Camping at Fort Mountain State Park

We returned yesterday from our second attempt at tent camping with a toddler. We had another great time. In fact, we had such a good time that we will be going on our third and final camping trip of the summer in about a week and a half. This time we camped at Fort Mountain State Park which is in the Northwestern part of Georgia, near Tennessee. We camped for four nights, Monday through Friday. It rained about half of our trip, so I see our trip divided into two parts: what we did when it was sunny and what we did when it rained. While it was sunny...

-- Eli "power" mowed. He loves his lawn mower at home, he pushes it all around the yard. We do circles around the outside of the house; I think we've worn a path in the grass. Fortunately, we thought to bring the mower and it went over well, he "mowed" the entire campsite and even lifted his mower up the little ledge to the field above our campsite (hence the power mowing, I felt like it had turned into an extreme sport).






-- Eli explored our campsite, and of course located and touched all our signs.




-- Elijah defaced State Park flora (oops!) I had to explain after he picked this leaf that we don't pick things when we camp. But, he was so darn cute offering it to me as a present.




-- We went for bike rides. We borrowed Scott's parent's trailer to bring our bikes with us. Unfortunately, the biking wasn't what we expected. The camp site trails were a little too steep. But, we gave it our best shot.





-- We went hiking. The loop around the lake was absolutely beautiful and a pleasant, leisurely walk.





We also hiked up to the little waterfalls at the park.




-- Eli played at the park's playground.



-- We swam and played in the sand at the swimming beach. You can see it as the little patch of sand on the left in this picture. We actually camped in the closest campsite to the beach which was really helpful for impromptu swimming.



And, while it rained...

-- We hung out in our tent, sleeping, reading and rough-housing. Eli took a marathon nap during one of the storms, I guess the sound of the rain and being in a tiny enclosed space with Mommy and Daddy is pretty cozy. And, of course in our tent we got to hang out with our spider friends who took shelter between our tent and our rain cover. Eli would wake up and giggle and count them every morning.







-- We explored the local area. One night, the storm hit before dinner, so we drove into Dalton (about a half an hour away) and had dinner at Chick-Fil-A, which Eli devoured. We picked Chick Fil-A because they all have play places. But, unfortunately, and unusually, this one had it's playground outside. So, afterwards, not wanting to return to the tent so soon, we found a Starbucks. It was inside the Kroger and we sat and drank some coffee and milk (for Eli). It was so funny, Eli had a ball at Kroger. He played in the aisles, flirted with the Baristas, and "drove" his car cart all over the store. Who would've thought that Chick Fil-A and Kroger, two destinations that we have in Peachtree City could be so entertaining!

We woke up the last full day at the park to another dismal day, so we decided to hop in the car and drive to the closest State Park, after exploring another local town. We drove to Amicalola Falls State Park via Ellijay. In Ellijay, we had a nice lunch at a Mexican restaurant. Then, after lunch we found some fudge for me and Eli and then a coffee shop. The coffee shop was adorable, the coffee was good (especially with the fudge) and Eli loved it's rocking chair.




Fortunately, by the time we got to Amicalola Falls it had cleared up, so we were able to get out and explore. We played at their playground, hung out with orange cones, met a very friendly camp kitty (which made us miss Kodi!) and hiked to the falls.













-- We spent an evening under a picnic shelter. When we got back from Amicalola Falls, it was still clear, so Scott started cooking dinner. As Scott cooked, a storm brewed. We took our dinner, books, and games and sought the relative safety of one of the park's picnic shelters. We had a great time, and played our second game of Scrabble with Eli. Since he knows his letters, we tell him which letters we want off our trays to make the next word and where to place them on the board. He also gets to choose our next letters from the bag. Helping us play entertained him for half of our game, and he entertained himself for the other half. We actually got to play an entire Scrabble game while he was awake -- pretty amazing!

Camping at FDR State Park

We finally decided to take Eli camping for the first time last week. We've stayed in the cottages at the State Parks before, but we've never camped in a tent with him. We had a GREAT time. In fact, things went so well, that we are heading out tomorrow to go on another camping trip.

We arrived last Tuesday at FDR State Park in the early afternoon and decided pretty quickly after setting up that we wouldn't be doing much that day. Eli was enamored with the tent. He climbed in and out, zipped and unzipped, laid down, stood up, sat down over and over again.






We were also very excited about relaxing at our campsite. It was beautiful: it was actually on the banks of the lake and we could look out over the whole lake -- very peaceful, tranquil and relaxing.






We also noticed some interesting things about our camp site...

-- We were growing corn (?).





-- We had very friendly ducks. They actually slept under our picnic table on several occasions, and just generally hung out on our shore.





-- We had a perfect toddler sized balance beam next to our tent.





-- And, we had our own little "beach" perfect for throwing rocks into the water (one of Eli's favorite activities for the past few months.)




All in all, we had a great, relaxing first day camping. Wednesday, the next day, started out a little bumpier (literally.) We rented bikes from Calloway Gardens with the intent of riding all over Calloway for the day. But, the paths were so bumpy that Eli was miserable. Every time Scott hit a bump, Eli's helmet would rattle against the back of his bike seat. He actually threw up from the horribly bumpy ride. Needless to say, we cut our biking short.

We left Calloway, he fell asleep in the car and we drove to Warm Springs for a snack of coffee and cake. We met a few very friendly community cats, recharged our batteries and watched Eli regain his spirits. Thankfully, he seemed to have forgotten the morning. Then, we went back to Calloway, and this time spent a very enjoyable afternoon at their beach. Eli and Scott played in the sand and built a sand wall -- notice how Eli is sticking his tongue out to concentrate. :)




Eli also had a ball playing at the playground right next to the beach.




And, of course, we played and cooled off in the water.





We woke up Thursday morning and took it easy. We decided it was best to let Eli sleep in the tent for his nap after the rocky first attempt at his nap the day before. And, unfortunately, we woke up to an ant infestation in our tent. So, we moved over one camp site, and spent the rest of the morning playing and relaxing. After Eli woke up from his nap we went to Liberty Bell Pool. It's a part of FDR State Park and it was built by the CCC in the 30's. It's huge.




Eli enjoyed swimming and playing in the pool, but the biggest hit of the day was actually the Foos Ball Table at the pool. Who would've thought?



The next day was the Fourth of July and Scott's parents decided to come visit our camp site and go to Calloway with us for the day. First they treated us to lunch and we went to Calloway's Country Kitchen, which is always yummy. Right when we parked the car, Eli started talking about last time playing the pole game with Ba-Pa. It's so funny what he remembers. But, we told him that if he wanted to play he'd have to ask Ba-Pa. We didn't want to attempt to hold him up and slide him down the pole. If Ba-Pa invented it, it was all him.




We also took our annual picture in front of the frame(?). It's so funny, I'm posting last year's picture before this year's and I noticed that Scott and I are almost wearing the same thing that we did last year, too weird.





When we arrived at Calloway it was a zoo, busier by far than I've ever seen it, and we were caught in the middle of a huge deluge. We all got soaked, but that didn't dampen anyone's spirits, in fact, it wet down all the sand, which made it better to play with. Eli had a great time burying himself in the sand and playing "sand monster."