It’s vacation time, and I wanted to take Corinne out for a short canoe camping overnight trip.

Weather had changed for the worse in the last couple of weeks, and there where no more days of 30°C and endless sun. Now the days where filled with clouds, and the temperature rarely exceeded 20°C.

My plan was to drive to Asa, north of Växjö, and paddle for the day in Asasjön and then look for a camp for the night. I planned to start at a camp site that I had found when I hiked Sigfridsleden last year. I drove up pretty early, and we arrived before noon.

Unfortunately this day proved to be really windy. It had been windy in Växjö too, but when I arrived to the lake I realized that I wouldn’t want to paddle with Corinne in those conditions. The waves where pretty high, and the gusts would mean a lot of work to get the canoe to go straight while paddling solo.

I decided to set up a base camp at the camping grounds instead, make short trips on foot in the nearby area, and if the wind died down, paddle a bit later in the afternoon/evening.

We found a nice spot a bit away from the structures on the camp site, where the tent was hidden from the camp site by young trees and bushes. We set up the tent, and this was the first time I used my Tentipi Olivin with an inner.

Once I had the tent up I saw that I had gotten the lines to the top vent tangled when I strapped the inner to the tent, and it took some effort to get it right. My plan at first was to use the inner when I’m camping with Corinne, and only the fly and perhaps a bivy when I’m camping solo. But the top vent adjustment makes the process of adding the inner a very tedious process, and now I think I’ll just leave it as it is.

When the tent was up, and our sleeping gear was unpacked, I put up the hammock closer to the water. But the wind made the hammock act like a sail every time we left it, so I had to unhook it in one end and put it back in the back every time, to not risk damage from the strong gusts.

We fried a few sausages for lunch, and then hung out in the hammock for a while. It was quite cold, and the wind made it even worse. We had our puffy jackets and wind jackets on. It didn’t look like we where going to be able to paddle today.

We started to explore and old trail that followed the shore south from the camping grounds. Sigfridsleden now follows the road away from the place, but I think the overgrown trail is a remnant of the old Sigfridsleden. We crossed a broken down old bridge over a little stream, and came to a nice open area where we sat by the lake for a while, and Corinne passed time by throwing pine cones into the lake.

After a while we hiked back, but stopped once in a while to eat blueberries and wild strawberries that grew at the sides of the trail.

The rest of the day continued with a lot of hammock time, and we both fell asleep in the hammock on one occasion. During the evening we hiked along the shore north of the camping ground, and came to the place where I had camped before a couple of times, and the place where I had my first solo camping.

When we came back to our camp we made dinner by the lake, hung out in the hammock and eventually went inside to go to sleep. Corinne was too exited to sleep though, and didn’t fall asleep until after 22.30.

I’ve been using different types of floorless shelters for over a year now, and have gotten used to it. But I have to say that an inner really adds to a cozy feeling, and it’s nice to get the added wind block in conditions like these. I really don’t like how much weight it adds, but I think I can get used to having an inner. The problem I did see though, with a tipi-style tent, is that there isn’t a vestibule to cook in when it rains. But I think I could just unbuckle the inner on the two sides of the door and move the inner back to get a vestibule for cooking in bad conditions.

The next morning we woke up, had breakfast and then packed up. I hadn’t even unstrapped the canoe from the car roof.

Despite us not being able to paddle anything I was happy with the trip. It’s always nice to get out and to get a night in a tent. Corinne loves the outdoors, and I feel that this is a really good way to bond with the kids, without a lot of distractions.