Getting the kids motivated to take them away for camping trips, can easily turn many people off camping with the family. Kids tend to have shorter attention spans, and a mountain of excess energy, to an inexperienced camper might seem difficult to both keep them focused and interested in coming away with you!

We have a handful of golden rules to making sure the young ones have an epic time away with you that they can brag about at show and tell when they get back to school!

1.Be encouraging

Now days it seems that many kids seem to want to spend more time on their digital devices than enjoying the moment immediately in front of them, this is usually because they feel like their contributions aren’t exactly valuable, the feeling of making a valuable contribution can be an extreme motivator for kiddies and will make them feel as if they are an essential part of your camping group.

The best way to encourage their participation in the camping life is to give them a responsibility when setting up and to offer them the reward of free time when all of the important jobs are done.

We love the Adventure Kings 10W Solar panel for keeping all of our USB devices fully charged up, then when it’s time for the young ones to zone out, one of these will easily keep any USB powered device fully charged as long as there is sunlight!

2. Give the trip meaning!

 By bringing the kids along you can make setting up camp a much simpler task, by taking on a self-appointed role of campsite leader and delegating all of the meaningful tasks, you not only reduce your workload but also give the kids something to be proud of when camp has been set up.

Responsibilities like collecting firewood, preparing food, taking care of the washing up, and even lighting the fire (supervised of course) can give your kids stacks of confidence when they are back ‘in the real world’, and by giving them life skills like being able to unroll your Adventure Kings Awning and setup their own Adventure Kings Kwiky Single Swag on their own, they will appreciate the simple things in life just that bit much more!

3.Keep it fun and not a chore!

W’eve said before that kids have short attention spans, really we all do, so if all you do is sit around the campsite and sink beers, the kids attention span will dissolve and they will get incredibly restless. By letting them choose some fun activities that the group is doing they will feel 100% responsible for the amount of fun they have and will also give you a bit of insight into their personality and where their interests at camp lay!

It is also important to let them muck around a little bit, in a safe way, if you are too strict at camp you’ll suck a bit of the fun out of heading out camping and they are kids after all and their creativity is something you should learn to enjoy!

When planning activities you can do with your kids, one of the most overlooked activities is food preparation and cooking, it seems like a pretty ordinary task, but by giving your kids lots of small jobs they will learn the processes involved in cooking and eventually will be able to cook for themselves.

4. Cook up a storm!

Our favorite recipe for kids to try is cooking up some bite sizes damper buns, the recipe is simple enough.

Take a large bowl and mix up 3x cups of self-raising flour, a pinch of salt, create a small well in the middle and gradually add a cup of chilled milk (from your Adventure Kings 60L Fridge Freezer) till you have a thick dough that resembles playdough.

Our favourite way to cook our damper buns is one of the most fun with kids, if you tear off a handful of your dough mixture and wrap it around the end of a clean stick that is around arm’s length, and by making a bulb on the end of the stick you cook your damper by sitting it over the coals of your fire, and provide yourself with a small pocket inside to fill with Golden Syrup or a few squares of milk chocolate, making a perfect desert for the kids that costs practically nothing and will put smiles on all their faces!  

With a few tips and tricks you can make the kids time away much more enjoyable and make memories that’ll last for an entire lifetime – don’t hesitate to grab the kids and getaway for the long weekend thanks to a bit of creativity and your Adventure Kings camping setup

To get a great idea about the range of gear available for the perfect campsite, head to www.4WDSupacentre.com.au call our experts on 1800 88 39 64 or drop into one of our fully equipped showrooms to see the range in person and head home with a cracking bargain to make the kids escape that much more fun and memorable!