Camping in Big Basin State Park
We took Busy Boy camping for his first time this weekend! A’s coworker had reserved an extra campsite that was going to go unused, so we hustled around on Saturday preparing for our first camping trip as parents. One of the most urgent errands was to get Mr. B his own sleeping bag… More on that later…
Mr. Busy did really well on the car drive out (he’s getting a bit fussy about rides these days), I think mostly because he enjoyed watching the scenery go by. Its surely a lot more interesting than our regular trips up and down El Camino.
Once we got to the site, we set up the tent, and went for a short hike. Busy Bear actually was walking down the path on his very own, and making good progress! He seemed super happy to be outside with us, in the woods, and traveling.
Hiking!
We hiked for about an hour, of which Mr. B lasted about 15 or 20 minutes before getting a ride in the backpack. When we got back to the campsite, a fire was built, and the cooking started. We dined on boil-in-a-bag Tasty Bite Indian food. Mr. B likes Palak Paneer, but not so much Chole. Anyway, after cleaning up, it was getting dark, and we started to think about going to bed.
This is where the fun began… On a typical night, we put Mr. B down in his crib, with his pacifier, and he snuggles in to his blankets and goes quietly to sleep, usually for the entire night. (9pm-7am is typical these days). So, all 3 of us climbed into our 2-person tent, we all got on our PJ’s, and started to “sleep”.
Yeah, looking back on it, its even hard to describe what was going on in there. Imagine a 15-month old, who’s never been in a tent before, and in fact, never been in any structure that doesn’t have solid walls, and who’s used to clibing around in bed with us in the morning. I guess it most closely resembled some kind of human jungle gym, where us parents were fun stuff to climb on, and everything was super-interesting because you’ve never seen it before. Let’s just say that the pacifier was lost in the dark for quite some time, there was a lot of crying, and we realized that the thought of him snuggling down inside his sleeping bag was completely crazy. The even crazier part started when he woke up in the middle of the night and really needed to talk to us. (By ‘talk’ I mean ‘babble’ because he has about a 10 word vocab at this point). So, he laid on my chest for probably an hour just babbling away quietly in the dark in the middle of the night, until he finally went to sleep. He did end up sleeping well (past 9am!) and we weren’t too tired the next day…
Sleeping on the trail...
So, we went for another hike, and Mr. Busy decided to take a break and nap for the big climb up. We had a great hike up to Sempervirens Falls, took about 3 hours round trip, and had a great time.
In retrospect, here’s what we learned:
- Camping with a toddler is actually pretty fun!
- Sleeping is something that we need to work on. I think a large set of Sleep Sacks would have helped a bit. The sleeping bag will have to wait until he’s older.
- Bring extra pacifiers! (Or wean him before our next trip!)
- Its impossible to keep a 15-month old clean!
- Don’t forget the can opener and proper type of camp fuel!
