More notes on Past Vacations

Some more notes on past vacations:

Some of the vacations we took with the kids—without camping:

1.    We took them to Disney world when Jennifer was 11 and Kelly was 8.  We were living in Benton at the time.  We drove as far as Gulf Shores the first day.  We spent the night in a nice motel with a pool, which happened to be just outside our bedroom.  So Don and I would sit outside and have “happy Hour” while the kids swam.  We then drove on to Disney world area.  We were staying in an apartment out side the park.  With was good for us.  The apartment had 2 bedrooms, with a kitchen, living area etc.  It worked out well even though we were off Disney property because we had a lot of space.  We would go back to the apartment mid day and take naps before going back to parks for the evening.  We had a great time.  The kids were old enough to really enjoy it and they could also do a little exploring on their own.  We took a couple of side trips, one to Sea world, the other to the space station at the cape.  Both were very enjoyable.

2.  We took the kids to Glacier National Park one year.  We had just bought our mini-van so we had lots of room for the drive.  What a long trip up there!  I think it took us the better part of 3 days.  We stayed on one side in a duplex and on the other side in a motel with a kitchen and one bedroom.   We did some hiking and exploring and driving around the area.  A beautiful area…. Which Don and I revisited several years later in one of the campers we had.  Not sure if I will ever go back because it does take so long to get there.

3.  One of the other trips we took with the kids was to Gulf shores area …. We had a condo right on the beach with 2 bedrooms… we could walk to the beach.  We would spend the mornings at the beach and when it was the hottest we would explore the area.  I’m not really a beach person, but it was a pretty relaxing fun vacation.

4.  We also took them skiing 2 different times.   While they were in High school, we went, with the Cummings clan, to Durango ski area… this we took during Christmas… and actually spent Christmas day on the sloops.  Was fun..

Later when they were in College, we took them to Winter Park to ski.. This also was a fun trip.  Although Don and I aren’t really skiers, KDB really likes it. (in fact, he went with the church youth group a few times)

One recent vacation was with Jennifer to south Dakota.  We stayed in an old farmhouse outside Custer, SD… We took bikes so we could ride on the bike trail that is in the area, which we did a few times.  We also hiked up to the tallest peak in SD…. You could see for miles up there.  We also enjoyed driving through the Custer State park and found a couple of herds of Buffalo there.  Really  had a fun time traveling with Jen and the house was very nice….

The last vacation that Don and I took was to Alaska… one of the places on my “Bucket List” to see.  We spent a lot on the trip but had a very good time.  It was worth all of it.  We had a couple of really great days viewing the Mt McKinley … beautiful view along the high way and in the lodge we were staying in.  It was also interesting that while were there,  it was light much of the day. We spent two weeks driving around the southern part of the state and saw many beautiful areas and wildlife.

More past travels

Past  vacations for the blog…. I am writing a blog about looking back and now I am writing on about looking back on vacations I have taken.

We have taken some nice vacations when the kids were small and growing with just the four of us. 

One of our first Big time vacations was taken when Kelly was almost 2 years old and Jennifer almost 5 years old.  We borrowed a pop up camper and id a tour of Tennessee and Kentucky.  I did learn some things on that first trip… try not to cram too much into a trip.   The plan was to go farther than we did but I soon realized that we needed so stay longer in a place instead of packing up and moving so much.  It just wears everyone out and no one enjoys the trip as much.  When there is a young child along… things can happen.. KDB fell off a table and cut his head which bled quite a bit but he was ok.. But I also learned going with young children can be a lot of fun… all the adults like to give little kids a lot of attention and seeing a place through their eyes is great.

When they were a little older, we did a major camping trip to the Smokey Mountains.  We took two tents and a shelter. (we slept in one tent on cots and dressed in another tent.)  This was a big trip because we camped there and back and stayed in tents while in the Smokey Mts.  I liked tent camping, but it was tiring putting up the tent and taking it down so much.  This area is really pretty and we did enjoy seeing it.  We did some hiking and other such exploring.  I do remember one night it really rained and rained!!! Everything was wet and no one was in a great mood when we got up in the morning.  Don decided it was a good morning to go out for breakfast instead of cooking.. Breakfast was the best and got everyone back in a good mood. I think this was the last big tent camping vacation we did because we found that it made for a really tiring time.   We did some other camping trips… but we would as least stay in a motel on the way there and back.  Also not long after this, we bought a used pop up camper which we used many times until Kelly was in JR high and it seemed we quit going as much… we soon sold it as we didn’t want it sitting around.

I have done a lot of camping in my lifetime.  The first experiences were when I was in high school and college.  My family had a pretty large canvas tent that we would take to Beaver lake which is just outside Rogers.  We would go and spend a week at a time, mostly just hanging out.  We would go in the summers, and when I was in college working summer jobs in Rogers, I would camp out there and then go to work from the camp.  I am sure at the time we did this type of vacation because it was not expensive.  We did have a lot of fun hanging around the camp and swimming at the lake beach.

After Don and I got married, we got a pick up truck and put a camper shell on it.  We were living in Lake Charles at the time.  We went camping out of the back of the truck…(one time we even went down to the gulf of Mexico and camped on the beach.)  We had us a foam pad that we would sleep on.  We cooked on a coleman stove and felt we had it pretty nice.  (we were up off the ground and had a shelter above us)  We used the truck camper a lot for camping until we had the kids and there just wasn’t enough room for 2 adults and 2 children.

