We headed to Red Top Mountain State Park on Lake Allatoona after work Friday for our second family camping trip. The park is about 50 miles north of Atlanta. We were a bit worried about Friday afternoon traffic, and it wasn't pretty but wasn't as bad as we had anticipated. It took us about 1.5 hours to get to the park. It is a huge park with over 90 campsites but they have it well organized into tent areas, pop-up/camper areas, and RV areas. The sites were large, well-maintained and level. We had a great site in the woods not too far from the lake. The weather was great; it was very warm Friday night, beautiful but cooler on Saturday, downright chilly Saturday night (but fortunately I had brought a warm set of PJs and fleece slippers for Spencer) and cold enough that we didn't want to get out of the tent Sunday morning. But we did, and immediately warmed ourselves with fire, hot coffee and sweet potato pancakes...it was lovely. Spencer had a great time. He likes sleeping in the tent and loved helping us collect wood and tend the fire.
Friday night there was a family with a 3-year old girl camped next to us, and they ran up and down the hill together between our campsites and played until bedtime. Saturday we spent some time fishing and found a very small beach area. I let Spencer wade into the water, which turned into squatting in the water to play (and thus getting his behind soaked) and finally he just went in the water. He was so excited and was having so much fun I could hardly protest. Another 4-year old girl came and they played together for a while. Finally it was time to head back to camp, so I had to borrow Fred's t-shirt to change Spencer into for the short walk back. Back at camp Spencer and I took a nice nap in the hammock.
Saturday evening Spencer found a small troop of young boys 2 campsites over. He joined them in running through the woods with flashlights and drinking cocoa...I think it took the boys' families a while before they realized they had acquired a 4th little boy. Sunday morning the boys resumed their traipsing through the woods, climbing rocks, falling into streams, and other wilderness adventures while we leisurely had breakfast and packed to head home.
After we got home and unpacked I realized how absolutely exhausted we all were. Spencer and I took a wonderful 2-3 hour nap (mine was 2 his was 3). Now we'll see if he goes to sleep tonight! Anyway, it was worth it because he was a whiny mess when we got home.This was the best Mother's Day I've had so far!
