Memorial Day Weekend is typically when we make our first family camping trip to our property in Vermont. This past weekend was no different. We spent most of last week planning and packing, figuring out exactly what we needed and what the plan was on how to get there, get things set up, and enjoy the weekend to the best of our abilities. Everything, as usual, was going without a hitch, except for one minor caveat; it was supposed to rain all weekend, or at least the majority of it. Being seasoned campers with pretty good shelter up in Vermont, we weren't too worried about it. I went out during the week to buy our son his first rain coat and we made sure we had our's packed well in advance just in case we needed them. So come Friday, our plans went into action. I attended my morning meeting, filled up the gas tank on my van, and after packing up my van at home, was on the road by a little after 11 in the morning. (The plan was for me to head up with our dogs, trim the clearing and get everything set up so that when my wife and son got there, we could just relax). It was raining a little when I left, but it wasn't bad and it actually stopped when I got on the road. Despite a few sprinkles here and there, it was just cloudy the whole way up. Even when I got into Vermont, and pulled off the highway to head to our campsite, it still wasn't raining. However, despite the fact that it wasn't raining, I noticed a distinct drop in the temperature from Connecticut to Vermont. I got out of my van in Vermont and goose bumps immediately sprang up on my arm. Odd, but it wasn't raining, so I got to work trimming our clearing and setting things up. I got everything set to go within two hours after which I started a fire and made sure to get it going nice and hot. I then waited for my wife and son to get there. With traffic, it took them about four hours instead of the usual three to get up to Vermont. Our son wasn't happy with the long car drive and by the time they got there, well after his bed time, he looked like a space cadet who was ready for bed. So we got him ready for bed, walked around for a few minutes, and then fed him and put him down. He screamed for a few minutes mostly due to being in a strange place, but then passed right out. My wife and I had dinner by the fire, and then it started raining, joy! It was getting pretty cool, and still being early, we decided to start another fire by our tarp to stay warm and also stay up for a little while longer. It was an early night for both my wife and I, and soon afterwards, we headed to bed in our shed. (No, I didn't feel like setting up the tent by myself, and the shed is much easier to sleep in anyway.)
Our whole family, meaning the three of us, slept in till about 630 on Saturday morning. When I got up, as usual the first only by a few minutes, it was still kind of cold out and of course, it was raining. Normally it would start warming up, but this past Saturday, it actually just got colder. We had packed plenty of warm clothes for us and our son, yet the rain didn't really help much. We ate breakfast, sat around under the tarp, walked around a little bit with our rain coats on, and essentially just remained cold. Even our son, who is usually pretty good with the cold, started saying "cold, cold, cold!" He wanted to walk around the campsite with his rain coat on, but with the rain and improper boots on his feet, he just got wetter, and consequently, colder. My wife headed out to get some small supplies that we needed and I hung out under the tarp with our son. We sat by our little fire and made the best of the situation. Yet, it just kept getting colder. While my wife was out, she checked the weather and by lunch time the temperature hadn't risen above 40 degrees. Definitely not ideal. When she got back to the campsite, our son had not yet napped, and was quite cold. We decided to put him in his car seat in our car (with the car off) and let him warm up some since my wife had just been out driving and it still had some warmth. Once he was in there, we started talking about the weather. It was supposed to rain the rest of the day and there was a very good chance of it raining on Sunday as well. And, yes, the temperature was supposed to get down to about freezing that night. We knew that we would be fine, but we don't as yet have a sleeping bag for our son, and frankly, we were a little worried about him. So we talked about our options, and we both decided that it would be best if my wife and son headed back on Saturday afternoon. The rain would have been manageable if it was about 20 degrees warmer, but rain and cold combined do not make camping fun, especially when you have a 19 month old. So we packed up what we could into my wife's car, and they left. I decided to spend the night up there, in the shed with the dogs, for no other reason than I wanted to see how cold it would get, and partially, just relax a little bit more. Well, for the rest of Saturday, I essentially sat in one spot by the fire without moving except to get a new beer or get more firewood. And let me tell you, it just got colder and colder. At one point, I looked up from the fire and it was a mixture of rain and sleet, not something I ever thought I would see on Memorial Day weekend.
While I was cold on Saturday, it didn't really hit me till I went to change from my jeans into my pajamas. In between taking my jeans off and putting my PJ's on, I started shivering uncontrollably. At that point, while I had already kind of known, I was secure in the fact that we had made the right decision to bring our son home. Sunday morning came, I woke up, and while it was still cold, the sun was out a bit. What would normally take me till lunch time to clean up and pack away, I rushed through in about 2 hours so I could get home by lunch time to spend time with my wife and son. So our first camping trip didn't go quite as planned, but then again, the weather had different plans than we did. We did the best we could, but in the end, it was a choice between our family being miserable with a 19 month old, or changing plans as we needed to and adapting. So adapt we did and the weekend turned out to be not such a washout after all. We ended up salvaging the remainder of the weekend and even had a cookout yesterday with our parents which we don't normally get to do. So despite our camping issues, none of which were too big (despite our tarp ripping and me having to fix it in the rain so that we had protection from the elements) it worked out quite well. Oh yeah, the tarp ripping definitely impacted our decision for two things; 1) that my wife and son should go home early, and 2) that we needed to build a permanent pavilion so that we didn't have to deal with the tarp ripping at least once a year. In any case, we made it out, learned our lesson that if the forecast says it will be cold and rainy, don't go camping with a really young child. So now its back to work and in two weeks I will be headed back up to dig the holes for and pour the concrete footings for, our new pavilion which should be done within a few months. Cheerio guvna, another project begins!
No comments:
Post a Comment