We then used tents for our camping trips with the kids.  We camped at Devil’s den, in the National Forest, Petti Jean… mostly places around Arkansas.  The kids enjoyed getting out and the fun of camping.. fun for them – work for me.. but I still enjoyed the getting out with the fam and enjoying nature… hiking and exploring.

We bought a used pop up camper (which I referred to earlier.)  We used this camper a lot… going to Colorado and Yellowstone in this camper.  We also did a lot of in state camping in this pop up. One of my favorite places was Erby campground on the Buffalo River. We would camp there with family and explore the area.  We would wake up with Elk close to the camp.  It was from this camp that I heard my first Elk Buggle… and interesting sound….there are many hiking trails around there and old homestead homes that are historical sites.  Plus, you can not beat the buffalo river for its beauty. The last time we went to Erby, Kelly was in Jr high and Jen was about to turn 16… anyway she got to drive the road to erby from the highway.   We had a good time --- I told a ghost story about someone stopping on the road and scaring the campers.  In the middle of the night a car did stop on the road… I have to admit it did make me a little nervous. Kelly also got sick in the night… so it did not end so well for him.

About this time, I got to where I liked to “camp” in cabins.  I could still enjoy the outdoors, hiking and canoeing,  then go back to a house… many times with a hot tub!  My kind of camping. 

The most adventurous camping trips were on the Middle Fork of the Salmon river floats.  We have done three --- one in 2002, one in 2006 and the last one in 2010.  The MFS is in Idaho.. It takes two – three days to drive out there.  Once there we drive to the “put in” were the primitive camping starts…. Boundry Creek…. Once we have the rafts loaded, we are on a week long trip down the river… what you carry in you carry out.  Plus class 2, 3 and 4 rapids along the way.  It is a fun trip… and most exciting… the area is very beautiful… and people we go with are a lot of fun…. However, that being said…. It is also the most physical trip I have ever been on.  We go down the river for some miles, make camp, cook etc….. go to sleep in tents, break up camp…. And do it all over again the next day, and the next day, and the next day etc….. by the end everyone is very worn out…. But proud to have made it down “the river of no return”.  One of the things we had to do on these trips was kitchen duty… that is above and beyond putting up and taking down your personal tent etc…. The food was always good… of course everyone is so tired and hungry that most anything would taste good.  The first trip we slept on matts, the second time we had and army type cots… the last time we had a roll cot that was the most comfortable.  The first time we went on the river it was about 3f (which at the time I thought it was a bit scary) the second time was 4 ft… an a little more scary plus we had some raft issues on this trip, the third trip was 5 ft and really scary… and it was cold.. snowy… But on all three me made it… (but I have told myself I will never go on that river trip again)

Vacations

I am now researching vacation options for next October.  I will be retired then (that is another "looking Back" story)  as always, as I research and plan a new vacation, I look back and remember past vacations.

As a child growing up, most of our family vacations were linked to my Dad's Navy two week training.  We would go along, stay in a motel, and tour the areas while he went to his training.  Being in the Navy, most of the places we went were on a coast or gulf area where there were ships.  Some of the places we went where, San Diego, New Orleans, Norfolk, Savannah, DC area (Naval Academy is close by) just to name a few.  We would spend time on the beaches if there were any, tour the historic sights in the area, and in general, have a lot of fun.  I remember most of the time when Dad got his dismissal orders, he would get them at midnight and we would start right home then, driving all night.  This may be why now, I don't like driving late into the night.  I always want to get a room in the early evening and relax, getting up early in the morning to continue the drive.

Some more "family" type vacations were taken after Don and I married and had Jennifer and Kelly.
One of the first was a trip to Colorado with Mike and Mary, Scott and Eric.  They were young school aged children at the time.  Since all 4 children are about the same age, they had a lot of fun with each other.  Jennifer was the only girl but I have to say she did keep up with the boys.  Mike and Mary had borrowed a van from Mom and Dad  and pulled their little trailer out there.  We had our pop up camper and pulled it with our LTDII that we had at the time.  We camped at a KOA campground overlooking the mountain peaks across the valley.  Such a beautiful view to wake up to every morning and go to sleep by at night.  We would all pile into the van and explore the mountains all day, driving up to some of the easy passes etc...

Another "family" type vacation was when Jennifer and Scott were 12 years old and Eric and Kelly were just younger.  We went with Mom, Dad, Mike, Mary, and all the kids to Yellow Stone Park.  We camped in a campground just outside the park... We still had the pop up at this time.  Again we would all pile in the van and explore the area.  When you get 10 people in a van, 4 being tweens.... you can always count on an adventure.  We had a lot of fun viewing the animals and seeing all the sights there were to see there.  We saw buffalo, moose, bears (black and grisley) elk .....
We also had our share of car trouble on this trip... the van broke down a couple of times stranding us in some spots.  (just made for more stories) Now that Mom and Dad are older and don't travel with us anymore, I love thinking back to a time when they could go with us and enjoy fun times with us.
More to come later....