This past weekend, T and I took off for a weekend of us. No kids, just us and the dog! We don’t do this all too often, but we try to do it a couple times a summer at least when we can camp. You can read about the times we did this last summer at:
Our Amana Excursion and Doing Nothing
This trip actually started off kind of as a challenge. The weekend before we had been camping with the boys and discussing the 4th of July weekend and T mentioned that he wished we could go camping somewhere because we were both lucky enough to have Friday off…well, I told him tht there was no way he was going to find a spot only 5 days out from the big weekend…challenge accepted by T and successfully completed. He booked us spots for Friday & Saturday night at the Lost Island KOA in Waterloo, Iowa.
We very much enjoy camping at KOA campgrounds
specifically for their “full hook-up” amenities. (For all you non-camping types, this means you get direct water and sewer connections to your camper, so no having to store either one of those items in your rig! Very handy and it makes for much easier traveling.) Most KOA’s also provide free WiFi, cable TV, and lots of activities. While, the Waterloo KOA provided all of those things, I’m going to be perfectly honest and say that we didn’t partake in most of them. We were focused on doing what we love doing when it’s just us…nothing!
And, that’s just what we did. We spent a lot of time talking, reading (ok, I did the reading), walking around, listening to music, and just being together. We also did one of our favorite things to do when we camp..experiment with food over the campfire. Interestingly enough when we picked M up from his moms today, he wanted to know what we had for breakfast, so…here it is
We love BIG breakfasts over the fire and as one Tweep said, “Everything just tastes better over the fire” and she’s right! The bacon is fried in our cast iron fry pan over the fire (and yes, we build a fire to cook every meal…no grills at our campsite), then the majority of the bacon grease is dumped out to fry the eggs and hash-brown patties. The cinnamon rolls are from a tube and we cook those in our Tonka Toaster. (I don’t know if that’s it’s technical name, but it’s what we call it). Also known a lot of times as a campfire toaster. It was all so delicious and it keeps us full almost all day!
Saturday evening we experimented with some foods: grilled chicken (a whole one) and homemade onion rings & fried green beans!
I’d like to report that the chicken wasn’t near as good as it looks. It needed to cook quite awhile longer to get tender, but we were anxious! The onion rings & green beans were good! The batter I used (a box mix) reminded me a lot of Long John Silvers batter and we ended up having to add some of our favorite seasoning to give it some upmf, but…they were tasty! Next time, I’m trying my own batter! I also cooked some garden fresh green beans in a foil packet and those were amazing!
Don’t worry, Ms. Nike didn’t starve either. She had plenty of sneaks of human food (that’s T’s doing), but the KOA staff at Waterloo had these awesome goodie bags for dog owners when we arrived and she was very appreciative of the treats!
Overall, we had a great weekend focused on each other and food. Just how we like it! 😉 And, our stay at the Waterloo/Lost Island KOA was so good, we’ve already made our reservations to take the boys later this summer, so stay tuned for that review after that trip!
Sounds like a fun trip!
It was! I’m happy to say that as long as we’re together…it’s always fun!
Perfect getaway and how sweet they give doggie bags when you come. That is actually brilliant on their part because I bet they had little “waste” bags in there, right? That campground is thinking! The onion rings look pretty amazing.
I thought it was pretty cool too and yes, there were 2 doggie bones, a bag, & a pair of gloves! Very much appreciated! I’m excited to take the boys back for more greatness later!