Camping in Bon Echo: Part 2 (or, Camping with Kids)

The other day I wrote a review of Bon Echo Provincial Park. In general we had a great experience, but there were some challenges. I complained a bit about the park management, but most of the challenges were related to the difficulties when camping with young children.

This was our first camping trip with two kids. We've gone with our oldest daughter around 18 months and then again at 3 years. This time we had both girls - one is 22 months, and the other will be 5 next week.

The walk-in site was tough with young kids. If you're planning a walk-in, or a canoe/portage trip, I would strongly recommend giving it a second thought. We had to carry all of our stuff - two tents, one kitchen tent, two coolers, one giant tarp, all of our bags, shoes, jackets, toys etc. over a 5 minutes rocky trail to get to our site. I'm all for "backcountry" or "real" camping, but I think I'll enjoy it a lot more when my kids are old enough to carry things themselves. Obviously you'll pack less if you're canoe camping, but it will still be a tough slog with little people who are learning to walk!

Another challenge is sleep - young kids who are used to a quiet/dark room will have challenges falling asleep and staying asleep, especially if you are unlucky enough to have loud neighbours (which we did). Expect to be tired, and perhaps consider bringing along ear plugs for your own comfort (we found the white noise app on our phone to work really well for my youngest, and we charged the phone in our car each morning!)

Here are some other tips that worked really well for us, and made the experience fun:

• tarp your site - try to cover as much ground as you can. If you experience torrential rains (which we did!), your children will still have some dry space to do crafts and read books
• If you're car camping, consider purchasing a kitchen tent. It gives you some great space to cook, do crafts and play games, and if you keep it zipped up, will ward of the bugs!
• Pack a huge tote full of markers, crayons, stickers, playdough etc. We brought this out every day, and the girls spent hours colouring and crafting.
• Also consider packing sand toys, Kidnoculars (or just regular binoculars will do!), bikes, and containers for collecting leaves, rocks and other things kids love to pick up
• Blowup mattresses are amazing - I know Thermarests are smaller and easier to pack, but blow-up mattresses make a huge difference for comfort.

My last piece of advice? Let go of control - yes, it will be messy. It will be dirty. You might be a bit tired (at least for the first couple of nights). But it's worth it. You'll have lovely campfires, see shooting stars, swim in a cool/clean lake, go for nature walks, and watch your children delight in the outdoors.

Our oldest started the trip complaining about the "stinky" toilets, being afraid of bugs, and getting upset over her feet being dirty. By the end of the week she was picking spiders off her legs and saying "oh, hello there Daddy long legs!" The transformation was amazing!

What are your tips for camping with young children?

Camping in Bon Echo: Part 1

My family loves to camp. Or maybe I should say my husband really loves to camp, and I sort of love it. I don't mind sleeping in a tent, and I'm happy outdoors as long as the bugs aren't too bad. But I have a terrible fear of bears, and feel uneasy in the wilderness. I know that I have a better chance dying in my automobile than dying at the jaws or paws of a bear, but there isn't much rational thinking that occurs when I'm imagining myself (or my girls) being eaten alive.

Despite my reservations, I believe that camping is a fantastic activity for kids. Not only are they learning new skills and an appreciation of nature, but they're doing what kids do best - getting dirty and exploring the world!

So each year we plan a camping trip with good friends of ours, who also have two daughters around the same age as our daughters. This year we chose Bon Echo Provincial Park, about a 2.5 hour drive from Ottawa.

We reserved site #165, which is one of five walk-in sites at the Sawmill Bay campground on Mazinaw Lake. Bon Echo also has back country camping, cabins and yurts. 

Positives:

• There's a lot to do with kids. We rented a canoe for 1 hour and went to check out the native pictographs on Mazinaw Rock. The park offered amazing kids programs every morning at 10am, and most evenings at their amphitheatre.
• The beaches are sandy and clean. The girls spent many hours wading, swimming and building sand castles.
• The walk-in sites are beautiful - rocky and treed, and right on the water. You could easily jump off the rocks at your site and go for a swim. The lake is the second-deepest in Southern Ontario.

