portion of this week’s plan has been axed.. I just haven’t broke it to Sport yet. (I don’t think he will take it too hard though. Once his sleeping bag was wet, he suggested that maybe we should find a hotel. Read my mind, there, Sport.)
Filed under: travel
Well, I’ll still take a picture, but the pack mule aspect of the car will no longer be quite so impressive. I spent about 45 minutes this afternoon figuring out how to attach the bike rack (with no instructions or pictures) and did get it on pretty securely. I tested it with my bike and it seemed fine. Then I pulled out Sport’s bike… yeah, no dice. His bike is too small to go on the rack – there’s not enough room under the top tube for both supports to fit. Shoot.
It’s probably for the best – a road trip of this length is not really the ideal time to test out new equipment. If it failed a couple of hours in we would have been pretty screwed.
So we’re heading out tomorrow – and the laundry is not done, the house is not clean, bags are not packed, etc. What else is new.
Remember that rooftop carrier I was going to get for the car? I never did buy it, partly because I was kidding myself that I would be able to afford to buy a new vehicle this year. I had to face reality on that one though, especially after sinking a large sum of money into the current vehicle on a somewhat necessary repair. (Hey, have y’all heard of tie rods? Turns out that’s what holds your wheels to the axle. Which is, well, critical.)
But once again, procrastination has come through for me. The $140 Thule cargo bag that I was considering is on sale right now at Canadian Tire for… wait for it…. $40. Score! I picked one up on Saturday, and it looks great. Then on Sunday the Schoolmarm came by with a freebie for me – her old trunk mount bike carrier, which doesn’t fit her spiffy new SUV. Even bigger Score!
Picture it… we will be setting off on our 2 week, 1700 km roadtrip with the wagon packed to the gills, a rooftop carrier, and a bike rack with 2 bikes. It’s not a car, it’s a pack mule.
On Saturday I bought the screen tent I had been considering. I also bought a new camp stove (I only have a little single burner backpacking one), a folding cot, and another camp chair. Then I went out to the parking lot, and could barely fit it all in the trunk. Hmm. Problem. After we got home, I hauled the screen tent out of the packaging for a trial run at setting it up. The good news: it is possible to do with one person despite what the instructions say. The bad news: it takes a while, and it’s pretty swear-worthy. Once it was up I was a little bit disappointed – it was not quite as good as I was expecting considering all the rave reviews online. Also it’s pretty big. I stood there staring at it, and flashed back to the camping trip last year when our campsite was composed largely of gravel, and my air mattress had a hole in it, and I was so frustrated by the time camp was set up that I came THIS CLOSE to turning around and going home. So is adding another tent-like apparatus that needs to be assembled and staked really a good idea? Setting up camp with one adult is quite different from setting up with two adults, which is the only way I had camped before. Sure, Sport helps (up to a point) but it still takes about double the time & effort.
Plus, the cot is lovely and would fit in my tent, but takes up way too much space in the car. Even with a rooftop carrier, it might not be do-able. So here’s the thing: if I return the cot, camp stove, and screen tent, and don’t buy the rooftop carrier, then I could just use the money and rent a cabin somewhere for a week. Hey presto, no equipment or setup required. It’s mighty tempting.
Ok, I’m guessing other people like shopping vicariously through others as much as I do. So here’s your chance to spend my money. Based on the comments on my post about our summer plans, there seem to be a lot of campers in the crowd. So which one should I buy: a bigger tent (bigger, as in sleeps 6 or 8 and I can stand up in) or a screen house, with our current tent for sleeping quarters?
(And no, Barbara, you may not vote for “stay in a hotel instead.”)
Here’s how I see it: A bigger tent means only 1 thing to set up instead of 2 and the ability to use a camp cot instead of an air mattress. A screen house means bug-free and dry suppers, and more flexibility in how the campsite is set up. Plus, of course, it would only cost about half as much as the tent.
Vote early, vote often!
Because it has to come eventually, right? Did I mention it snowed here last Saturday? Yes, for real. No, it didn’t last. BUT STILL.
Anyway, I have started booking campgrounds for our summer holiday and for a few other weekends here and there. We camped three times last year, and Sport loved the whole thing. The campfires, the marshmallows, the swimming, the glorious filth… he is convinced that camping is a GREAT vacation. Mind you, we barely had any rain, which helped.
In my pre-child days, I camped quite a bit, but not usually for extended periods in one place. Road trips were more the name of the game, and so the ability to set up and take down camp quickly was critical. I have a ten year old Eureka tent which I love, and which is virtually storm-proof, but it’s a bit small and too short to stand up in. But the tent used to be only for sleeping, since days were spent sightseeing and/or driving, so that wasn’t an issue. (One night in Banff the car was for sleeping, actually, due to a combination of nasty May weather and a fatal bear attack about 200m from our campground a few days earlier. My Aussie pal & I decided discretion was the better part of valour, and all that.)
Needless to say, last year I discovered I was going to have to upgrade my equipment a bit. I would love to upgrade to a small tent trailer and a vehicle with tow capacity, but that isn’t going to happen anytime soon. I started looking at bigger tents, and although it is tempting to go that route, I’m thinking that instead I’ll invest in one of these screen rooms. It’s going to be just Sport & I this summer after all, and probably next summer too at the rate things are going, and all of our campsites last year would have been big enough for a small tent plus this shelter. So maybe the tent can still be just for sleeping, and any hanging out/game playing/reading can be done under a different roof. (Which would have the added bonus of keeping the tent cleaner.)
The only real drawback will be having to find space for it in the car. I discovered last year that camping with a kid requires a lot more assorted crap than camping with another adult. The car was pretty full last year, and our longest trip was 6 days, with 3 days of camping. I may be forced to add one of these to my shopping list as well. And then I will officially bid goodbye to my days of travelling light.
Ok, so it’s 12:30 am, and we have to leave for the airport at 4:45 am. So I’m looking at a maximum of 3 1/2 hours of sleep at this point. Less, really, because I still have to do a few critical tasks like oh, finish packing.
This is going to be the most disorganized Disney trip in the history of the world. It was kind of a rough week and did I mention that Tinsae has come down with a cold and I am getting it too? If I survive four flights in five days with my eardrums intact it will be a miracle.
Anyway. Whatever, right? It will be sunny and warm and we will see Mickey. See y’all in a few days, and I hope there is some really good news in certain parts of blogland when I get home. (You know who you are, Ana-ray and Azel-hay.)
