If you read my last post here, you know that I was angsting about the camping trip I had planned for the holiday weekend– the weather was forecast to be crappy, and my husband and my friends were not excited about it. But in the end, no one backed out (although my husband and I had a long talk where he said something like “I don’t think this is fun, but I’m going to go because you really enjoy it”) and on Friday evening we packed up the car and headed out into the woods. Our friends joined us on Saturday morning.
My camping skeptic husband and friend enjoyed car camping a lot more than backpacking. My husband could take bigger things like a cot for sleeping on, so he was a lot more comfortable. And this was our first time using our new Coleman camp stove. What a great thing! It’s much more versatile than a backpacking stove: two burners, adjustable flame. That meant we could have real food, not just rehydrated stuff in packets. Eggs for breakfast!
But it rained. A lot. We spent a lot of time trying to rig tarps so we could sit by the fire and at the picnic table without getting wet. Our campsite didn’t have many trees nearby, so many long lines were rigged from further trees. I was proud of the job we did tying out the tarps, but they weren’t perfect– we spent too much time draining the puddles over our heads. Thankfully everyone’s tents (and my hammock) stayed dry on the inside, but outside was soggy and unpleasant through Sunday morning.
Sunday noonish, though, it cleared up and a light breeze lowered the humidity. I checked the weather forecast and decided that sticking around until Monday wasn’t a great idea– thunderstorms overnight– and we took the opportunity to hang our wet gear up to dry in the sunshine before we packed it. So it was a leisurely tear-down– we sat around the fire all afternoon, enjoyed the day, had lunch and dinner, and by the time more clouds came in everything was dry and packed up and we headed home as the rain started up again.
The trip wasn’t perfect, but the newbies learned some new skills and discovered that maybe camping wasn’t terrible after all– which was about as much as I could’ve hoped for.
Running While Fat 