Yosemite Valley – Bell Tent Camping Trip

A couple weekends ago, the boy and I took a few days away to go sleep under the stars, throw some food on a fire and explore a new place. We’ve been wanting to take advantage of the beauty of California now that we live here and this trip was perfect. Big shout out to AirBnB for the awesome weekend accommodations! We found our “deluxe” tent on their site.

I haven’t ever done real camping prior to this trip. In Hawaii, my mom would rent cabins along the beach for a week or two in the summer and we would call it camping. But we had beds, running water, showers, an oven and a fridge…. so yeah, not really camping! But this was camping! And I kind of fell in love with it. Sure it was hot and we were covered in dirt and dust, smelled awful, and packed way too much food – but I still loved every second. When we got home, I spent 5 hours researching tents, camp cookware, simple camp recipes and camp dog gear online. I had so many tabs open at one point I decided to start a Pinterest board.

And of course, we brought along the puppy! She can be kind of a diva so we weren’t sure how she’d do. Turns out we had nothing to worry about! Our girl does GREAT in the wilderness! She immediately understood this was our space, and spent most of the weekend protecting it and us from the elements, including ants, grasshoppers, and scary sounds from the trees. She even did great with the howling coyotes at night while I tried not to have a panic attack.

And after all that fun, we’ve already booked our next trip! We’ll be heading up towards Big Sur in a park just south of the Los Padres National Forest in September. It’s going to be fantastic!