Tents for adult campers, too

Most of Amber’s friends and many of mine said they were surprised to hear we intended to spend the better part of a week camping in a tent.

I was surprised myself when Amber first suggested the trip.

Sleeping under canvas — or its modern equivalent — was not a new concept.

Both of us had been enthusiastic tent campers as teenagers, and we continued to enjoy the back-to-basics approach to outdoor shelter after we got married and started a family.

Why did we stop camping in tents more than 30 years ago?

I give full credit to a windless 100-degree weekend in August 1973 at Stockton Lake.

By the end of campout, I had sworn to purchase a mini-motorhome. I did and that was that.

Well, almost that. Amber insists we went camping in a tent together once in the early 1980s.

Her no-doubt-accurate memory of that occasion includes us spending a night huddled in our tent, enduring a gully washer.

I never parted with our tent, stove, lantern, garage-sale cookware or various other camping necessities.

I rationalized that that mound of gear didn’t take up too much room in the garage, and I might want to use it someday either by myself or with one of the kids.

I addressed the task of finding a destination both of us would enjoy.

My search, which was short considering the hundreds of possibilities, ended when I discovered Taum Sauk Mountain (Missouri’s highest point) and the Johnson Shut-ins, which are within hiking distance of each other. Plus, Elephant Rocks State Park is only a short drive away.

Since neither of us had ever seen what a brochure described as “Missouri’s three most beautiful state parks,” they were a natural focal point for our adventure.

There’s a campground within Taum Sauk Mountain State Park (the campground within Johnson Shut-ins State Park should reopen sometime in 2010), but never let  that keep you from pitching a tent anywhere that has ready access to fishing, hunting or both.

Facilities at the federally administered Council Bluff Lake Recreation Area, which is located in the Mark Twain National Forest a few miles south of Potosi, include both Wild Boar Campground and the area’s namesake lake.

Based on my extensive, albeit decades-removed experience with U.S. Forest Service campgrounds, I was confident Wild Boar would be tent-friendly.

I was so confident that I made an online reservation to secure the campsite a line-drawing map of the campground indicated was closest to the water.

On June 15, our planned departure date finally arrived. If you were in Sedalia that morning, you may recall more than 2 inches of rain falling between daylight and noon. We got under way only an hour behind what was, by my standards, a loose schedule.

Our campsite proved to be more secluded and more beautiful than I’d dare hope.

By the time we had camp set up and had enjoyed a cool drink, the forest had so beguiled me that I decided launching the boat could wait until morning.

“Now,” I said to myself as much as to Amber, “I know why I used to love this so much.”

I was roused from sleep by a combination of thunder, wind and rain long before daylight the following morning.

Our air mattresses did a good job of keeping us above the worst of the water sloshing through the tent.

It didn’t rain any more after that, but then it didn’t need to.

Technically, daytime temperatures the rest of the week didn’t crack the century mark as they had during the previously mentioned Stockton trip, but they did rise into the mid-90s. That was close enough to qualify for what Yogi Berra once called “deja vu all over again.”

I know it sounds like what I’ve just described wouldn’t rekindle any adult’s camping fever. That’s not the case. We so thoroughly enjoyed our week in the woods that we’re already planning future outings as tent campers.

All three of the state parks I mentioned in this column are well worth the time and effort it takes to explore them thoroughly. However,  I’d like to pass along this word of warning: If the sign at the trail head describes the upcoming hike as “rugged,” it probably is.