Our third trial at camping with small children took place in the last few days – and we’re pleased to report that now they are both a little older it is starting to work pretty well. Having seriously considered a range of Dept of Conservation campsites (which are located in stunning places but don’t come equipped with playparks, jumping pillows and ice cream stores), we ended up taking the easy option and drove up the coast to a very lovely holiday park at Paekakariki instead.
Cheating, I know, but it made life much easier!
Paekakariki was a major US Marine base during WWII and I believe there were over 20,000 Americans stationed there for training and recreation purposes. It’s hard to envision now, as these days it’s just a very sleepy, little coastal town (with a population of less than 2,000).
We had an incredibly lazy time, the hardest work being the 15 minutes required to put up the tent. Other than that, we played tag on the beach, had coffee at one of the best cafes in NZ, hung out at the play park, visited Pizza Hut for dinner (aaagggh, yes really, we did), and read lots of books and magazines.
At night the kids were allowed to stay up late and take their scooters out around the holiday park and go on the jumping pillow – oh ,what fun they had! (Oh ok, ok, so did we!)
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ReplyDeleteI think holiday parks are great - and certainly easier than DoC campsites when you have kids! Either way you're braver than me, I dont know if I could manage a tent quite yet with our kids.
We'll be testing out a DoC site next time - they are in beautiful spots, but I think we need to wait a bit longer before we go!
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