Avec Les Enfants – 1 of 4

Looks somewhat like a refugee camp

What madness possessed us? A trip out with the tadpoles is bad enough but to take some of their friends, too? Well, that's just pure folly.

The plan was to take the two Tadpoles, each with a well-chosen friend, down to Rondeau park for three nights. What could be better than leaving the kids to their own devices, thus freeing us up to relax and get over the stress of actually bringing them?

Of course, children are now banned from Towed Haul so they were allotted two tents. That sounds like a fine idea but that's two tents to pack, four air beds, four sleeping bags and four backpacks and sundry other things, plus the transport of said children, to concern ourselves with. Throw in the added confusion that the male Tadpole's nominated friend was female (and not even a “special” friend) and the female's friend has to leave a day early and you'll see that the logistics were getting complicated.

Two trips would be required. Mrs T and I packed the hound and up rations for four, and dragged Towed Haul down to the park, sans les enfants, where we went through the usual routine of emptying the poo tanks and filling up with fresh water before checking in and setting up on our site. The site was not the one we'd been eyeballing during our visit last week, though. Not site 64 as we'd thought, but rather it's neighbour, site 63; cock-up on the memory front there. It was quite a good site but required a bit of thought to position the trailer in such a way as to allow the two tents to go up, and for them to be slightly above the lowest point on the site so as not to be concerned with flooding. Planning is all.

So, trailer positioned and unhitched, we set about putting the tents up. Now you know that I'm not one to complain about the weather but working on the tents in the blazing sunshine wasn't a very pleasant experience; even the poor old dog was suffering in the shade-free zone that was the camp site.

I departed the site some hours later than originally planned, bathed in sweat and not entirely in a cheerful mood, and made my way back to town to collect les enfants. At least the tadpoles were ready to go when I arrived, so we then made our way across town to pick up J1 and J2 (Code name for the young ladies who both have names starting with a J ). It was J2's turn first, then J1, then back to J2's place because she'd forgotten her sleeping bag. Tut.

Back down at the campground, Mrs T was very organised and had all the air beds out ready for inflation, set up a shaded little sitting area and even fed the dog; a camping veteran indeed.


Les enfants headed out to go to the beach but, due to a basic navigational error, turned right instead of left and wandered around looking for said beach for an hour. It gave the big tadpole, who'd declined such a girlie expedition, a chance to build a fire, cook the night's supper and impress J1. Actually, he did OK with the mix of meat and non-meat burgers and we all enjoyed sitting out in the evening warmth, munching our way through the big tadpole's (not very) burnt offerings.

All the kids (this time) decided on a swim in the lake as the light was fading, and turned the right way this time as they made their way to the beach. Mrs T and I did our usual amble around the campground, hound in tow, to look at the various caravans, motor-homes and tents that were settled in for the night. We'd followed an Airstream into the campground earlier in the day, and now we discovered two more, one a 25' Safari (a guess!) and the other a relatively rare 30' with a slide-out. Four in the one Park almost constitutes an Airstream rally.

On their return, the sand-encrusted children all showered (such clean people!) and then settled down to making s'Mores, a North American delicacy that consists of a couple of Graham Crackers (biscuits to us English folk), some choclolate and some marshmallows roasted over the fire. Squidge the hot marshmallow between the biscuits with the chocolate and there you have it, s'Mores. We cheated a bit with some biscuits that already had a thick layer of chocolate on one side; much less messy of course.

I don't know much about the evening's shenanigans because I retired early and slept like a baby, hearing nothing until 6.30 the next morning. There was chatter late into the night and the sound of the air bed pump, apparently, until les enfants where rightly chastised by Mrs T. It doesn't help that so many campers seem to go to bed as soon as it gets dark, so the sound of three excitable girls and a cool, never excitable boy (ha ha), was going to be a major irritation to most of our neighbours. Anyway, I believe that they settled at about 2 am!

The morning promised an early start for me as I had to head back to town for another appointment at the employment place. How was day 2? Stay tuned to this channel, folks.

 

 

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