I'll do a proper trip report for the
Travels section soon. Until then, here's a stream of consciousness wrap-up:
First, enjoy the
quick photo gallery of photos I took with my cameraphone during our camping trip. (UPDATED: Justin is adding some of his photos taken with a real camera.
)
Justin and I loaded our Ford Escape Hybrid and headed about 25 minutes down the road from our house to
Guadalupe River State Park yesterday morning. We booked only one night, Friday night, since this was Sara's first TENT camping trip (we took her cabin "camping" at Buescher SP when she was 6 months old).
While I pitched the tent and unpacked our gear, Justin took Sara for a 1.25 mile walk in her stroller. She loves the outdoors and did great as always. When he got back, we ate lunch and then assembled an alligator kite we'd brought from home (winds were forecast to be gusty 10-15 mph, with gusts up to 30mph). Once the kite was ready to go, we drove down to what used to be the wide open field just before the river day use area. I'll post some photos since they've added a TON of new parking spaces and new drainage and natural restoration, including converting the wide open field to what looks like more than 100+ parking spaces. There's also parking at the road crossings of the hiking trails so folks can start hikes at those locations and make for shorter hikes if they want.
Kite flying didn't go so well--the winds were very wonky and inconsistent. Had fun trying, though! Came back to camp and fed Sara and hung out at camp and then did a long walk at dusk all the way from our campsite to the river day use area (good walk!) Loved seeing all the families out on their bikes...we didn't bring ours but will at some point (want to get a bike trailer for Sara).
Ate dinner at camp and roasted some marshmallows over the campfire and sung Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star looking at the night sky. Went into the tent for the night around 10 PM or so.
Sara did great until 1:15 AM at which point she woke up inconsolable. We had some lessons learned--mummy bags aren't great for sharing with a 1 year old toddler. We kept her warm but only by sacrificing my own comfort (couldn't zip my bag up past my thighs, and couldn't change positions unless Sara forced me to sit up while consoling her.) Thought she was hungry so Justin was a trooper and got out into the now-very cold (low 40s, forecasted) air to fire up the camp stove and heat her bottle up. But she didn't really want it... she doesn't drink as much when we're camping--too much stimuli or something? Haven't figured it out, and need to because she needs to drink more especially once summer arrives. Anyway, she was in very fitful sleep for the next hour and a half at which point we made the executive decision to evacuate her with Justin back to our house, and I'd solo the rest of the night with our gear and all. So I suddenly went from having my beloveds with me to being solo. I tell you, I love solo camping, but not this way--I missed Sara and Justin the rest of the night.
Thankfully, before Justin had to leave with Sara we both got to hear the owls (great horned? my memory's fuzzy), but later in the wee hours (maybe 4:30 AM?) I heard a bunch of owls talking to each other while I was warming myself up after having restoked our fire, after having had to get out and shoo off a raccoon who'd gotten into our trash bag (had forgotten to stow that in the Escape and since Justin had left, didn't have a vehicle to stow it in...and no trash bins near the campsite.)
Anyway, slept alright all things considered and took a short morning hike on the trail by campsite #34 to enjoy all the Guadalupe River valley overlooks. Hightailed it back to camp to break camp so when Justin arrived with Sara they wouldn't have to wait around for me. Sadly, we would have struck camp and stayed in the park today for geocaching and hiking, but somehow I picked up my 12th (yes, 12th!) tire puncture so we developed a low tire in the hybrid. When Justin returned to the park this morning, he brought our decidedly non-environmentally friendly F-150. He dropped me, Sara and our gear off at home and headed right back out to get the hybrid over to Discount Tire to patch the soon-to-be flat. 2+ hours later, free patched tire. Thankfully my tires handle punctures well--I've had successful patches and no sidewall punctures, and only one puncture that resulted in a true flat. And I have TPMS (Tire Pressure Monitoring System) so my vehicle warns me if there's a certain percentage of drop in the tire pressure on any one of the four tires.
Anyhow, not the way we planned the trip but not bad for having a 1 year old and not having camped in our tent in YEARS. Yes, sadly, YEARS. We will get another camping trip on the books, sticking close to home again until we can get Sara comfortably through a night in the tent.
Minor annoyances from this trip (always seem to have a couple) --
pet owners who don't properly secure their pets, which is both required by
TPWD and part of responsible pet ownership. I have neighbors who don't care for their dogs and it's just a huge pet peeve with me (pun not intended.) Also, a large group of adults somewhere in the park got obnoxiously loud way after 10 PM... more like midnight to 1:45 AM... and we know they were very far from us but the sound was carrying. We are certain it wasn't the Boy Scout pack also staying in the park, nor any of the campers in our general area.
Park is booked -- they have a sign posted on the ranger station window at the entrance, so this is a long-standing issue.
Folks of course can call and see if there's any availability, because even though the park filled up well as the day progressed there were still plenty of available campsites.
More later. We had a great time and will try again in a bit.