Camping - Mt. Diablo

Watching the beautiful sunset at Mt. Diablo

I am finally catching up on my posts. In April we traveled over to the East Bay to camp at Mt. Diablo. We were going to meet up with friends but it ended up just being our family. I have to admit, I am still not jazzed about camping with our crew. Jane and Cate are at great ages but Lizzie is a bit of a wild card. The last time I went camping with a baby/toddler it was a 2 nighter and it did not go so well. I guess I still have PTSD, so I was a little hesitant to go on this trip. Jane and Cate were especially excited to go and Trever wanted to get away as well, so I gathered my courage and put on my game face (I don't really have a game face but I tried to be a good sport).

The drive was a little long but it was worth it. The views from Mt. Diablo are beautiful. After we set up our tents, we jumped in the car and drove to the summit to get a better view. We could see the all over the Bay Area (East Bay, Mt. Tam, and even San Francisco). Luckily we kept close tabs on Cate, she tried to scale the guard rail to get a better look. She is an adventurous one.

When we arrived back at our campsite, things were not as we left them. The tents were in tack but our cooler was not. We eventually figured out that a raccoon got into our cooler and stole our hot dogs and pancake batter. The girls were terrified and miserable because they were really hungry. The best/worst part was that the raccoon was in the bushes near our campsite and we could see it eating our food. Trever has a great video of Cate and Jane crying about the whole ordeal. I saw my opportunity to escape and suggested that we go home and make the next day a beach day. Trever of course denied my request. We eventually packed up the kiddos and headed into town for a Mediterranean feast. We were roughing it!

Luckily the raccoons didn't get into our s'mores supply, so we were able to enjoy dessert while watching an amazing sunset.

After s'mores, we put the kiddos to bed. Lizzie and I slept in one tent, and Trever and the big girls slept in another. Lizzie actually slept like a champ and got a good nights sleep. I, on the other hand, had a funky pillow and could hear raccoons circling our tent for most of the night. We were also woken up around midnight to the sound of Cate coughing and eventually throwing up all over her sleeping bag. I got up to help Trever because he couldn't really move around. Unfortunately he broke his ankle a few weeks prior to our trip and he slept with his boot off during the night. After gathering the sleeping bag in a large garbage bag and sanitizing the bottom of the tent, we all went back to sleep, if you can call it sleep.

The next morning the girls were still very excited about our camping adventure. They loved exploring our site and climbing the nearby trees.

Once we packed up our site, we spent the afternoon at Rock City, which is located inside of the park. The rocks were very cool and the girls had a great time climbing around. The area reminded me a little of southern Utah.

So there you have it, our trip to Mt. Diablo was an overall success. There were a few bumps along the way but we had a good time. I am still a little hesitant to camp with our crew but I think I am up for another trip.