Cultural Differences in Camping

We started the day off early, 6 am to be exact. Even though our camping trip was only 2 days long, the car was packed to capacity. The kids each had their own backpack filled with books and toys to make the 2 hour drive more enjoyable for them and for us. We met our camping companions at about 7:30: Mhkitar,  a local that climbs with Jared, and Mhkitar's Uncle, Aunt,  their 2 kids and another cousin, all from Belgium visiting Armenia for the first time. Because space was tight in their rented Lada Niva (a small 2 door, 4X4 car), Mhkitar asked to ride with us. Of course we acquiesced his request and I moved into the backseat with the kids. The next 2 hours were spent getting bruised ribs from Ava's car-seat knocking into me with every pothole we hit, trying not to throw up my breakfast with car sickness, and managing piles of toys and books on my lap. This task proved to be difficult with the winding road and the aforementioned potholes, but was nonetheless VERY important, for if Ava accidently touched one of Van's things, or vice versa, I turned into referee for the ensuing argument.

Upon arriving at Noravank canyon Mhkitar told us to pull over and showed Jared a multi-pitch climb he wanted to do.... right then... BEFORE "wasting time" setting up a camp spot. I stood, looking at the busy street and the river across it and was not super excited about the prospect of entertaining kids in such a  place, but Jared and I figured the kids could spend a few minutes stretching their legs and throwing rocks in the river. So Jared pulled out all our camping stuff  (tents, sleeping bags, duffle bags & food) in order to get to his climbing gear which was conveniently packed at the bottom. After re-packing the car they started up the cliff around 11. We had fun for the first hour or so. Van lost a shoe in the river, which I was able to rescue downstream, Ava fell and scraped her knee and they were both covered with a fine brown soot-like dirt from head to toe. To make the day even better add on top an awkward serving of language-barrier with people we had just met. Then the sun came out. Now we had a lot of things to talk about, such as how hungry Ava was, how hot Van was, how the sweat made Ava's ams itch and how cute it was that her tears streaked her dirty face. After another half hour of that, Mhkitars' family found their way to a different part of the road and communication efforts were halted. Finally by a quarter to 1 Jared reached the ground and was met with a hot, frazzled family. After re-packing the car for the second time our friends told us they would like to visit the Noravank Monastery. We conveyed that our kids were hungry and wanted to set up camp so that they would be more comfortable. Mhkitar assured us there was a great, shaddy picnic area he would take us to. Placated, we climbed into the car, and followed his directions. But we did not end up at a great shady picnic area. Instead we ended up at the Monastery.  Hmm that was weird. While the family explored the spacious grounds of the Monastery our kids hung out in the shade and talked about what they wanted to eat first. Ava wanted a peach - whole, not cut up; Van wanted a juice box.

After another hour we were close to having a car picnic. The kids had eaten nothing since the early morning we left our house, and it was now nearing 2 o'clock. As we were heading back to the car, Mhkitar's uncle spotted the little souvenir shop and suggested we all stop in for an ice cream. That was the first good idea I had heard all day! So we ate dessert before lunch and it never tasted so good!! After stopping at 3 different places we finally found a place with some shade where we could eat lunch. We were much happier once we had full bellies! At this point it was after 3. Mhkitar wanted to climb more, but we insisted that we needed to get camp up. So after some convincing we left Noravank Canyon and headed back to Hell's Canyon. Once there, things improved dramatically. We put up the tent, unpacked the bags and finally found our snacky foods. There was plenty of room for the kids to run, rocks to throw and sticks to break. The sun was hidden behind the facing cliff, so the flat was cool and comfortable. After a long, hot, frustrating day it was great to be able to relax and run around with Van & Ava. 

Around 7:30 the kids were wanting dinner. We packed tin foil dinners, so we knew we had to start the fire so that the we had coals to cook our dinner on. Well cultural differences came to play again. Armenians don't eat dinner until "evening," which means roughly about the time the sun goes down. Um, the sun doesn't go down here until after 9:30. With rough calculations, that meant eating around 10:30 by the time the coals were ready. Yeah, not happening. Jared tried to explain that the kids needed to eat before that, but we don't think that they quite understood, because they looked very confused when we started to prepare our dinners. But in the end it turned out fine, and the kids were all taken care of.  After dinner, there was climbing by headlamp. 

(Ava and her bum crack, watching the climbing)   

Of course no camping trip would be complete without smores! Mhkitar did not care for the smores, neither did his Uncle or Aunt. Their kids however thought they were quite tasty! 

Ava and Van had no problem falling asleep. They were really excited to sleep in the tent!

And they woke up happy the next morning!!!

After waking up we managed to get in some climbing. Even I managed to pull myself to the top of a 5.8!

 

Van's favorite thing of the whole trip was discovering that there were frogs in the stream!! He spent the rest of the morning doing catch and release, although I think the "release" was more of the frogs doing than his. 

This is the frog he named "Banana." He was heartbroken when Banana released himself.

All-in-all we had a really good time.