While Matt and I were dating I made sure to inform him of my camping experience and enthusiasm. Zero. I can thank my wonderful mother for this and I echo her idea of camping as a hotel with a beach view. Or a lovely cabin, all the amenities included, close by to a little quaint town. However I do see the charm in some of the traditional camping activities. Cooking dinner over a fire, boating, games, smores, hiking, kayaking, all great. It's mostly the sleeping out doors and the lack of personal hygiene that loose me.
I stand by Jim Gaffigan.
After we got married I knew that Matt had some "tender childhood memories" of camping and I thought maybe I could give this whole tent thing a try. So, like an idiot, I suggested we go camping. It was last year Labour Day weekend and I thought It might be fun to spend our last bit of summer together before he started school. That week we asked people at work, and really anyone we knew, where the ideal place to camp would be. We set our goal destination to "Mirror Lake" and began rounding up camp gear, which we obviously didn't own. Matt got us a tent from our friends Trevin and Allison and I insisted in taking our pillow top air mattress. We also bought a few of the essentials; fire wood, fire starter, flashlight, bug spray etc.
Friday afterwork we set out on our adventure and drove the 2 hour drive up the mountains to Mirror Lake. It was along this very windy road that I started seeing other camp sites with a large wooden sign out front that read, "Camp Ground Full."
Camp Ground Full ?! I was astonished! There were enough crazy people who intentionally spent there last bit of summer subjecting themselves, to what I could only imagine as my future day and a half, to fill up over 5 other campsites. It was then that I also learned people not only PAY for this experience, they RESERVE. After passing a few more "Camp Site Full" signs we saw a sign for Mirror Lake. This sign also informed us that it was full but we decided to take a look and see if it was really telling the truth. We found one vacant spot and tried to find the camp ranger to see if we could take it. Obviously someone had come to there senses and decided against there camping "vacation."
The camp ranger was very nice and told us that we could wait until 7 or 8 and if no one was there we could just set up camp. We waited until 8 and now one showed. We unloaded our tent and air mattress. For the recored "4 man tent" actually means 4 infants or 4 midgets. It does not fit 1 pillow top air mattress without sticking out the sides. It also does not fit the mattress at all if you blow it up outside the tent and then try to fit it in.
| Obviously not us but similar measurement challenges. |
Determined to stay on the positive side of things I began to make dinner. Dinner was in the fire, Matt and I were playing games and then we had company. No, not the folks I had borrowed the air pump from earlier to blow up the mattress after ours ran out of battery power, the family that actually reserved this location. GREAT.
We explained our story and they told us how they had been late leaving work and that they had reserved this camp spot the previous year. I began to get our dinner out of the fire and the wife looked at me and exclaimed, "Oh, you even had dinner cooking? Well I don't see why you can't just camp here too, Its a big enough lot." After discussing this possibility Matt set out to find some level land to place our tent. By this time it was quite dark and what may have looked flat was actually a 90 degree angle.
Our night went surprisingly well, we shared our smores and all talked around the fire as if it was intended to be that way.
Finally It became too late for us to be up and we all decided it was bed time. Matt and I walked down the cliff to were our tent was now perched. With our air mattress extending up the side of the tent and the angle pushing us further downward it was impossible to stretch out all 5"11 of me and 6"3 of Matt. Like a champ Matt fell asleep within a few mins and I remained awake. I then remembered another reason why I hated camping. I was FREEZING. I woke Matt up just to make him aware of my situation- still awake and cold- he pulled me a little tighter and comforted me and then within a few more mins he was asleep. I woke him up an hour or two later-still awake and cold. By this time he had gotten increasingly uncomfortable from not being able to stretch out the length of his body. This time we stayed up and talked, laughing at the whole situation. We decided that we weren't going to sleep anymore and that if we acted quick we could pack up the tent and leave before the other family even knew it. We were packed up and ready to go by 6am.
Determined to enjoy something from our excursion we explored the camp ground, got some pictures and ate breakfast by a waterfall.
I slept most of the way home.
Mirror Lake: I came, I couldn't sleep, I left.
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