Camping with kids isn’t child’s play, so when people heard that Michael and Naomi van Dyk were taking their toddler triplets to the Richtersveld for five days, many almost choked on their coffee. This is what the Van Dyks learned …

Triplets who are 15 months old in the Richtersveld – and during April on top of everything? !If you’re gobsmacked, you’re not the only one.

Even the hardiest preschool teacher would falter at the mere thought of it – teething, dirty nappies, unsure waddling about. But that didn’t deter Capetonians Michael and Naomi van Dyk.

After a self-imposed two-year exile from 4x4ing and camping due to the triplets, they decided enough was enough − come hell or high water, they would take their three little girls – Micha, Jana and Carli – along to the Richtersveld.

As part of their planning and preparation for their comeback, the family had three “practice camps” close to home.
“That way we could expose everyone to camping, test how and if the children adapted, and figure out what we should take along and what we could leave at home,” says Michael. So doing, they could, for example, test their new dome tent and see how the triplets handled sleeping in a tent.
In the process they realised they needed better lighting and more shade, and that heat can make suppositories melt in the first-aid kit.

The next challenge was getting people to go along to the Richtersveld, because not everyone is prepared to go camping with small kids.
“That’s why we decided to invite some friends with children of the same age,” Michael says.
Apart from the Van Dyks and their triplets, four couples and four more children (three aged between 9 and 17 months and a 4-year-old) went along.

Richtersveld, here we come!

The group stayed in Springbok on the first night, at Sendelingsdrif the next night and camped at De Hoop for four days and explored the park from there.
Even in April the Richtersveld was still boiling hot. When the group stopped for a picnic at the Hand of God during one of their daytrips, the vehicles’ thermometers indicated 38 °C or higher.
And on the hottest day it was still 41.5 °C in the late afternoon – in the shade …

Even worse, before leaving Michael couldn’t have a leak in his vehicle’s air-conditioning system repaired, so they had to cope without it.
They did manage to install a 12 V fan for the kids in the back, and had the darkest tint applied to the back windows.
“The children did pretty well, but we got nailed by the heat in the front at times,” Michael adds.
What’s more, a 15-month-old boy started feeling ill on the second-last day in the Richtersveld, causing the group to turn back before reaching one of their destinations. They realised later he’d been bitten by a spider.

And if that wasn’t enough, two snakes visited their camp on the last day. Getting the big snake out of one of the kids’ tents, says Michael, was quite a hassle.
“It made everyone slightly uncomfortable. And that’s when you feel secretly relieved that you’re heading home the next day.”

The group had planned on camping at Kamieskroon one last time on the way back to the Cape, but some distance from the town their collective courage failed them and they decided to rather stay in a guesthouse.
“It’s incredible how one appreciates the small things anew after a week’s camping.”
Would they do it again?
“Yes, it is hard work with kids under eighteen months old,” Michael says, “but it can be done and you can still enjoy it.”