That was the Camping trip that Was

[roseembolism]

Well, I survived my first camping trip in 20 years, and my first camping trip with racerxmachina.  Big Basin park is beautiful, and despite (or maybe because) of my nearly wrecking myself, I had a wonderful time this weekend.

notes:

Pretrip:  We need to do some more skillful planning and packing next time.  Also, penny wise pound foolish definitely applies.  Still, we could have done much worse- we got the amount and types of food to bring down perfectly.

Friday: I am so happy we passed over the large camping spaces that were conveniently next to the bathrooms...and lots of large families with children.  Our spaces were small, but nicely private.  Also, the nice thing about having multiple people bringing food is that a large variety of foods results.  dinner and fire afterward was nice.

Saturday: this was the day of mishaps.  Waking up early in the pitch dark AM to go to the bathroom in a tent, on an underinflated air mattress, in a too-small mummy bag is slapstick hilarity waiting to happen. 

Also, note to self: when the sign says "strenuous trail", they MEAN it.  I think I broke myself on that hike,  mainly out of a stupid desire not to be "the person who says lets turn back",  I came back with various things hurting... but on the other hand, I did get to, have lunch on the trail with friends, and saw a bunch of actual banana slugs.  I even got to explicate the standards for judging banana slug beauty.   And I reached camp with a real feeling of triumph- over myself, if nothing else.

But the truly, utterly beautiful part of the camping trip was Saturday night, sitting around after dinner, singing classic camping songs like "Jealousy" and "Walk on the Water.  Well, they SHOULD be classic camping songs.  This is the memory that I'm going to recall years from now, sitting in my friends, looking into the fire, and feeling warm and happy.

This is why the camping trip was an utter success to my mind; I got to spend a weekend in beautiful surroundings with friends.  I couldn't ask for better company this weekend, and for that, I thank everyone.

Comments

[therobbergirl.livejournal.com]

I loved the singing part best, too. I wish I had pictures of it, but I didn't take them at the time because I didn't want the flash to ruin the moment. So I'll write about it instead, which I always find more useful to me later than pictures later when I want to recall the event. I relate better to words than to visual stimuli like pictures.

I'm glad that I got to spend an entire weekend with people like you. *smooch*

[silverstreak.livejournal.com]

Yup, just hangin' out around the fire was one of my favorite moments too. And I couldn't of had a nicer group of friends to do it with.

[deirdremoon.livejournal.com]

You were a freaking trooper on that trail. And I understand about not wanting to be the person who makes 'em all turn back, even though I was. Hope you didn't *actually* break anything, so you'd be willing to do it again. :)