Camping is something I have done every year for as long as I can remember, with the exception of the past 3 years while I've been in Virginia. Now that I'm back in NY, I'm looking forward to getting back to it this summer...if Corona lets us have a summer that is. Sitting around a campfire telling silly or scary stories while the stars shimmer in the billions above us in a black velvet sky. I'm craving it. Every time I'm out on a delivery and I smell the unmistakable aroma of burning wood wafting through the air (which is ridiculously often actually) I just stop in my tracks and close my eyes for a minute letting memories come back to me in waves. Ugh. I love it. If you could make that exact smell into a candle or a spray or something, I'd buy it all up. I want to snuggle up in a hoodie or blanket that's been blasted with smoke from the fire and just breathe it in. Soaking up the warmth and the comfort that the smell brings me.
When I was young we used to have an array of campgrounds we would go to. Fun ones like Holiday Hill are especially well remembered by me because as a child those were my favorite. We camped in a pop-up camper and I would get to bring a friend because the dining area converted into a third bed. Holiday Hill had (I assume still has, but I haven't been in a while) dance nights in their picnic pavilion, a little arcade and store to buy candy and camping stuff, hay rides, a Christmas in July celebration, a swimming pool, and an amazing playground! I have a lot of great memories of this place, and a lot of silly memories, like the scrunchie system the pool had when there was too many people. They would let a certain number of people in at a time and when your color scrunchie was called, it was your groups turn to swim! There was also the time a tornado passed pretty close by. I still remember the storm that night and the eerie quiet right after all the animals freaked out. So wild.
Watkins Glen was another place we frequented, getting to walk the glen nearby and check out the small town and its shops. Camping deep in the woods was always a neat experience too. We camped in the "woods" at Holiday Hill, but it was not deep in and it never truly felt like the woods if that makes sense? The smell of dewy leaves, grass, and trees and the feeling of the crisp air the minute you'd unzip your windows in the morning was so refreshing and earthy and just made me ready to get up, throw on a hoodie, eat cereal from our little foam bowls, and drink hot cocoa. Hoestly I don't remember much about Watkins Glen and camping there. I know my cousin Tommy came with us one time, we celebrated my cousin Lauren's birthday there once, I got Nanook the Husky beanie baby from one of the shops and wasn't allowed to have him til Christmas, and the one time my uncle said something to the cop at the pool that wasn't so smart (though I can't remember now what it was, I just remember it being a funny story).
But my absolute favorite place, hands down, is the 1000 Islands. I have so many amazing memories from here, and at one point we just stopped going anywhere else and would go here 3-5 times a summer. Keewaydin is the one with the pools, huge Olympic sized pools which is nice if you want a break from swimming in the St. Lawrence....and actually I don't think there's any places to easily access the water from Keewaydin. Which is probably why they have the pool at all. Huh. This is also the place where we had to get my second cousin Devin out of the water after he fell in, where that one kid asked if we wanted to go to his haunted house (in the middle of summer, yeah okay dude), and where they have this cute little gazebo right on the water where we used to bring cards or just sit on the rock ledge and look at the water. You can also see the 1000 Islands bridge in the distance from that gazebo! This campground is also where all the big boats seem to go by constantly.
Kring's Point is my mom's favorite of the 1000 Islands camping spots and the site she always gets is basically right on the water. Its a hard spot to get every year because of its prime location, but she has the system down and had gotten it every year for at least one week for the past I don't know, 5 years or so maybe? Its honestly the best site on the grounds, so close to the water that its actually underwater right now after the river rose from heavy rains this past year. Which is very sad though. Before that, it was so peaceful to wake up or fall asleep to the lapping waves on the rocks. There's also a little store on the campground where they sell the best jerky, firewood, and some other camping odds and ends and a walking path that goes over a bridge and onto a little adjacent island. This was where we had seaweed wars and climbed huge rocks near our first few campsite trials with my cousins and aunt and uncle.
My personal favorite place though is Wellesley Island, still in the 1000 Islands region. I'm not entirely sure why I love it so much, but I do. The campsites that are absolutely amazing are numerous, there's a nature center with hiking trails, and a lot of great family memories. I think this is the place we used to always go, besides Keewaydin, when we first started coming here. Its where my sister fell and busted her lip on a picnic table, its where we used to camp at this one spot that you had to climb down a rock path to get to your own little private water spot, its where my dad sat in butter and buttered his buns, where the people with the glowing green eyes story was born, where we listened to one way cell phone conversations on our scanner, where one year was infested with bees and the next mosquitoes, where we "met" Ricky the raccoon and he got into our coolers, where I made so many unforgettable memories with my family. These were especially important when my cousins moved away and camping was the only time we'd see them. When the cousins and I went back to camp on our own, it was Wellesley that we went back to.
Camping is just a way to get out in nature, ignore your normal responsibilities, and feel really free. Especially as a kid. We roamed anywhere we wanted basically and even got lost one time- oops! Don't worry, we found our way back pretty quickly. It was a time of barefeet, tank tops, scraped knees, looking for minnows in the shallow pool, avoiding zebra mussels in the water, playing Frisbee or throwing the Nerf ball around, and just spending quality time with my family. Even has a teenager, when I hated everything (like most teens seem to) I loved going camping. If being outdoors is something you're into, I highly recommend getting into camping if you're not already.
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