Here’s part 2 of this year’s camping trip. One for the records! It had so many ups and downs I swear it could out-do the greatest roller coaster ride in the world!
Click Here to read part 1!
So where did we leave off? Oh yeah! Jesiah and I decided we were going to try camping for another night at another camp site- despite the risk of encountering more mosquitoes.
Here’s our theory for why we encountered so many mosquitoes at the last camp site; the location we went to was far away from civilization. It was in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by a lake. So naturally we were the only food available for an insane amount of reproducing mosquitoes. That’s our theory.
We drove around from one camp site to the next that Friday morning. The kids were so excited to try camping again despite the horrendous the night before. It was a little awkward driving into each camp site and finding it full of families staring at us like outsiders. Then inquiring about availability to only be met with a very confused response; “Why didn’t you book ahead?”
We finally got to one that had a lovely gentleman at the entrance in a booth. The area looked like farm land that was being constructed into camp sites.
This man was very friendly. Right away he offered our kids Freezies. He chatted with us about his past- he was in an interracial relationship as a young adult with a Hattian young woman and my husband and I reminded him of this.
This man said that there were a few camp sites available. But before confirming our stay we asked about the mosquitoes. He confirmed there were none. He went on to explain that because their camp ground was beside a river, it was not an ideal area for mosquitoes to lay eggs.
We were sold! We agreed we would stay the night at this camp ground- before finding out the cost. He said it’s $20/person plus $15 for parking our vehicle on site. But because he liked us he offered he wouldn’t charge for the kids nor the vehicle. I was so ready to have a fun and relaxed camping trip that I told Jesiah, “Just pay the man!”
He gave us camp site number 31 and off we went through the grounds in search of this site. We drove around for 20mins past quaint little camp sites and found no camp site number 31. In fact the neighboring camp sites’ numbers jumped from 30 to 32.
We finally went back to our friend in the front booth and inquired about this. He checked his documents and realized there was no camp site 31… We were confused by the fact that he gave us a site he didn’t realize did not exist.
But in the end he took us to a beautiful large open area surrounded by trees. This area had no numbers on it. But it had multiple picnic tables and fire pits for the choosing. He said the entire area was not booked and we could pick any spot we wanted. We were so excited.
As we set up camp we could hear the rushing river nearby. The entire site was perfectly quiet other than the sounds of nature. It seemed we were the first to arrive. And most importantly, there were no mosquitoes.
After being fully set up I got ready to make ourselves the meals we had packed away. I hadn’t entered the cooler since we left home (as we could not brave cooking on the gas stove with all the mosquitoes at the other site). The cooler was almost lukewarm. All the ice packs were melted. I went into panic mode and cooked everything up for us to eat. While doing so I prayed over everyone’s meal that we would not get sick.
As we ate our slightly sour meals, vehicles began to drive through the camp grounds. These vehicles were jam packed with people. People with no kids… Strange.
In the distance we began to hear the sounds of music. Someone was blasting a small speaker with tunes we didn’t recognize. Jesiah and I grimaced. One of our biggest pet peeves is hearing music through speakers while in nature. If it was someone with an acoustic guitar or an instrument of some kind- totally different story.
We shrugged it off and decided we would head to the river with the kids. Our friend at the entrance said the water was still enough for the kids to play in.
When we arrived at the river we found a beautiful beach and a stunning view. It was perfect! Jesiah and I set up our towels and laid down while watching the kids play in the sand. We were the only ones there for all of 10 mins. Then came the sound of speaker music on one side of the beach. And what looked like a group of men having a bachelor’s weekend of sorts. They looked old enough to have 9-5 jobs and maybe even families at home. But they acted like frat boys- drinking, yelling and wrestling with each other.
Then on the other side of the beach came Gen Z young adults with another speaker playing top 40s pop music. They stood there with their innocent looking baby faces awkwardly drinking out of red solo cups while trying to move to the music. Good Lord, where were their parents?
The music from each group seemed to compete with each other, but we did our best to ignore it. That was until a group of middle aged women showed up with cans of vodka sodas and a speaker playing country music. We were done. If you can’t beat em, join em. If a competition of speakers was what they wanted, it’s what they would get!
Jesiah decided to go back to our camp site and grab his small JBL speaker. On it he cranked the only kind of music that should be played at the beach- reggae music. We actually managed to relax after this music started playing in our ears. It perfectly drowned out the other music.
After an hour by the river we went back to our camp site to roast hotdogs and marshmallows. The camp site was perfectly quiet once again as everyone else was at the beach. We found that across our large camping area we now had a neighbor. An adorable looking older lady who sat outside a small one person trailer with a novel. We exchanged smiles and waves. What a perfect neighbor to have!
