Into the woods, part 2

Okay, I really meant to finish this up the day after I posted part 1, but getting things ready for the twins second birthday party (and the regular busyness of life) got in the way.

The second day of our camping trip was HOT and very, very sticky. I think it bothered the adults much more than the kids, but the lack of nap and the heat had definitely caught up with us by mid afternoon. We took a little drive in the air conditioned van to get some ice cream to cool down a little, and when we got back the whole group headed over to the river to explore. 

That proved to be not such a good plan for the little kiddos, because the footing was very tricky, although they both enjoyed putting their feet in the little puddles in the rocks. But my sister and I headed back with the twins pretty quickly. Unfortunately, Colin fell asleep in the van on the way back to our campsite (a big 5 minute drive). I decided to wake him up right away so I could get them both into the shower to cool down and clean up — and that's where the fun began. 

Colin was not happy with being woken up. The showers were too hot, which made both babies (and Mama) very unhappy. So we were all crabby when we got back to the tent and I tried to get them to eat something (no go). 

And then the thunder started.

It thundered while I was fixing bottles. It thundered while I was trying to get the twins to sleep (Veronica fell asleep almost right away, tired boy … not so much). It thundered while Colin screamed his “I’m overtired and I don’t want to go to sleep” scream. It thundered while Colin woke Veronica up again. It thundered for at least an hour without any rain.

When John came in to take over with the twins, I started packing up the site and loading everything into the van, just in case. It wasn’t a well packed van — there wasn’t really room for people in the van when I was done — but at least everything was under cover. 

And then the rain started … or should I say, the torrential downpour. With more thunder. And lightening, directly overhead. And then hail. And wind. 

Ethan got very scared by the storm’s fury. Fortunately, he was able to retreat into George and Patty’s camper with the other (older) kids to wait out the storm. (This was somewhere between the start of the torrential downpour and the arrival of the hail.) 

After getting him safely inside, I went back to see how John was faring with the twins. They, of course, were not sleeping. We had given up on that. But they also weren’t acting scared. Colin spent the hour and a half of the first storm “reading” his book. The first two very loud cracks of thunder made him jump — right into my arms. But I think that was involuntary, because he didn’t really seem bothered by it.

Meanwhile, Veronica turned the tent into her own private bouncy house. Every time a crack of thunder shook the ground, she would squeal with delight and bounce all around the tent, diving on everything in sight. 

After the first storm wound down, we were finally able to get Colin back to sleep. Veronica took a little while longer (she had to eat the meal John brought over for me first), but she finally settled down and fell asleep as well. 

And the rain continued. But at last the temperatures dropped.

The rain let up enough at bed time that we were able to walk to the bathrooms and brush our teeth. But we had more or less just finished zipping up the tent when the rain started again. Another storm rolled through at around 10:00, but only lasted maybe half an hour. John was able to keep everyone mostly asleep through that one, and they all slept pretty well until we got our 4:15 wake up call from Veronica:

“Mommy! Daddy! Ethan! Col-y!”

We went out to survey the damage (and go to the bathroom): two large-ish trees down in our part of the campground; a gully under our tent where the impromptu river sprang up during the storm; lots of smaller branches down. And while we surveyed, the humidity starting rising … quickly.

Everyone in the group agreed that the tents were unlikely to dry, so after a grand breakfast, we all just stuffed the wet, muddy tents into the backs of the vehicles and decided we would set them up again back home. 

Surprisingly, I think the kids had a great time, despite the less-than-ideal conditions. But we decided that back-to-back camping trips would be too much for them, so Ethan and I went solo for the second trip. But we’ll get them back into the woods again this fall.