This is a long overdue post, to be precise this should have been my first post of this summer😬. Anyways here it is finally !!

In the last week of June when the schools closed their doors for summer holidays, we went on our first ever camping trip 😄🎉!

After the RV trip, S was a little wary about camping especially when it came to me , but to his surprise and mine, I utterly loved the whole experience of camping in wilderness ❤️!

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On a warm June afternoon over a phone call I learnt that my cousin and her family had just returned from a fun adventurous camping trip. She had nothing but great things to say about her experience.

S was planning to take few days off the following week and was looking at options for us when I walked into the room and apprised him of the chat I had with my cousin on camping.

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“Would you like to try it ?” asked S and I nodded a YES!

Before I changed my mind,he started looking for available campsites close by. He went on GoingToCamp that lists all the campsites in the Washington state parks and narrowed the search to few of the known camping parks close by.

Now, the campsites get booked as early as January, so instead of weekends we looked for mid weekdays and voila as luck would have it, we got ourselves a campsite not far from home!!He booked it for 2 days.

And that’s the story of how a phone call with my cousin led to our first camping trip 🏕 .

Camping Gear

We had most of gear:-Coleman tent, Go anywhere Portable Toilet and pop up privacy tent, queen size air mattress, stove, lanterns ,kayaks and life jackets etc. All of which was purchased last summer in the hopes that we would go camping, which of course never happened , not until this June.

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Once the dates were confirmed, I took the reins from him. There is a ton of information available online on camping. After quick google search I had my list ready.

They fell in three board categories: Food and everything kitchen,Kids related activities (swim gear, Bikes, chalks, board games etc) and finally most importantly cleaning supplies and first aid.

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While S can’t stop raving about his Range Rover, which by the way makes for a cool drive. It is my sturdy van that has been doing all the heavy duty work for last two summers!!

It has bigger boot space allowing for us to carry the portable toilet everywhere where since the pandemic.We couldn’t have done the long drives last year without it.

Yes, this is me appreciating and thanking my van for all the trips this summer 😍😛.

Quarry Pond Lake-Deception Pass State Park

Deception Pass state park is camping park that spreads across two islands Fidalgo and Whidbey (where lies the oceanic Bluff trail that we did on the labor day), stunning views, tons of trails, fishing, boating, pretty beaches and lot more.

It’s one of most popular state parks in washington with over 300 campsites.

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Quarry Pond Lake is a part of the park that lies on the other side of the park, smaller and more private with over 70 camping sites.Our campsite costed us mere $35 per day with electricity and water outlet.

After a quick lunch of burrito bowls we left for Deception Pass state park.Two hours later we were on our campsite, setting up the tent .Setting up was easy or should I say looked easy as I watched S doing all the work 😂.

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The best part of our site? The campsite opposite to ours had a kids of similar ages. They just walked in to our site, introduced themselves to each other and that was that !

The girls got busy playing and exploring the camp with their new friends.

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Soon after all was set up, I was ready for some tea. He volunteered, I obliged 😁. I have cooked out in open before, with my cousins during our summer holidays in Belgaum.

11 of us cooking a meal of rice and dal on a clay stove or chula!! Summer vacations were the best.

For S this was his first, I think! I didn’t ask him, I just let him enjoy this moment of preparing the tea out in open 😂🤪.

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S wanted to experience the authentic camping experience! He did all the leg work, the cooking, and I took over the cleaning ! My OCD would get better of me if I didn’t have clean dishes or table even in wilderness 😜!.

How I sometimes wish that if only I could ignore the mess once in while how easy life would be for me!🤨

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I had carried one meal from home to keep it easy on us, being our first time we weren’t sure of how long it would take for us to setup things.

We sat down for a early dinner under natural light and yet we had some uninvited little guests! I just explained to the girls how flies would make for nutritious meal and eating them would only make them stronger.

I haven’t seen my girls eat this fast before 😂🤣.

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After dinner we went exploring the camping ground and on the way back we got some firewood for the campfire from a small campground store.

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The idea of camping as I understood is to spend a lot of time outdoors , doing hikes, biking, swimming etc only to return to your tent for rest or sleep.

So we left for the beach which was literally 2 mins drive away on the other side of the road.

The weather so far had been anything but perfect warm and sunny! The girls were happy to head into the water.

Day 1: Evening

S and I settled on a log close by taking in the viewing and patting ourselves for finally taking the leap while girls got busy playing with the waves.

We picked up ice cream from other campground store and were back at our site, just in time for the campfire.

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Since the RV trip,getting a campfire started was like a child’s play for S , within minutes we had beautiful flame 🔥 going on for us .

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Over ice creams, we narrated spooky stories ! I went first followed by V and then smart N took bits and pieces from our story and created her own version! 😂

At last it was S‘s turn, he got a little too carried away, after 30 mins we finally protested and he ended his scientific-horror-mystery😂🤪.

By now N was spooked and didn’t want anything to do with him 😂.

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Day 1: Night

At 9pm, the campground got quite. Everyone moved in to their tents or RV’s .This is where things got interesting for us.

We grossly underestimated as to how cold it could get in the night ! It was summer, and going by that it should have been anything but pleasant.

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But no, even our double duvets were no match for the cold. S cursed himself for not getting the heater. He kept tossing and turning and the girls kept getting up to relieve themselves !

Pitch dark, not a person in sight and these girls had to go! It was a scene straight out of horror movies and it didn’t help that there was some rustling of leaves too!! 😂

After a while we just hurdled up real close to each other, I am not sure how long it took us but we finally managed to sleep!!

Day 2: Morning

The next day,running low on sleep but high on spirit S was back on breakfast duty. We had scrambled eggs, bread and hot tea!

Now our original plan was to stay for two nights,but we had a last minute change in plans just before we left for camping and now our plan was to head home after lunch!

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After breakfast we headed for the beach again, this time for a swim! I like swimming in pools not in cold open areas so I opted out!

We reached early, the water was warm enough for the three of the them to get in.Ms. N was the first one to get out. She preferred playing in the sand.

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After an hour of water play, we were on to the next activity -Kayaking. The crowd had slowly started trickling in.

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V and N both got on to the kayak! V helped her dad and N played tourist 😂. It was time for lunch, we left for our campsite and this time I prepared Maggi while S started packing up.

This part wasn’t as easy , we struggled a bit as we tried getting them back into their original tiny compact bags! 😅.

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The girls did throw in a little protest,they were having fun and totally digging the whole experience.

They even made friends,but we had other plans.The post on that plan will be out soon.

So after saying goodbye to their friends we were on our back on the road.

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A last minute planned Camping trip that turned out to be super fun! So much so that I went ahead and declared to him that I was all ready to do it all over again next year!

Keep your face to the sunshine and you will never see the shadows.~Helen Keller