★★★★★★★
Trip score: 7 out of 7. Fun for the kids, relaxing for mom. No planning, cooking, or clean-up required. Huge success!
The local University in our backyard, Houghton University, offers a range of summer events for the local community members. Among the offerings are some family oriented outdoors experiences.
This summer, now that the youngest is no longer in the baby stage, we have joined in on several of these EPIC Adventures.
For families just getting into camping, one of the biggest obstacles is sourcing all the gear that goes along with a campout. The EPIC Adventures Family Campout solves this by offering an option to rent all the sleeping gear your family will need for an overnight in the woods.
Gear rental includes tent, sleeping bags and sleeping pads. Believe me, it’s not cheap to buy all these things for a whole family. So if you’re not ready to invest in a whole mess of camping gear, but would like to try out some family camping, this is a great way to get your feet wet (while staying dry in a cozy tent, of course).
Another huge obstacle for beginning campers is the whole food question. What to make? How to cook outside of your own kitchen? How to plan what you need to bring?
Again, the Family Campout makes this easy by taking care of all the food (dinner and breakfast), included in the price of the campout. They plan the menu, pack in the food, do the cooking, and even do the cleanup. Finally, a camping trip that’s actually a vacation for mom!
The only complaint that anyone had, really, about the whole campout experience was the abundance of mosquitoes. Next time, we need to bring better bug repellant!
The Family Campout – Set up and Dinner
When we went on the campout this summer, the weather was perfect. Sunny and hot, but not too swelteringly hot.
We parked at the upper parking lot of the Houghton Trails, where we met Laura, the event coordinator. She told us where to go, and as we were already familiar with the trails, we headed right there, each kid carrying their own backpack.
It was so nice that we didn’t have any gear to pack in except a water bottle, a change of clothes, and one pillow each!
If you opt to bring in your own gear, you have the option to have everything packed in (driven in) to the campsite for you.
A short walk of about a quarter mile brought us to the lean-to area where the campout was happening. The first item of business was to choose which lean-to area we wanted to claim as home-base for our family, and then set up the tent.
Since the tent for our crew was too big to fit in the lean-to, we needed to find a spot nearby in the woods to pitch the tent. Laura and other event-staff members helped us clear an area of sticks and stumps, and low-hanging branches.
The tent set-up was pretty straightforward, made easier with help from the experts. Since the site was not completely level, we worked a bit to make sure the tent was oriented so that everyone would have their feet downhill, rather than on a slant.
Next was filling the sleeping pads. These were of the self-inflating kind, but a little bit of extra lung-powered inflation helped to get them topped up. Then unpacking the sleeping bags, and arranging everything so that when we piled in after dark, all would be ready to go.
The event staff had gotten a nice campfire going for roasting the hotdogs, and also the propane burners for cooking the macaroni and cheese. Perfect camp food for young kids.
Everyone roasted their own hotdogs (or got Mom to finish the job – yes, I can cook 5 at a time!), and then took their plates up to sit at the tables under the pavilion. Veggies and lemonade rounded out the meal.
An after-dinner hike was completely optional, but everyone in the group wanted to go. So while the EPIC Adventure team did the dinner clean-up, all the family campout people hit the trail to see the river overlook.
Dusk was falling by the time we got back to the campsite from the hike, making it the perfect time for s’mores over the campfire.
Stickiness ensued, and no one got burned, so I consider that a huge success.
As darkness closed in, toddlers got completely loopy, and mosquitoes sang their whinny songs, we did our best to enjoy the cozy campfire. We even tried to do a little campfire sing-a-long, but no one could remember any campfire songs.
Another campout singing session bust. Maybe next time I’ll remember to bring some songsheets.
Sleeping (Or Not)
If you haven’t done much camping before, you may not know that sleep is scarce, at least on the first night in the woods.
The reasons are numerous. A new and unfamiliar location. Night-time noises (from the wildlife and your tent companions). Uncomfortable sleeping space. Those noisy tent companions.
A tent is a must when mosquitoes are at large. A sleeping pad is also a game-changer for (slightly more) comfortable sleeping.
We’ve now gone on several camping adventures, and each time I just plan on not a lot of good sleep happening. I’ve been told the second night is better, as everyone is just so exhausted by then. We’ll have to try it.
The youngest was completely exhausted by 9, so I put her down in her sleeping bag in the tent before everyone else was ready to go to bed. This turned out to be a good idea, because by the time everyone else was ready to get in the tent and finished all the going-to-sleep rustling, she would have been gnarly indeed.
The rest of the family finished the campfire hang-out time, took one last trip to the port-a-potty, changed into PJs, and were finally ready to hit the sack.
Once we were all in the tent and everyone had found a sleeping bag to slide into, it took at least another half-hour before anyone actually went to sleep.
We heard owls. We heard giggles. We heard sleeping bag zippers and those interminable sleeping bag rustles as everyone tried to get arranged and comfortable. Seriously. Someone needs to invent quiet sleeping bags that don’t rustle around like a plastic bag.
Eventually, everyone quieted down and drifted off. Several nighttime wakings occurred, including Naomi waking up without a sleeping bag (who stole it!?), Anna’s sleeping bag inside out, and Luke sitting up crying for no apparent reason.
At least no one asked to go to the bathroom.
By 6:30, the sun was pretty much up and filtering through the overhead branches into the tent. And when one kid wakes up, everyone else wakes up, too.
So we got up, got dressed, took the whole party to the potty, and then headed over to the pavilion to find out what was for breakfast.
Breakfast
Breakfast, it turned out, was the classic camping fare of pancakes and sausage. The event staff did a fantastic job of preparing all the food, while being friendly and entertaining at the same time.
Everyone ate their fill of chocolate chip and banana, or chocolate chip and blueberry, or just blueberry pancakes. Sliced melon and hot cocoa was also a big hit among the younger set.
While the staff did the breakfast cleanup, a bunch of the campers went for a second hike. I took the opportunity to pack up the sleeping bags and sleeping pads.
While I was momentarily away, probably at the potty with one of the little ones, the staff also took down the tent for us. I was totally intending to do it myself, they just beat me to it! This is seriously the best way to go camping!
By 9:30 or so, the hikers were back from their walk, the campsite was cleaned up, and we were ready to head back up the trail to our car.
All the kids agreed that the best time to do another campout would be the next weekend. At least for the EPIC Adventures family campout, unfortunately we’ll have to wait a whole year till next summer.
And if you ask the kids what the best part about the campout was, they’d tell you it was the dogs. Two border collies came along for the weekend, and accompanied the kids everywhere. Those furry friends made the campout extra special for my kiddos.