June Bucket List: #6 – “Go tent camping”
While plotting out what would be on our wedding registry, T thought I was absolutely nuts for putting on camping stuff. I tried to put on off-the-wall stuff, like an underwater iPhone case, albums on vinyl and board games. We had lived together for quite some time, so we weren’t in need of too many regular household items. My husband was not particularly down with the camping items on account of my “cupcake” nature. It was clear that I needed to prove to him that I could handle a little ol’ camping trip.
We chose the Observatory Campground on Palomar Mountain.
When we first arrived, chaos ensued. We pulled up to our assigned lot (Lot 28, for future reference) and it was not what I had envisioned. At all. There wasn’t one tree on the lot (during an Excessive Heat Wave Advisory), and to add insult to injury, our lot contained a path to the bathrooms/showers directly next door and held a water pump that multiple campsites would be using. We were so sad :(
Luckily, we had shown up an hour before check-in time and we ventured to a big sign that let us know that some campsites were non-reserve-able, first come, first serve – including the lot next to our dismal lot (Lot 27!), which we promptly swooped. It’s only $15 a night to camp there, so we ate both fees and chalked it up to not having any neighbors for $30 total. Crisis averted.
Now, I’ll warn you – we are total rookies. The big bad camping trip made us very aware of how green we really are. You’ll see.
The Observatory Campsite is named for the Palomar Observatory, which is right up the mountain and boasts the 200-inch Hale Telescope. There is a hiking trail that runs roughly two miles to get to the Observatory and we had planned on getting up there after pitching our tent. The tent went up and so began our journey.
So, let me just explain something – we are only smiling because after walking 1/4-mile in a heatwave and fighting off tears, malnutrition (we forgot that thing called eating) and bugs (we forgot the bug spray on the counter), we tossed the white flag. Yep, we quit our hike. There was always tomorrow and a car waiting to drive us up the hill. We would never make it on a “real” camping trip, but we have plenty of years to perfect this!
Caught him picking up his dusty old guitar. Poor thing shrieked when he began playing and realized his musician’s callouses had gone away. It sure was nice to see him pick up an instrument again though!
We grilled some corn on the cob, along with hot dogs and baked beans.
My new favorite camping treat – jalapeños stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped with bacon.
I love cooking and this new-found camping thing was pretty relaxing and awesome too, so I decided to mix the two. I grabbed 10 jalapeños, cut them in half, stuffed them full of cream cheese (one small package) and wrapped them in bacon. The sizzle on the grill was the best part (besides eating them)!
T checking out the tent.
We stayed inside the tent to cool off for awhile. We played this game called Cards Against Humanity. If you have a gross sense of humor, you should probably look into it. If you get offended easily, stay far, far away.
When the sun began to set, we tried to light a fire. No one told us we had to tote in our own firewood to the campsite. Us smartypants-es decided that since we were in a forest, there must be logs everywhere, right? Oops.
The sunset was PURPLE. What?!
Oh, and yay!, I forgot to mention that I got a new car. Here he/she is before it needed a detail from all of the dusty camping gear.
And here is our fire. It only lasted through two roasted marshmallows, which was actually a bit longer than 10 minutes on account of me forgetting that I had opened the bag for a late-night snack and threw into a soggy cooler. Hence the wet looking marshmallow.
Bed time…and man, oh man, was it dead quiet the entire night.
And then the birds woke up around 5 a.m. Bacon time.
Hubs is sad because we don’t know how to use charcoal. The bacon tasted like straight-up fuel starter. We will have to Google that next time we go camping.
Our hour wait-time three pieces of bacon.
After we packed up, we finally headed to the Observatory.
Here it is! Palomar Observatory. The top part is on wheels and slides open so that the telescope can see out. Kind of wild! I really wish we had the opportunity to see out the telescope, but most of the Observatory is closed off to the public.
In summary, I give us a B-. We survived, which is always a plus, but we still have a lot of learning to do. I’m ready to soak it all up!
