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First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - Mike - 04-01-2018
I have been a Dad know for 6 years. I have a daughter how is 6 and a son who is 4. I have loved back packing and camping my entire life. For the last 6 years I have been camping with my kids ,who I love, attached to my truck like a imbilical cord. I took my daughter out back packing once wen she was small and it went fine. My bag was heavy and then I ended up piggy backing her as well. It was rough. So trying that with two kids was out of the questing, until I discovered goats. I was watching youtube on fly fishing with kids one day and came across a video of a family packing there kids up to a high mountain lake to do some fishing. To move all the kids stuff the parents had rented pack goats. What a sweet idea, I was hooking!!! That was around Aug or Sept of last year. I know have 3 good sized goats with 3 set of panniers. My kids and I have put alot of hours in training and getting everyone working of the same sheet of music. We are not a well oiled machine yet but we are well on our way!!! So this last Thursday we decided to put our hard work to the test.
The plan was initially that I would get off work on Wensday morning, weigh and pack all the gear and get the food all bought. So on Thursday I could have everything ready to go, goats loaded and son dressed so I could pick her up right at school at 3:30 and be on the trail by 4:15. Well while I was at work my daughter got invited to a Easter Egg painting party on Thursday after school. I pritty much cancelled the trip.at that point. I was not a big deal because the weather report was looming crappy anyway. Then Thursday role around and the weather is awesome. So I real quick that morning weigh and pack eveything, whip.up.some pancake mix, and make the filling for a egg quiche for dinner (my kids love "egg pie"). So everything is prepped. Well at 530 in the evening my daughter gets home. This is the beginning of the evening adventure. So she has to change, then we have to put the goats in the truck. Then I realize I forgot to get a pie crust for the quiche. So that a stop by Fred Meyer with 2 small kids. Now we start the 50 minute drive to the trail. Since it is know peak traffic we get stuck in that. Time and day light are not stopping for us!!! We finally get on to Ft.Lewis and onto the tank trail. As we are driving to tbe trail we pass a FOB (Forward Operating Base) that has triple stand wire and defensive fighting positions dug in. What that means to me is there is going to be atleast one or two ambushes on that base throught the night and they are just on the other side of the pond we are going to be camping on. So we finally get to where we are going to park the truck. We get all the goats saddles, and all the back packs on the kids and we start moving out. At this point we are really racing the end of day light. We are almost to te camp s8ght and it is just barely dark and then it happens. Ambush number 1. We are talking full meal deal. Blank M4, SAWS, 240B, M2 and artilary simulators. My daughter totally lost it. It really scared her. My son was ok, and tbe goats where also fine. I really had to take a second and explant to.her what was going on. So.we keep moving and finally reach our camp sight. Now the pan there was to sleep in a A frame shelter some one else had made and had been there for atleast 6 months. The kids where really exited to sleep in it. Well some one else had been there prior to use. The camp sight was trashed and the shelter had been burned in the fire pit. So now both kids are crying because it is know dark, we dont have fire, there is trash every where, we have no shelter and we did not bring a tent. So again I talked then of the ledge. I had brought two large tarps with us. One for the goats and the other to put over the existing shelter incase it sprinkled. So I started a fire, got everyones headlamps out, gave them both cheese sticks and sat them on a log. Luckily the dumb asses who destroyed the camp left the ridge pole up for the existing shelter. I judt through one of the tarps over that and steaked out the corners. I put a ground cloth down and the kids sleep pads on it. The kids came over and where very exited to stay in there new "Fort". Next issue- Dinner is a egg quiche that takes 45 minutes to cook in my dutch over. Well it is know about 9:30pm and on a late night my kids go to bed at 8pm. So I fed them both a apple sause, a yogurt, and another cheese stick. My son ,who is 4, gave up and put himself to bed at 10pm. My daughter , 6, almost made it, but she knocked out at about 1015. So at 1030 I had egg quiche by my self. So since I was the only one up I put a tarp for the goats and put the food up in a tree and went to bed. Luckily the FOB across the pod stayed quite for the rest of the night, and nothing triex to eat the goats of the left over quiche. The next day went more normally. I was able to reheat the quiche which the kids murdered, then I made the the chocalate chip pancakes. The murdered those also along with hot chocolates. Really good morning!!! My kids and I ended up picking up.8 pounds of trash i the camp sight and sorounding area. We packex up are camp around noon and got back to our house around 1:30, 2:00 pm. The trip.was a whirl wind but it was a blast. I was really proud ok my kids ability to adapt to less that awesome sercumstances. My goats did well also. I packed them all at 20% of there body weight and we had more than enough pounds to get our gear in. I even packed my son a daughter at 20%. Everyone killed it!!
RE: First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - Mike - 04-01-2018
I wanted to add some more picks to my last post.
RE: First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - Nanno - 04-01-2018
This story is both awesome and hilarious! Congrats on your first successful goatpacking trip with your kids! Sounds like you all did great despite everything "going wrong". I'm glad it didn't pour down rain. Too bad the previous campers trashed the campsite. What a shame. Awesome that you guys were able to clean it all up though! Thanks so much for sharing your adventures!
RE: First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - Mike - 04-01-2018
Nanno,
Your not kidding about the rain. I was checking the weather channel every half hour before we left. The weather is so unveliable this time of year in Western Washington. I am not going to lie to you if it had started to down pour the goats, kids and I would jave been sharing one occupancy.
Its kinda fun when everthing goes of of the rails. It teaches the kids resourcfulness and resiliance.
Happy Easter
RE: First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - blackie's maiden - 07-28-2018
Thanks for your "Good, Bad, and Ugly" account. Hubby and I in our 70' s are just starting this goat packing/hiking thing as totally green "pansies". Your.story gives hope that in our second childhood, we "kids" can rise to the challenges too.
RE: First Pack Goat trip with kids turned out great in the end! - Mike - 07-30-2018
(07-28-2018, 02:54 PM)blackie Wrote: Thanks for your "Good, Bad, and Ugly" account. Hubby and I in our 70' s are just starting this goat packing/hiking thing as totally green "pansies". Your.story gives hope that in our second childhood, we "kids" can rise to the challenges too.
Well at a some point we where all Green at everything. Goat packing is pritty easy. Being educated and prepared will make life much easier. Marc Warnke is a great resource. He is on youtube and has a web sight packgoats.com. Being on this web sight is also a step in the right direction. If you ever have a question just post it and if anyone can help they will. Good luck.