I’ve never been camping, no reason why not. I guess mainly because excursions away from home were always arranged with the assumption that sleeping would take place in a bed, under a roof, rather than the sky. My parents didn’t take me camping, we always stayed with family when we spent holidays in Cornwall so there was never really a need.
There was the time Neets and I missed the train back from Run to the Sun in Newquay, (I got drunk and disappeared, very out of character for moi). We had to crash with some guys we knew from Saltash (only a small coincidence the Neets had a huge crush one of them). We were smuggled into the campsite in the back of a VW beetle (so rock and roll!) Although a little worse for wear (and being slightly distracted by a skater friend of said guys from Saltash), I did wonder why they had decided in their wisdom to pitch (see, I know the lingo!) a tent on a fairly substantial hill next to the stage which was playing host to a very enthusiastic dance DJ. Even with my limited knowledge of camping common sense, this seemed to be a poor choice.
I also have some fairly high maintenance friends. I don’t think they’ll be offended by this description, I mean purely from the “roughing it as a way to have a fun weekend” point of view. There was never a suggestion from any of the girls that we should have a camping weekend. There was of course the caravan holiday with my fellow cows, but that was really as far we got with the whole “back to nature” activity. Cowface doesn’t regard nature very highly, not if she has to actually be in it for too long (although a Pimms will always make it a much nicer place). Now I’m not suggesting that she doesn’t appreciate a stunning coastline or a lush green field to gaze over but she has no desire to be part of it (too wet, too muddy, too far to walk, that kind of sentiment). She’s a City Moo, bless her. Laughing Cow is better. She grew up in Cornwall, and, like me, will happily work a relaxed “beachy” look. On occasion she’ll throw caution to the wind an even do away with her usual polished look (what’s not to love about Big Hair?). Other friends have camped, but usually at the behest of their man and/or a promise of some inflatable(mattress, not bouncy castle) fun under the stars!
So I’ve always been inquisitive about camping, the idea of being outdoors , sleeping and eating, really appeals to me. When I was young I used to love being able to go into the garden on a warm summer evening with my pj’s on. If I’d had a bath and washed my hair, mum would let me sit in the sun and dry my hair naturally (no danger of me catching a cold, my hair would dry in next to no time. It was, and still is, fluffy wuffy fly away hair. The kind of hair that could easily be dried with a sneeze from a fairly large dog). Even now, when the opportunity arises, I will take my cup of tea into the garden in the morning and sit in my pj’s whilst I enjoy the early morning sounds. I love listening to the birds, I love that nature seems to be in charge at that time of the morning, there are no (or very few) people making a noise so you can really appreciate what’s happening around you. I always feel that nature is getting on with it’s business before the pesky humans get up and start getting in their way. Having been disturbed by me hanging out some washing, I imagine a Blackbird sitting in our apple tree thinking “I didn’t sign up for this, having to stop my juicy grub hunting to wait for this girl to disappear indoors again and leave the garden to me”.
Anyway, back to the matter in hand, camping. I’m not sure exactly how we came to the decision to go forth and camp… oh yeah, I do remember. My husband was playing at a festival in Wales and there was no other option but to camp. Oh, that’s another tale in itself so we’ll come back to that later. Yes, so, camping had been agreed and a trial weekend was identified. Dan had a seminar in Falmouth so we decided to look for a campsite nearby. We found a lovely one at Meanporth, just outside Falmouth, by the sea. We arrived, signed in and set up camp. Dan is very good at erections (sorry, I couldn’t resist!) and we had the tent up in no time at all. We decided to take it easy on the first night so agreed to go and find a pub for some dinner. Well as it happened we found an amazing restaurant called The Cove, they serve a stunning glass of wine and the food was truly wonderful. This was turning into a “glamping” weekend, which I can totally get on board with!
I spent the next day amusing myself in Falmouth whilst Dan attended his seminar. It was a great day, a fair amount of sunshine and plenty of time to browse in shops, read and just spend a little bit of time with myself. I met Dan later and we had a BBQ on the beach with some of his friends from the seminar (nice bunch of people by the way) and partook of a few drinks. We made our way back to the campsite as the sun set and a few clouds started to form. Settling ourselves outside the tent with a glass of wine, I was wondering why we hadn’t done this before. The campsite itself was pretty quiet, it was only early June, so it was just us and the birds tweeting away (the old fashioned tweeting of course, not on an i phone!). I settled down for an early night, I’d done a lot of walking that day and was cream crackered. Not long after snuggling under the duvet, a soft drizzle descended and I was gently lulled to sleep by the sound of light rain on nylon (oh the romance!).
And then it all went horribly, monumentally wrong in the most torrential way!
Now, I’m not one to scare easily (well, not that easily) but oh my word I have never encountered the sound of a howling wind and rain under what is essentially a small portion of manmade fibre. In the middle of a field (it seemed a good spot at the time), we were buffeted from every angle and the sound was horrific. There was a section of nylon that covered the top of the tent, secured by attaching it to the poles (I called it the flappy hat), and this was being whipped into a frenzy with every gust of wind! I was convinced that this was going to be ripped from the top of the tent and sent flying into a tree, far out of our reach. At 1.00am – yes, 1.00am, we debated the possibility of packing up the tent and driving home. There was no end to this storm and it seemed as though the wind was picking up every time we mentioned trying to ride it out. Common sense prevailed (although I still reckon I would’ve given it a go) and we decided to try and get some rest and make a move at first light. Sleep was impossible so at around 4.00am we decided we had just enough light to pack (well ok, shove) everything in the car. We packed up the contents of the tent and in a moment of genius set aside some dry clothes to change into after operation “Abandon Camp”! We looked a treat as we donned waterproofs and boots (so glad we chucked all this in the car “just in case”) and started to load the car. Oh it was awful, it was lashing down and we could barely see what we were doing. On the up side, I think we did a stirling job of packing everything away. It was like a SAS manoeuvre. I thought it best to let Dan take control (feminists, stay clam). He knew how the tent went up (I helped of course but essentially did what I was told by way of holding/poking/lifting at various times) so he was going to make a much better job at taking the thing down. It worked. We worked together. It was a great piece of “soaked to the skin, can’t really feel my fingers, oh my it’s very muddy” teamwork. Never underestimate the success of one person taking charge and the other doing as requested if it means getting a tricky job done quickly and done well. Had we needed to produce a Victoria Sponge, the roles of course would’ve been reversed and I (master baker of the family) would have been issuing the orders to Dan (lovingly) and he would have carried them out without hesitation (dotingly). We focused on the matter in hand and eventually managed to get to the toilet block and jump into dry clothes for the journey back. To say we were tired would be an understatement. Once we arrived home we had a cup of tea, a bacon sandwich and fell into bed. It continued to rain all day so even if we’d stayed the job of packing the tent would still have been rain soaked.
Most importantly I did have fun on my first camping trip. With it blowing a hoolie and chucking it down with rain, it did dampen my spirits somewhat but I got to experience enough of the good stuff and a small insight into the future fun that could be had. We survived a truly terrible storm, on our first camping trip, so I felt I could tackle anything now, which as it turns out was a slightly over enthusiastic attitude to take given our next camping trip – The Sonic Rock Festival, Wales.
Next time: Festival camping – a whole new kettle of lentils!
No Comments so far
Leave a comment
Leave a comment
Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>