We wanted to get one last camping trip in before the weather got too cold. Our Saturdays were looking pretty busy throughout the first months of school, but we finally found a weekend in late September when we could make it work. Damon got off work a bit early and we left as soon as the kids were out of school. We were headed for Portola Redwoods State Park, a quiet little place not too far away in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
Despite being a short distance away, the drive took awhile since it involved a narrow and winding road. Still, we arrived well before dark & got the tent set up before meandering down the road to the visitors center before it closed for the night.
We took an alternate path back from the visitors center along one of the park's hiking trails.
These tall trees never fail to impress me.
And there are always some great hiding spots. I love this photo because Maggie has her arm around Gunnar. She is wearing my old Brownie Girl Scout sash and Gunnar is wearing a homemade one, hoping to earn "badges" established by Maggie on the camping trip, like the River Badge. They had a lot of fun together on this camp-out.
The great part about camping with our children now is that they are old enough to help set up! Camping is fun, but can be so much work. Now that the kids have gotten bigger, they can take on responsibilities. While I made dinner, the kids got all the pads and sleeping bags unloaded from the car and rolled out in the tent. Then they set to work preparing for the fire, which is definitely the highlight of camping for my little pyromaniac family.
This was one of our better campfires, if you ask me. For once, we brought wood from home. We had some old fence boards that were nice and dry and burned quite nicely.
We had a great evening around the fire, roasting marshmallows, sitting, warming ourselves,
or just being silly!
I love this one of Damon looking at his girls. He's a great dad. He loves his kids.
And they love him!
More camping to come in the next post! I couldn't get all the photos to load into a single post.
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