We took the BRV out on its first multi-day trip. We decided on Folsom lake mainly because by the time we looked for campsites this was the only state park with one available Memorial Day weekend within reasonable driving distance. Turns out there was a good reason for this: the campground was lovely, but it was on the far side of the lake, and pretty darn inaccessible from the south/west - basically an extra hour drive around the lake and up over the American river from where we thought we would be staying.
I never knew there was this enormous lake just a few miles north of Sacramento. I've only heard of one thing in the town of Folsom: a prison. And guess where that prison is situated....right on Folsom lake (the south side so we never saw it).
On this trip we learned a lot of useful things:
1. The BRV gets bad gas mileage
2. The BRV can accelerate up hill (unlike our car which requires a running start to get up a long hill, and is decelerating the whole way up)
3. The BRV can hold it's own speed in traffic, none of that lame driving in the right lane with the campers for us!
We can easily keep up with this man on a horse!
4. It is possible to be totally self-contained for 3 days in the BRV*
5. Dawn is good at food planning, Amber is good at BRV packing and organizing
6. The driver's door on the BRV will swing open at inopportune times (like while speeding down the freeway) if it's not closed just right.
7. Our van camping packing skills still need some fine tuning
(*especially if you have a brother come bring you a bag of ice on day 2.)
On that last point, after our big shopping trip we had a lot of potentially useful gear for the BRV, and this was our first chance to test it out:
Mosquito netting - We duck taped this over the windows to allow for ventilation without bugs - this worked pretty well, but we have a vision for a better solution that will be more re-usable (stay tuned).
Camp stove - bought the cheapest version but it worked really well and I cooked several two pot meals including a chicken stew with tons of veggies. It turns out, if you cut up all your veggies in advance and measure out all the ingredients, cooking really is just as easy as it looks on all those cooking shows.
Pans - whoops, forgot I had already bought a camping fry pan so I bought another one at the grocery store, and now we have two. But it's van camping, we have room for two!
Camping shower - We were staying at a state park specifically because they have showers (important to wash off all the pollen every day), but this place had only 2 showers for the entire campground, and 5pm is peak shower time. After a 12 mile hike, we saw the hour long line and decided it was a good time to try out the camping shower. It's really just a black bag with a hose on the end that employs gravity to deliver the shower. Unfortunately we weren't quite ready to use said shower - we didn't have anywhere to hang it, we hadn't worked out the shower curtain situation yet, and we hadn't left it out in the sun to heat. I have a vision of hooking a curtain across the back doors of the BRV and putting the shower up on top of the van....but first we need to get the back doors fixed so they will open. So this time we improvised, and for a squatting down, partially exposed showering experience, it worked reasonably well (no pictures available - this isn't that kind of a blog).
Cooler - OK I know everyone uses these, but I don't think I've ever owned a real cooler. Just those cheap ones that don't really work for more than a few hours. I put veggies and chicken and other stuff in our cooler with a bag of ice, and after a really hot Saturday I started to get worried that the food would go bad before cooking Sunday night. But it was a 25 minute drive (each way) to the nearest store. Fortunately we had already planned some hiking with my brother so we got him to bring an extra bag of ice. But when I went to add the fresh ice to the cooler I noticed the ice in there was still totally frozen. It's like a miracle! The extra ice did not go to waste: we had a bottle of white wine that was nicely chilled for dinner Sunday night.
Big plastic water container - the kind that collapse when they are empty and have a spout so you can fill them with water and then have running water at your camp site. Amber wonders why her family never had such an amazing convenience.
Curtains behind the drivers seats - a brilliant idea from Amber that not only blocks out the light from all the windows in the front but also makes the back of the van seem more homey.
Kitchen island - ok we didn't actually get this for the camping trip, we just got lucky and found one we wanted near Sacramento on craigslist and used this trip as an opportunity to pick it up. So our campsite was much classier than all the other ones (even the RV ones didn't have a kitchen island)!
Bed-in-a-bag - this is the cheapest way to get new sheets and a blanket. In this case you get what you pay for. I think the sheets have a thread count of 10, and the very poofy comforter was just thick enough for sleeping on warm nights.
Radio - The BRV does not have a radio so Amber got us a portable one that has an ipod dock, and she tied it to the dash so that we have a pretty good radio right where it should be. The BRV runs a little loud on the freeway, but so does the Tracker so we're used to blasting the radio to hear over the car noise.
Note the fancy kleenex dispenser now built in to the BRV dash as well!
Butane lighter - another miracle tool that I've never owned. No more messing around with matches!
Firewood - yep, this stuff really works. And buying it before you get to the campground is a great strategy we plan to employ in the future.
Camp chairs - I've always been jealous of friends who bring the comfy camp chairs, and now that we've got a big van there's space for us to cart along the campsite comfort.
Rain/bug tent - You know the big square contraptions that people put up over their picnic tables at campsites to keep out the rain and bugs? Well we seem to have purchased only the netting part of that. We're not sure if that was because I had a vision of using it to keep bugs out of the BRV (which clearly won't work) or because Amber wanted the whole thing but we didn't notice you have to buy the poles and top part separately. Either way, it was useless.
Marshmallows - 2 bags, a small accident of duplication, but you never can have too many marshmallows when camping, especially when you've got chocolate and grahams and firewood and a butane lighter.
What we didn't bring but should have:
- swimsuits - yep, we were camping on a lake and this didn't occur to us
- bowls - plates can't be used for everything
- mugs - 1 isn't enough for 2 people
- pillows - bed-in-a-bag doesn't include pillows, just the pillowcases
- quarters - showers at parks only take quarters, fortunately same brother who brought the ice also brought some quarters
The BRV also made some friends on this trip:
The BRV's little brother, owned by my little brother
This guy pulled up next to us on the freeway to ask the year of our van!
-Dawn
