Camping 2019

Last summer we went camping; we try and go somewhere every summer but honestly, we'd probably never go anywhere if it wasn't for Jamie and Tim booking campsites and telling us where we are going. It's the way to do it. Anyway, so this summer it was Mammoth. All I knew about Mammoth was that it was high - our campsite was at 9,000 feet - and I might love camping on mountains but I truly hate driving up the mountain roads to get there. But I loved Mammoth - the approach was gentle and not twisty windy roads with sheer drop offs on the side. So I loved it from the drive up onwards!

Our campsite was lovely, with lots of shade... which is the number one priority for a good camping trip!

We hadn't been there more than half an hour before Kate drove a giant splinter into her leg. She was jumping from post to post and fell against one of them. Her leg was pretty scraped up, and it took several minutes of quite intense surgery before Jeff pulled out a 3 pronged splinter that was at least an inch and a half long. We keep a first aid kit in the car, with actual bandages, because we've been camping with Kate before, so she was wrapped up in a real bandage because the damage was too much for a bandaid, and then all we had to do was try and keep it clean for the next 3 days. In the woods and in the dirt! (When we got home we pulled an additional 6 or 7 splinters out of her leg!)

On our second day we took a wander around Twin Lakes, which was beautiful.

On the next day we went up Mammoth mountain to the top, where the kids had a snowball fight. On the 31st of July! There was still so much snow up there.

In the afternoon we hiked up to Devil's Postpone and Rainbow Falls...

... which, because we were at altitude, was tiring in the extreme! But worth it.

This trip was the first time, in all our years of camping and diligently storing food in bear boxes, that we had an actual encounter with a bear! It came ambling through our campsite one evening and seemed totally undeterred by Jeff banging pots and pans to scare it away. Ellie and the kids met another one the next day on their way to brush teeth before bed. It made our trip memorable!