Camping Anyone?

One of my favourite memories as a kid was of going camping. Every other weekend during summer we would grab our sleeping bags (and a tent if mum was coming too), our fishing gear, some old kitchen stuff, an esky full of beer and sausages, the portable radio, loo paper, a gas bottle & lantern and off we would head into the wild blue yonder.

Well OK. Off we’d head to the local state park and recreation area – commonly referred to by the locals as ‘The Dam’.

When I was quite young, we had a purple power boat that we’d take along. Mum would ski, dad would fish and we would get towed along on the boogey board.

When I was older we only had the old tinny and we’d putter around looking for good fishing holes. Sometimes we’d get a cabin near the recreation park where there are showers and toilets and a kiosk and water slides. Usually we’d go ‘out the back’ of the dam to where there was well, nothing.

We’d set up camp, establish our domain put out our rods and handlines, collect fire wood and settle in for some serious fishing. Us kids would grab the airbeds from the tents (again the mother thing) and take them swimming with us, we’d walk the dam edge to look for lost sinkers and lures, we’d whittle sticks with our pocket knifes (seriously) and if we really got bored we’d play cards.  We learnt to cook toast on a stick, roast potatoes wrapped in foil in the coals, sizzle sausages on a fry pan on the fire, to boil a billy to make hot milo, what catfish, yellow belly, trout and carp are and what kind of places they like to visit.

We’d always go home with a few fish, dirty clothes, dirty faces and a sunburn that would see us having cold showers for a week.

Good times my friends.

And something I looked forward to sharing with my kids (except the sunburn bit).

We’ve been out the dam a couple of times, we spent a week camping in Victoria the other year, but we just never seem to get away regularly. I know it’s hard for hubby to be motivated to travel when he’s not on the road for work, but I feel like we are missing out. There are so many different experiences that I want to share with my kids.

To that end I have been working on him about making the most of his occasional long weekend. One of the pluses of his work is that he is sometimes home on either Monday/Friday or both. So after minimal nagging/begging and threats discussion we are off on what I hope will be the first weekend of many camping this year.

For Easter we are going a short hop, skip and a few hours jump away camping at Wellington Caves.  We will be meeting up with friends from Dubbo for the weekend.

Camping, catching up with friends, cheap cask wine, cavorting through caves.

What more could a girl ask for?

Now to go find where all the camping gear has been stashed…………..