Our time at the fire was so much fun. We read more of Harry Potter in front of the fire. We told stories and jokes together. As the temperature began to drop the kids sat in our arms and we cuddled. It was perfect.
When the sun began to set we told the kids it was time for bed. And after getting them settled in the tent, Jesiah and I sat by the fire and watched millions of stars in the sky. As time went by, more vehicles began to drive through the camp grounds. Vehicles filled with more Gen Z young adults. And there suddenly came the sound of a very large speaker and a DJ.
Jesiah and I were shocked. It was 9pm! We had a look at the camp ground rules and found that quiet time was 11pm. So we made the best of the situation. Jesiah pulled out his small JBL speaker and played the most romantic camp fire music… Marvin Gaye.
I swear to you, the flames from the fire danced along to the beat of Trouble Man. We listened to the entire soundtrack that night. It was beautiful! We couldn’t even hear the sound of the DJs music.
But then we got tired. It was time for bed. I looked at the time on my phone- it said 2am… What?!
The party was still going. There were the sounds of people whooping and singing along. Thank God this DJ had some good taste in music. He played some of my high school favorites; TLC, Beyonce and Kanye West. But it was still very late and we were very tired.
We went to bed anyway, hoping we could somehow fall asleep. Jesiah slept in his hammock and I went to the tent with the kids. Luckily my kids are deep sleepers but I am not and I was exhausted. To make matters worse, as I got comfortable on that memory foam topped air mattress I suddenly felt wet. Perfect timing. One of the kids wet themselves.
I got out of the tent and got Jesiah up. We went over our options of what to do. The memory foam was now soggy and one of the kids was wet.
We considered packing it up. I mean we couldn’t sleep anyway with all that noise from the party. But we at least wanted to try to figure out another option for us to stay.
Jesiah got towels and laid them on top of the soaked area of the mattress. We got our daughter to change out of her wet clothes. And we went back to bed.
Now in the process of doing all this, I was cranky. And naturally I had to make this known to the entire camp ground. So I yelled things like, “THERE’S A TIRED MAMA AND KIDS TRYING TO SLEEP HERE!” and “GEN Z IS A LOST CAUSE!”
Then a small group of Gen Z’s came walking through the camp ground right beside our site with a small speaker blasting music- “HAVE SOME HUMAN DECENCY AND TURN THAT OFF! THERE ARE KIDS SLEEPING HERE!”
They turned it off immediately and one of them sheepishly said, “Wanna come party?” Jesiah and I tried hard to hide our laughter. That was cute.
On their way back they had the music playing again! And I yelled, “GOD BLESS YOU FOR BEING SUCH KIND PEOPLE!” They turned it off again.
When we went back to bed, Jesiah tried calling the office of the camp grounds… Of course no one answered. I tried wearing noise cancelling headphones to get to sleep. Would you believe they didn’t work? The music was so loud that I couldn’t drown it out with noise cancelling headphones!
5am… The music stopped at 5am.
Two hours later we were up. I wasn’t staying at that camp site for breakfast. I was done and on the brink of snapping. Jesiah and I discussed driving through the camp grounds blasting Baby Shark on our vehicle speakers.
I considered standing in the middle of the camp ground and using my naturally loud “mad black woman” voice to lecture everyone on common decency and following the rules.
Instead we packed up our camp site and I called the office. Someone answered. It wasn’t our friend from yesterday, but his business partner. I kindly told him we needed a refund of the $40 fee we paid. We had a horrible night and no one was there to enforce the rules.
Praise God this man felt horrible and agreed to refund our money. He apologized and offered that the next time we visit, (like that’s gonna happen), we ask about a quiet camping area. Apparently they have a camp site far away from the “party area”. (I don’t understand how someone that saw we had kids didn’t think to offer us this “quiet camping area”). We politely agreed to do so, took our money and left.
On our way out we saw our lovely neighbor- the older woman, sitting by her camp fire. She came over to say hello and said she felt horrible that we had to sleep through all that noise. We asked if she slept alright in her trailer and she said the trailer drowned out most of the noise quite well. I wish we could have stayed for breakfast to spend more time with this sweet old lady, but we had already gotten our refund and packed everything up.
Would you believe, the kids had no idea what happened. None! All they knew was that mommy and daddy were cranky so we had to leave.
We stopped for some breakfast on our way home. And once we arrived home, we told the kids it was time for them to stay with their Grandma while mommy and daddy went to a hotel. And oh boy did we desperately need that hotel stay!
This entire camping trip almost had us convinced we would never camp again. Almost… Was all the downs of this trip worth the ups?? I actually think so. So we’ll try again next year.
Other than that, Jesiah and I had an amazing and we’ll deserved time at the hotel. We also went to Loud Mouth Brewery and Rock Climbing. Here are the pictures to prove:
