When I saw this week’s topic for Ten on Tuesday, I had an immediate thought and nothing else I later came up with seemed any better so here it is:
Ten things to bring on a camping trip.
1 – 10. Hotel reservations.
Don’t get me wrong, we used to camp. Not well and always in a tent but we did it.
There was the time Gail and I were camping in Maine where it rained all week and an earthquake struck while I was using the camp bathroom. I think that was the trip when my arm was in a cast which made setting up the house size tent lots of fun. Of course I could be confusing it with our camping trip to Cape Cod, where it rained all week and Gail bought this ginormous shell lamp in Provincetown that took up half the car on the way home.
There was the camping trip to Lake of the Ozarks where Jack got a sinus infection the first night. We lasted one more night amid the humidity and bugs. The beef bourguignon I brought was tasty — doesn’t everybody bring gourmet meals on camping trips?
There was the camping trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area where the sun shone the first day while we portaged miles and miles through the wilderness, carrying 80-ton packs, fishing poles and a canoe. We stumbled over rocks, lost the trail a few times, got our feet wet and made it to our campsite in time to set up camp and build a fire to cook first-night steaks (“we don’t need no stinkin’ camp stove”).
We enjoyed a sunset skinny dip before crawling into the tent to fall asleep to the whine of mosquitoes, sleepily making plans to push on to the next campsite in the morning. Only to awaken in the middle of the night to falling temperatures, rising winds and thunderstorms which lasted most of the remaining five days.
It’s hard to keep toilet paper dry when the trees are dripping on you while you straddle the pit toilet, waving away the mosquitoes with one hand and holding your pants up out of the wet with the other.
I’m just sayin’.
The rotten weather (I’m sensing a theme here, aren’t you?) curtailed our tour of the Boundary Waters and sent us home a day early from exhaustion, cold and the tedium of eating peanut butter and squeezable-grape-jelly sandwiches for dinner (see no camp stove and wet wood).
It’s a wonder we survived, especially after I dumped Jack, fully clothed, in the water because I couldn’t keep the canoe stable. Why he was trying to balance in a canoe that was pulled up on shore I don’t remember.
Good times.
I’d do it again.
No, really.
They must have Super 8′s in the Boundary Waters by now, don’t they?
At what point do you realize that Mother Nature does not want you sleeping outside?!
xo
I think the trip to Cape Cod also involved you telling two guys who wanted to know if we had any pot we wanted to sell that I was a DEA agent with a gun and mean as hell. I think that was after we finally got the tent up so the expression on my face probably reinforced what you were telling them. I’m with you, camping sounds great until one is face to face with it. Can do it …don’t want to. I do remember laughing a lot though.
OMG! You made me laugh out loud again!! Stop it already. I didn’t answer because I agree with your 1-10, but I don’t have hysterically funny stories like you do!!! Of course, they’re only funny in retrospect, right???
OMG! I cannot stop laughing! And at Gail’s comment too! It completely puts hotel reservations into proper perspective.
People who say that getting away from it all by camping have never had adventures like that.
I”m completely with you. And Gail is SO funny. Did she really SAY THAT? Perfect!
The mosquitos, ticks, and assorted other insects would be the deal killer for me right off the bat.
K. So Ian and I are going remote camping next week. We can hike in, or we can paddle in. Which sounds easy enough except that we will have one water-loving labrador and one insane high-strung mutt who would never stand for a paddle – both of which would guarantee a tipped canoe or kayak. One of us will hike in with the light stuff and the dogs, and the other will leisurely paddle across, hopefully with gourmet food and several bottles of wine. Wish us better luck than you’ve had.
Remind me never to go camping with you. (Consider the common denominator in all those disastrous camping trips…)
Oh mercy! Laughing away here, get the impression the Universe just doesn’t want you out there camping? snort. Oh, the fodder for later laughter in our lives, just can’t be beat.
Stick to your #1-10 ;^)
OK. My idea of camping? A Holiday Inn without a restaurant.
The best line was “I’d do it again.” Seriously! We’ve had similar experiences, I totally should’ve participated in this 10 things!
Now I think I would prefer hotels too.