The dermatologist assured my mother and me that many other 10-year-old boys also suffered from what he called crotch rot. In case you avoided this itchy ailment, blue jeans and cotton swimsuits don’t dry quickly and where things don’t dry, fungus grows. Trust me.

The treatment was a small jar of white cream, applied liberally twice daily. The solution however is to spend more time—and sometimes money—when shopping for kids’ outdoor gear.

A friend of mine is a manager in a very posh ski shop north of Toronto, a place where the skintight ski suits are trimmed with furry hoods. Yet many of her well-to-do customers refuse to spend $59 on snowboard helmets for their kids. Why? Because they say they’ll just grow out of them.

I want my two kids to enjoy their time camping as much as we do and outfitting them with good gear has been worth every penny.

To me, helmets for kids are a no-brainer in any gravity or action sport. of course they will grow out of them, but what about now? Aren’t their heads worth protecting no matter what size?

Nobody runs, jumps, falls, rolls and climbs more than camp kids—rain or shine. In my mind we should be dressing them in hard-shelled, quick-drying, fuzzy, waterproof, breathable, cool, bug-proof and rugged clothing; whatever it takes to protect them, but also whatever it takes to make their time outside as enjoyable—and rash free—as possible.

The sun is probably the most dangerous and underestimated hazard our children encounter. Too much sun can ruin any camping trip, not to mention cause long-term damage to their skin and eyes. Properly fitting sun hats with good coverage and SPF-rated beachwear are worth it. After five summers guiding whitewater rafts I can barely open my eyes on a sunny day without a good pair of shades. Some parents don’t bother with sunglasses for their kids because they say they’ll just break or lose them.

Do you remember being dressed in a garbage bag instead of a raincoat? How expensive were raincoats that it made more sense for our parents to blow through a box of garbage bags every camping trip? Not to mention the fact that plastic sacks with three big holes cut in them really aren’t that dry.

Socks that fall down in boots are not only annoying, sweaty bare feet in boots get blisters. Companies like Smartwool and Wigwam have virtually eliminated this childhood nuisance, not to mention that these socks dry quickly and resist odours.

Smart shoppers save money by buying clothes that will serve double duty, like long underwear for camping in the summer and skiing in the winter. They choose colours that both boys and girls will wear as they are passed down, or ferret out other outdoor families through the scouts or ski clubs and buy, sell or trade clothes. shopping out of season can save you up to 50 per cent. While rooting around at a used clothing store we found a $28 MEC sunhat for $3. Don’t limit yourself to camping brands; just consider the styles and fabrics that will keep kids dry and warm or cool and shaded.

I want my two kids to enjoy their time camping as much as we do and outfitting them with good gear has been worth every penny. I’ve stopped thinking of this as an expense, but rather an investment. If we don’t invest and outfit our kids with gear that allows them to be warm, dry and safe it won’t only be the clothes they grow out of, it will be the outdoors. 

This article first appeared in the Fall 2008 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

To me, a camp gadget is a luxury item you can do without—but would rather not. A camp chair even qualifies, as long as it has a backrest and a cup holder and allows you to sit high up off the cold, wet ground. 

• The first turtles are thought to have (slowly) roamed the earth 215 million years ago, before lizards and snakes.
• Painted turtles spend the winter buried half a metre deep in the mud at the bot- tom of lakes and ponds. They breathe through gas-exchange sacs below their tails.
• Turtles play a key role in many aboriginal creation stories. According to Ojibwa legend, North America rests on the back of Maukinauk, the great turtle.
• Baby painted turtles often spend their first winter in a semi-frozen state, with their heart and breathing stopped.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a comic series, television show and movie in the 1980s and ‘90s, told the story of four turtles that evolved from sewer ooze and fought evil with martial arts. It was inexplicably popular.
• Courting wood turtles dance side to side for up to two hours before making things official.
• According to the book Up North, the Soviets sent the first spaceturtles around the moon in 1971.
• Snapping turtles can live to be 90 years old.
• An overturned turtle can lever itself back upright with its neck.
• Since turtles can’t expand their ribcages, in order to breathe when out of water they use an air pump to draw in air.
• Four of Canada’s 15 species of turtles are listed as endan- gered under the federal Species at Risk Act.
• Nestlé Turtles blend caramel, pecans and cashews inside a milk chocolate shell. Each turtle contains 90 calories— enough energy to paddle a canoe for about 20 minutes.
• A group of turtles is called a bale. No deaths have ever been attributed to stampeding bales.
• A turtle’s shell, just like a geo- desic tent, gains much of its strength from its dome-like shape.
• Californian pop-rock band The Turtles were originally called Crossfires from the Planet Mars. They crawled to the top of the Billboard charts in 1967 with the single “Happy Together,” dislodging a song called “Penny Lane” by another band known for its hard shell. 

Things in the next moments happened very, very fast. The sky did strange and awesome things. The air temperature plummeted to that of a blustery November day. Boiling clouds of purple and green rolled towards the surface and us with the action of an exploding fireball.

I fixed my eyes on my son and—wham!— at that split second, it hit! This force of air was so violent that it blew me over. I struggled to brace and roll up into the maelstrom.

The low, green sky said “take shelter” to anyone from the Midwest. We knew this, yet there was no chance of shelter. Ex- panding contorted clouds, looking as they would burst, only acted as a harbinger of worse yet to come. The sheets of rain found us and giant drops stung as they hit, then hailstones added blows to the head.

Again I swung my gaze toward Jason. One cloud beyond him caught my attention. An ominous spin had begun and soon a funnel hung. The father instinct kicked in and I sprinted toward my son. I yelled to him to raft up but he could not hear.

The funnel, for some reason, held at a distance above the water. Below it, spray began to blast up from the seas as if some giant, invisible food processor had touched the surface. Blasts of spray began to rise and spin. Then, for a short moment, it all seemed to stop until—“whoosh”—the spinning spray jumped up and joined the cloud. Georgian Bay was being sucked up into the sky. The birth of a waterspout, right before our eyes!