Dewi, your story reminded me of the first time I took my oldest nephews camping. They were just over 8 and 5 years old, respectively, and their dad had taken off about 18 months earlier. They wanted to go camping and discovered that he wouldn't take them any more--so after a couple of day trips to local state parks, we planned together what would be the first of five annual camping trips.
I had a tent that was tall enough to stand up in, but that I could pitch by myself (I camped often at dog shows.) We went to a kind of remote, marginally improved state forest area that is used for horse owners who do cross country trail riding. Good, relative easy hiking, a stream to wade and fish in, and only about a half hour from grandma's house if the kids panicked in the middle of the night. Plus, it's exactly the kind of place that a woman with two little kids and five dogs (yeah, *five* dogs) can camp and no one is going to be bothered.
Beautiful first day, nice hike, fun cooking over a campfire, awesome sunset. Then the wind picked up, and it began to thunder. My younger nephew says, 'Aunt Patty, I don't *like* thunder.' I show them how to put out the campfire, put the older two dogs into their crates in the truck, shepherd the kids to one last trip to the toilet house, and then we pile into sleeping bags in the tent with the three younger dogs. I light the battery-operated tent lantern, and we sing songs and tell stories and play games to relax the younger nephew. Soon I have two sleepy kids, so it's lights out.
They are out like lights, but I'm sleeping lightly in the worsening thunderstorm. About two-thirds of the way through the night, my older nephew wakes up and says, 'Aunt Patty, it's really wet over here.' I know that the tent is watertight, but I get up and check. The rain (it's still pouring) is washing down the very edge of our campsite. So I grab some safety tarps (the kind with reflective coating on one side) and two 30 gallon trash bags out of the truck bed, and wrap both boys' ancient military-issue sleeping bags in the tarp and garbage bag combo to keep the kids as dry as possible. I block off the washout from the edge of the tent, put two of the dogs on down stays next to the kids and the third on a down stay at their feet, and we all cuddle together. At least the lightening and thunder have stopped, and now I just want to get them through the night as dry as possible.
Morning came bright and sunny and warm. We got up and spread their soaked sleeping bags over one side of the picnic table to dry out. I get the kids into dry clothes (always store the backpacks with dry clothes in the truck!) and start a fire (always store the charcoal in the truck, too!) After cocoa, oatmeal, hard-cooked eggs, more cocoa and some bananas, the kids are ready to go exploring, make new friends at the campsite they can see down the hill (at least we were on higher ground; the sites below us are flooded.) We have another wonderful day exploring and hiking and playing in the stream. Toward mid-afternoon, we head back to camp and I ask the boys if they'd like to pack up and head back home, or camp another night. Rain forgotten, they vote to camp another night which is (thank you goddess) bright and starry and DRY! And when the birds start in at daybreak the next morning, my younger nephew wakes me up with a loud 'Aunt Patty, we're CAMPING!'
Dewi--every single summer I took those boys camping, it rained at least one of the three days. Sometimes it rained the entire trip...so we camped in the rain, and fished in the rain, and sometimes went into town for blueberry pancakes or mini-golf--in the rain. The boys remember the rain..but they also remember the camping. Truly, for them it was about the jjourney (rain and all) and not just the destination.
And they still borrow my tent now and then to go camping on their own (btw--my older nephew is now 27 and his younger brother is 23.)
My friend and I camped out under a large shed in her back yard at 11 years old. All alone. She went right to sleep I played in the fire pit we built. We had an awsome (small)fire. Kinda surprised no one got arrested for letting us do that.......
I feel safest when in the company of Teardroppers! 
We stayed at Ft. Walton a few miles down the road and not as "student" busy..............Enjoy!
Early March for northern colleges and late March for southern ones.