Negatives:

• For a walk-in site, I expected to have neighbours who had done a lot of camping and respected general camping rules. Nuh-uh, didn't happen. We ended up with several yahoos camping on either side of us - one couple lighting their fire with charcoal and starter fluid, another dragging giant logs and brush to burn, and a group of campers with no respect for quiet after dark (to give them credit, they weren't drinking or anything - they were just obnoxiously loud people. In fact, the following group at that site were the ones drinking and carrying on, and even they shut up at 11pm. I could have kissed them!)
• Walk-in sites and young children don't really mix (but as another positive, I'm in really great shape after all that walking back and forth!)
• Lack of policing from park rangers: our friends were staying in the main Sawmill campground, and had a horrible experience with drunken teenagers (or maybe they were 20...whatever). And in the walk-in campsites, we didn't see a single ranger in seven days. I realize funding is scarce, but I think a walk-through each evening is warranted.  I could have made the park a ton of money by handing out tickets for all the infractions I spotted
• The park was BUSY. Although I appreciate the human bodies surrounding me (as protection from bears, of course!), my hubby and I could have done with a quieter experience. We camped Achray in 2012 and it was very peaceful.

Although my negatives seem to outweigh the positives, we still had a wonderful time. The girls had a blast with their little friends, and the giant tarp my husband rigged up over the campsite saved us from days of rain. We're already planning our trip next year, and need ideas. What are your favourite campgrounds for kids?

Oh, and no bears were spotted. That didn't stop me from having a 2am heart attack after I heard what I thought was a bear - it was just a really loud racoon :)

Calypso Theme Waterpark - Fun for the whole family!

I had heard the ads on the radio. I knew that there was a waterpark not far from Ottawa, but I had definitely never been, until about a month ago when I got the opportunity to take my family to Calypso for the day.

If you've been, you know this already, but I have to say that the park is HUGE! Big gates at the entrance open to a promenade area with lockers on one side and life jacket rental on the other. (Rentals are free by the way.) Then there is the gift shop and restaurants leading the way to the attractions. Attractions.. rides.. I'm not quite sure what to call them. Some were just big slides, but others were truly amazing.

Calypso has 35 slides and more than 100 games. There's a lazy river suitable for kids, and a huge wave pool. The biggest draw, according to the people at Calypso, is the lazy river, the Kongo Expedition. It takes 15-20 minutes to meander along the river, past elephants and alligators, through water features that spray and soak, with animal sounds the entire way.

The pools are all heated which is great because Calypso is open in all weather during the summer months, though the slides are closed during thunderstorms. There is one area suitable for even the youngest kids, with a gentle walk-in pool and small slides, and a spot for bigger kids right next to it.

There are grassy, shaded areas near all the rides with lots of picnic tables. You can bring your lunch or eat at one of the many restaurants in the park.

Now that I've been and experienced Calypso with my kids, I'd love to go back with just my husband and go on all the big rides. Or go with a group so that we could trade off and do some rides while the kids play. Either way, Calypso was a lot of fun and I can't wait to go back!

Top 10 Innovative Ways to Stay Cool During Pregnancy

I guess pregnant women don't have to worry much about heat this summer - it's been pretty cool and wet! Even so, keep these awesome tips on hand for those days that try to break 30 degree C :)

10) Eat lots of ice cream and/or popsicles. Even if you gain 50lbs during pregnancy, it's OK.

9) Have a cold shower, and then run naked to your bed. Let evaporation do its job.

8) Run through the splash pad with your toddler (bonus points if you try to splash the other parents)

7) Put your head under the water sprays in the produce aisle of the grocery store (bonus points if you then toss your wet hair in a very sexy way, attracting the eyes of the produce boys)

6) Buy a Japanese Ice Bra!

5) Drink hot tea (the British in India swore by this)

4) Bathe your feet in ice water (bonus points if you do this at the office)

3) Crunch loudly on ice cubes (again, the cubicle is a great place for this - especially to annoy your insufferable cube-mate)

2) Always expose your stretch-marked belly at the beach by wearing a bikini (bonus points if your bum is eating your bikini bottom)

1) Go skinny dipping (bonus points if you do this in a public pool)

National Ice Cream Day!

July 20th was National Ice Cream day, and the Canadian Agriculture and Food Museum celebrated appropriately with the Ice Cream Festival! We arrived early, and thank goodness, because the parking lot was jammed by the time we left at 11:30 am. As museum members, we got to bypass the HUGE lineup, and headed inside to see the cows and horses. My daughters were worried about all the noise the animals were making, so we made our way over to a demonstration of ice cream making with an old manual ice cream maker. Nearby the girls could play with hoola hoops and make giant bubbles.

Of course, the highlight of the day was free ice cream, which the girls gobbled up (and I do have to comment that normally our family tries to avoid Nestle products for these reasons, but I made an exception in the interest of toddler meltdowns). There were also ice cream sandwiches being made in the kitchen, and the girls enjoyed watching the bees working away in the beehive.

A visit to the Canadian Agriculture museum never disappoints, and you definitely want to add this event to you calendar for next summer!