Tense Moments at Barrett Cove

After leaving our one-night stop-over in Vacaville and saying “goodbye for now” to family, we headed further inland to an even more random and remote spot.

Yosemite National Park graced the top of the must-see list ever since our early planning days. If you’ve ever been there, you’ll know that it is not easy to get to, but it’s totally worth the hassle. Staying in the park was not an option given the length of the RV and the fact that there is notoriously zero cell service in the area.

Instead, I found a state recreation area, like a state park, that was about two hours West of Yosemite, where we could stay for the week. I also booked us a canvas tent in the park for two nights at the end of the week. I figured we could bookend our Yosemite adventure by staying at Barrett Cove Recreation Area and leave the RV there while we traveled to Yosemite and back. Yosemite was so great it deserves its own post. But Barrett Cove, oooo boy, let me tell you. It had great reviews online (you see where this is going…), but I’m still trying to figure out its appeal.

First of all, we lost cell service about 5 miles from the campground. Perfect start, right? We arrived in the late afternoon on a Sunday after driving a good 2 hours from anything remotely resembling a city. If we got to Barrett Cove and realized we had no cell service so Alex couldn’t work, we would be SOL. Cue my breath starting to shorten.

We pull in and the ranger at the gate says, “oh good, you’re the ones I was waiting for.” As in, we were the last campers she was expecting that evening, or maybe even that day! We didn’t think much of it at the time, but it soon made sense.

This campground is humongous. There is loop after loop after loop after loop packed with sites. Something like loop A through loop M, each with at least 10 sites spread around the rim. Our site was in loop C, which we soon learned was only accessible by way of the sign for loop D. It didn’t make sense. Without the map that we asked for last minute, we would have driven around and around the campground trying to piece it together and trying not to get stuck.

We started up a ginormous hill and I quickly got turned around, misread the map, and directed Alex to turn down the first loop we saw. It was immediately clear that we were not in the right place. The sites were too small and the road too short and narrow. There was no turn around, so Alex (starting to show his frustration at this point) maneuvered backward and forward, backward and forward, tilting the RV only slightly over the edge of a ridge, and managed to turn us around and aim us back up the hill.

When we were almost to the very top of the hill, we looked around at the other loops below and beside us and realized that we had yet to see another person or vehicle. Not one. The place was completely empty. Despite the hundreds of campsites, warm weather and availability of full hook-ups, there was no one here. No one!

Ok, that’s not true. We didn’t see anyone on our way to our site, but much to our surprise, there were three occupied campsites in our loop. “Fhew, we won’t be totally alone up here,” I thought. It turns out they were all packing up to leave.

But isn’t the goal to be alone, you ask? Aren’t you looking for peace and quiet wherever you go? You must be thrilled to be away from others! Sure, yes, that is all mostly true. But you guys, this place was creepy! It’s one thing to boondock down a dirt road, alongside a lake in the middle of nowhere - on purpose; to seek out silence and desertion as an escape from the world. It’s altogether different to find yourself alone in the largest campground you’ve ever seen. It’s like, what are we missing? Is there something we don’t know? Do the locals not come here since that murder – what is going on? It’s hard to let that pit-of-your-stomach feeling go. It’s as if any minute, during any one of the 5 days we’re there, something weird or scary or creepy could happen to make us go “ohhh, thaaaat’s why no one is here.”

Our loop sat at the very tip top of the hill and the tallest point in the campground. Admittedly, that part was cool. The views were pretty great from so up high. And, in an incredible stroke of luck, we actually had service up there! Decent, usable, stream the Vikings game and host work zooms type of service!

Alex wasted no time getting to our site, speeding down the hill in a huff. We were like the overconfident newcomers sauntering into the room with our chins up, arrogantly commanding attention, while the experienced campers looked on, eyebrows raised, unimpressed.

We were put in our place soon enough when we tried to make a turn and back into our site. What looked like a wide-enough cul-de-sac to me was just a tad too short and we couldn’t make the turn with our 40 foot home. Despite the wise and well-timed (ha) counsel from one of the exiting experienced campers (“oh sure that will make the turn, my buddy just did it the other day…”) Cue us trying with Alex shaking his head the whole time, and then from the “helper” we got a “huh, I guess that won’t make it.” The turn just was not big enough to make a 180 and back the camper in. So, now what?

This was one of the few moments thus far where I just wanted to throw in the towel. Like, welp! It was fun while it lasted! Since the RV is stuck here forever, we should just cut our losses and move on. Where’s the nearest airport? In case you’re wondering, the other time was in Nice when we thought the wildfire had us trapped in that hellhole.

Let’s just say this point in our journey was… tense. There was no other place to turn around! If we were going to make this work, we would have to back up the hill – which was several hundred yards, turn around at a T in the road, and back all the way back down the loop into our site. Yikes!

Gradually, Alex backed us up as I did my best to guide him, sloooowly but surely. It felt like forever, but eventually we made it to the part where we could turn around and start the reverse descent to our spot. It literally felt like a half-hour process. In fact, it might have been. I was so relieved when we were stationary and actually fit in the spot. And fitting is a big deal so we didn’t have to worry about sliding down the hill in the middle of the night. Done!

For the six other people who apparently camp here, the draw of the campground is the reservoir on which it sits. From the brochure we learned that in its prime, there are two marinas on site, houseboat, pontoon, jet-ski, and kayak rentals, and even a swimming area for kids. The water level was at historic lows while we were there, which only added to how depressing everything looked.

This is a picture of the “swim area”, where apparently water fills a little swim hole from the reservoir nearby. From here all we saw was dirt and dry grass. The reservoir was nowhere to be seen and I couldn’t imagine what would need to happen for it to overflow to the point of reaching the little swimming hole.

We talked to the owner of a convenience store who told us that the water level can get as high as the line just below the trees in these pictures. Can you imagine?! What a different view this would be!

Now that we were firmly settled in our exclusive, private campground, I had to figure out how to kill three days with the girls while Alex resided in the RV during working hours. Thinking back, I really don’t know what we did. I must have blocked it out. I do know that the hill down to the playground was at least a half mile long, which meant the hill UP from the playground was also a half mile long but took at least twice as long to traverse. One trip to the playground before lunch and another after and we pretty much used up our day, thank goodness!

In all seriousness, the girls biked around the campground and played freeze tag and hide and seek. We did our schoolwork at a new picnic table each day, and we kept our eyes peeled for new guests – somewhat out of fear, but also curiosity. We hiked on an amazing mountain bike trail alongside the campground. I would have loved to run the trail but there was no way I was venturing out on a remote trail alone in that creepy place.

The real highlight of the week was undoubtedly the trip to Yosemite. What a contrast in just a few short hours! More to come on that front.