Taking it easy by the campfire. photo: Amy Baggott
It seems I have fallen back in love with something I once hated. Perhaps not hated, but disliked. As a child, my family and I spent many summer vacations camping. We camped in Death Valley, in Yosemite, in Bear Valley, in Switzerland, by the shores of Loch Ness in Scotland. We camped everywhere. It’s strange that I can remember only the bad things that happened. Once, the tie downs on the roof rack broke as we hurtled down 280. I watched helplessly out the back window as our sleeping bags and camp stoves, our toothpaste tubes and food were run over by the speeding cars behind us. Another time, my mother drove a tent stake through a water main in the camp, making us the pariahs of the campground. Somehow as an adult, free to pick my own vacations, I just stopped camping. It wasn’t so much these events (small in the grand scheme of things) put me off, it was the intense vacation scheduling we were subjected to. A camping trip with my family was carefully planned with guidebooks and brochures, maps and compasses. There were no languid days spent by a creek bed or long breakfasts at the camp picnic table. There were monuments to see, historical markers to document. There were mountains to ascend, trails to traverse and at every turn, educational opportunities. I remember feeling quite weepy as my father would look at his watch and announce what was next on the agenda.
But something happened over Memorial Day weekend. On a group camping trip to Fremont Peak Park, I fell in love with camping. With three children, two of them just three years old, I suspected the trip would be a bust. I imagined having to sleep all night with the lantern blazing above our heads, the kids too scared to sleep. Any minor disaster at home – a leaking diaper, an upset stomach, a generally cranky day spent with the kids, would seem that much more awful while camping. In the days leading up to the trip, I caught myself saying to several people: “Well, it’s not too far away, we can always come home.” To be fair, the second we had the tent set up, the kids asked when we’d be going back to mommy’s house. But by the end of the weekend, they too were in love. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t like camping as a child, it was simply that I wanted less of a plan. Because I’m often exhausted by the three kids (there were only two of us growing up, and I think it makes a bit of difference) and because I’m not much of a planner, I was able to just let the kids do as they liked. One of them went off looking for tarantulas with her friends, the other two played in the dirt. We hiked once in the afternoon and in one evening we took the kids to the peak to see the stars. And that was about it. Something about the freedom of having no agenda made the trip actually feel like a long and relaxing vacation.
This past weekend, I went camping again, this time in Yosemite. As before, it felt like a true getaway. We took a drive to Glacier Point, stopping to take pictures when we felt like it. We got up late, we ate when we were hungry, we didn’t fret when the weather made a hike impossible. On the Sunday we left, the weather was better, but instead of trying to cram in a weekend’s worth of activities in the one sunny day we had, we went to the meadow beneath El Capitan. We pulled a blanket and pillows from the car and lay on our backs and watched the climbers ascend the mountain. Perhaps because my dad made us see so much as children, I’ve given myself a break as an adult. I’m not sure what kind of vacationers my own kids will be. I suppose that’s up to me. I’m hoping they’ll be able to take some joy in knowing we can only plan so much and that half of the enjoyment of vacations, camping especially, is just being outdoors.
