When we pulled into our site at Myakka River State Park at 2:15 on Saturday, the camper was already up. A white pop-up sat level on the pad with both bed ends out, the steps down and the awning open, and a man in a red ball cap was sitting in a camp chair next to it, reading a paperback. That was Gary. The first thing he said to us, before hello, was "Don't touch the crank until I show you."
The walk-through
Gary is a retired firefighter from Venice, and he walked us through his 2015 Coachmen Clipper the way I imagine he used to walk new recruits through a fire truck. It took 35 minutes. The one bad review on his listing said he talks a lot. It was right, and every word was useful:
- How the crank raises and lowers the roof, and why you never crank with the bed ends still out.
- How the bed ends slide out and what holds them up.
- The propane, the stove, the little fridge and how the furnace works if we needed it.
- Where the water hose connects and how to tell how much fresh water is left.
- What he'd check every morning if he were us: canvas, latches, anything dripping.
Then he drove off and said he'd be back Tuesday at 11. Maya took notes the whole time in the back of her nature journal, which turned out to matter.
Shade, bugs, bathroom, and gators
Our site had good shade from live oaks, a few mosquitoes at dusk and a bathhouse with hot showers a short walk away. Three for three, which almost never happens. The new screen shelter went up for the first time at a real campsite on Saturday evening, and we ate the chili I'd frozen the week before inside it, by lantern light, with nobody slapping anything.
The gators were what the kids talked about all weekend. Myakka has them everywhere: in the river, along the banks, on the edges of the lake. On Saturday evening we walked to the bridge where the park road crosses the river, and Maya counted 23 alligators between the bridge and the bend, most of them floating with only their eyes and nostrils above the water. We gave the kids our usual talk about staying well back from the water's edge. Nico repeated it back to us word for word, then asked if he could get "just a little closer." He could not.
The canopy walkway and the lake
Sunday morning we went up the canopy walkway, a narrow suspension bridge strung through the tops of the oaks and palms, with a tall tower at one end that climbs above the trees. The bridge sways when you walk on it. Nico walked straight down the middle with his arms out like a tightrope walker. I held the rail the whole way and told everyone I was "checking it." From the top of the tower, the marsh spread out flat under a pale November sky, with a line of white birds working along the edge of the lake.
On Monday we took the boat tour on Upper Myakka Lake, $62 for the four of us. It was about an hour on a big, slow boat with a guide who pointed out gators, herons, wood storks and a pair of roseate spoonbills that made Maya grab my arm. We ate lunch at the park cafe afterward, $38 for four, more than I'd budgeted and less than a hungry, cranky family would have cost me any other way.
Our first nights off the ground
This was the real test, so here's the honest version. Dana slept better than on any camping trip we've ever taken. She credited the mattress and the fact that nobody's knee was in her back. The kids had their own bed end, with Maya reading by headlamp until 9:30 and Nico asleep in about ten minutes, a record for him in any bed, anywhere.
I learned what a bed end really is: a mattress in a canvas tent hanging off the side of a box. When it dropped to 54 on Sunday night, the canvas over our heads got cold, and the warm air from four people breathing turned into condensation on the inside of it. I'd left the zip-down window covers open, and at about 4 a.m. a drop of water landed square on Dana's forehead. Maya's notes from Gary said "close window flaps if cold." She had underlined it. I hadn't read it.
Gary was back on Tuesday at 11 sharp. He folded the camper down in about 20 minutes, looking over each side of the canvas as it went in, and told the kids they'd been good tenants. Somewhere on Alligator Alley on the way home, Dana was quiet for a long stretch and then said, "I could get used to the not-on-the-ground part." That's as far as she went. The money side of the trip, all $876 of it, gets its own post.
