Our Family Vacation

Last week we took our first foray into the wonderful world of family vacations, also known as, "We're supposed to be having fun, dangit!" In our case, this meant camping, since we're too poor for hotels or motels (or, let's face it, even camping...oh well).

P. and Dangerboy had never seen Yosemite or redwoods, and since I have such nostalgic childhood feelings for both of them, we planned a trip up there. On the way there and back (we got lost once each way...insert frustration here) we stayed with my lovely friends Barb and Jeff in Tehachapi, and their two boys. Lots of fun getting caught up with them, and especially hearing all the old Taft gossip! And the most comfortable part of our trip.

Highlights: Yosemite, Half Dome, El Capitan, the Grizzly Giant, the sequoia grove in general, are all as hugely awesome as I remember them. During Dangerboy's nap one day we drove to Glacier Point and were treated to an amazing view of Yosemite Valley--truly the stuff of dreams. Reminds me of the Hudson River School of artists (the link shows just one example).

Another highlight: the morning light on the giant sequoias in Mariposa grove (the trees pictured have names--two are Muses and the one on the left is The Bachelor, I think).

We camped two nights; Summerdale (the campground) was spacious and not crowded. I loved playing with Dangerboy in the tent and watching P. use his Idaho-grown Survivorman skills--cutting wood, making the fire, cooking food. He got to show off another of my favorite skills on the Merced River, just below El Capitan--skipping rocks. He's so good! They go all the way across the river to the other side. DB also had fun the river, scooping up rocks and tossing them in until he too fell in. We took off his shorts and (dirty) diaper so he wouldn't have to walk back to the car wet, and he had fun dipping his little bum in the cold river. It was cute, but I won't post that video here! (The picture below is P., not Dangerboy).

Another fun afternoon was in Hart Park outside of Bakersfield where we had a little picnic and waited for our friends to come back from their temple trip. DB played with some kids there on the playground by the Kern River and P. took a much-needed rest. DB decided he'd like to try it out too (didn't last long):

So those are the highlights. Here are the "lowlights": Way too much car time, which DB didn't like, and by extension, neither did we. Ditto for hiking--he didn't like being in the backpack or walking, really. We had to keep pretending to leave him before he'd follow! DB was scared at night--it was pretty dark, even after we bought a lantern at the general store. Every time he saw a flashlight across the campground, he's say something about "Mater and the ghost Light" and want to go in the car or tent. Also, it was about 20 degrees cooler at night than I thought--so I had to share a sleeping bag with DB to keep warm, and P. was cold the first night--the second we put all the sleeping bags together, so we were warm, but then DB just kicked us both and rolled over us. Three out of four nights of our vacation were disrupted by loud parties. So basically, if we'd have been able to sleep, we'd have had more fun. For now, I think the plan is to keep family vacations much closer to home and hold off on camping for a while. Next time our family vacation may consist of Lego Land and a picnic on the beach...doesn't sound so bad, does it?