Let's Go Camping...

The first time I ever went camping was with my husband. The last time I went camping was with my husband. The next time I go camping will be without my husband, because I'm never going again.  

Honestly, does anyone really love sleeping on the ground in the middle of a forest? Do they like waking up in the morning with campfire remnants in their lungs and nose? Who loves going to the bathroom behind a shrub? Does anyone enjoy eating "Krusteaz" pancakes that were made with a stick? Who can wait that long to drink their first cup of fake coffee? Who likes being dirty all day with no makeup on? What about the wild animals that could eat you? Axe murderers? Werewolves?

I remember one luxurious trip where we brought practically everything we owned, including a set of dominoes and a Slinky. The only thing we didn't bring was the tent! We ended up sleeping in the car all night long with our dog. You've never seen such steamy windows and "licking" marks and those were just from us. I wanted to write HELP, but couldn't figure out how to write backwards.

On another great camping fun-fest, we managed to bring all the things we needed. Things were fine until thousands of little flies showed up and went directly for our eyes. I refered to them as tse tse flies, but I guess they were gnats. Because of these bugs, my husband (aka Mr. X in this story) had to set the tent up wearing a bandana around his face. He looked like a bank robber. The scorching sun turned him into a swearing, sweaty bank robber.  He finally got the thing put together, but it was inside out. What a fun night it was -sleeping in a backwards tent, in dreadful heat, with a bunch of lousy, stinking bugs.

Before we left, we thought we'd get at least one good hike out of the deal, but there were so many flying bugs, we had to wear paper bags over our heads. We cut holes out so we could see, but it didn't exactly work. Just one paper-bagged-look at each other on the trail, followed by bursts of laughter, and we were headed for home. 

There was also a fun back-packing trip. By the time we got started, it was afternoon (a no-no) and the blazing sun was upon us. We started following the markers and were doing okay for the first half hour, but an hour later, we'd finished all of the gorp trail mix and were getting low on energy. Somehow the markers had vanished and our trail had gone cold, but our bodies were hot and we were getting irritable. Where was this stinking destination! 

After getting completely lost, we ended up at the only available spot, which was basically one boulder after another. To say it was a miserable night, was an understatement, so we decided to leave. A person can't sleep on rocks forever, you know. Before we left, we were extremely hot and since there was a lake closeby, Mr. X suggested we go skinny-dipping. "What!!! I'd rather walk a tightrope!", I screamed.  "We're in the middle of nowhere, no one is within miles!", he kept saying.  I'm very stubborn about that kind of stuff, but he practically forced me into it, so I finally did what he wanted. As soon as I took my "skinny" off, taking my first steps into the water, an entire troop of Boy Scouts came through...Mr. X's laughter could be heard echoing throughout the mountains of California and Switzerland.

Heading back to the car we remembered how long it had taken us to get to our camp site and knew it would be a trek. A few minutes later...Voila~~~there was our car! We thought we were lost in Nowheresville, but were three minutes from the parking lot...What stupid campers we turned out to be. I wonder if it would be different for us now - thirty years later? Two geriatric skinny-dippers? No...