Last Friday Clark decided that we needed to go camping. We have been hiking several times before, as you may or may not know, and had one experience backpacking, in the winter, that did not go so smoothly. So, Clark suggested we go camping and then go hiking the next day, which is a step moving towards another backpacking adventure. Since I have started loving the outdoors and our adventures, I consented.
We spent Friday finding all of the things we needed from the storage below the house, packing this and that in simple packs, and preparing food that would be cooked in the camp fire. We bought a cheap cooler, since we have yet to own a real one, and loaded up the car. While I was somewhat against it, we did decide to bring Luna, our puppy, because she goes on all of our hiking adventures with us-- and we couldn't go camping for the first time without her, could we? Well, you'll see what the answer to that question should've been later on.
Around 4pm we left for our campsite. When we got there, we settled for the one that was most likely to have a few other campers join us at first. However, as I started looking for fire wood and Clark started setting up the tint, I went up a hill a little ways to discover a "better" campsite. It was more secluded and we would have a wide open space all to ourselves, since there was only one fire pit. I yelled down and got Clark and Luna to come up where I was and start making camp there.
My search for firewood was rather useless, but since I knew we only needed some for that night I did successfully find enough to keep the fire going for the short amount of time we needed it. I then came down and helped set up this and that and keep the puppy calm, who had been running all over the place before we tied her up since some others had showed up at the campsite below us.
At first we decided we'd just hang out, since we weren't hungry and wanted the fire long enough to roast marshmallows and things like that. So we got Clark's crash pad for climbing and used it as a sort of hang-out matt to play cards on. We played Phase 10, and although we didn't really keep score, we had a lot of fun just keeping track of who was on what phase. At one point I got two phases ahead of Clark, so you can imagine who won the game.
When we finally started getting hungry enough to cook our camper's meatloaf and corn on the cob, Clark began moving things around in the fire pit to make a fire. I was throwing the Frisbee around with Luna, when Clark says, "Oh, there's a snake!" Thinking it may just be a dead one, I go over to observe, and as I do such it MOVED!
I screamed, jumped, and ended up behind the tent-- which kept me a nice distance from the fire pit. Then I hear, "Oh, there's two of them! No, there's a whole nest of them in here!" He looks up at me. "Do you want me to kill them?"
"No!" I exclaimed, not entirely sure I meant it. "Just, get rid of them."
So soon I see Clark with a stick poking the snakes and throwing them this way and that away from our campsite and down a hill. "What if they come back?" I asked.
"They won't once we make a fire," he said with some confidence, so I believed him.
After Clark had disposed of six snakes, yes... six, I crept back over to the pit to help him. As I did, a toad hopped out from under one of the rocks. Apparently he had noticed the snakes too late and was hiding from them, just waiting for Clark to rescue his situation. At least, that's how I look at it now. Mr. Toad hung out with us until we lit the fire, and then he hopped away, not a fan of the heat or flames.
I helped start the fire and kept it going, which I was very proud of. Luckily someone had left some sort of grill for us to use so we were able to put our corn and campers meatloaf safely on that piece of metal to cook ever so nicely. They still got a little over done, but that's because we both weren't exactly sure how long they should cook. The burned parts on the peppers tasted surprisingly good, but burned corn ends up tasting like charcoal.
To make campers meat loaf, you take a bell pepper of your choosing and hollow it out from the top where the stem is. I used water to wash it out so no seeds were in there. Then you take prepared meat, usually beef mixed with onion, seasoning and breadcrumbs, and stuff as much as possible in to the hollowed out pepper. You wrap it up in tin-foil and make sure you know which side is the top that has meat spilling out-- because you want that side to be face down while you're cooking it. We cooked if for about 45 minutes and it turned out perfectly. For the corn we just put butter, salt and pepper on it and wrapped it up in the tin-foil as well. I would suggest not cooking it as long, or moving it around and not just leaving it face the same direction. We did that and a part of it was black, but still good!
After we ate our dinner there was enough ash and such to still roast our marshmallows. We decided to be "lazy" so to speak, and we didn't make s'mores. We just roasted marshmallows and ate those, which was still delicious! We played with Luna a little after that. There was a lake below our campsite so we walked down there and allowed her to play in the water as much as she wanted, then went back to the campsite and tied her up-- where she was to stay for the night. We put the crash pad right in front of the tent "door" and left the screen open so she could see us. After a little bit of whining she figured it out, and lay very protectively in front of us.
We played poker in the tent until it got dark. Clark gave up because he taught me how to play and I seemed rather ignorant, so there seemed to be a good chance he would win, but I kept ending up with full houses or two, three of a kinds with Aces. So, we stopped playing poker after awhile and just talked, which was wonderful. One good thing about camping that I learned is that it's an amazing escape from appliances. Phones, iPods, computers, TVs, video games... we were away from it all and I LOVED it.
As it began to get dark and we fell asleep, we were woken up by Luna trying to bound off and barking. We heard people pulling up at the campsite below us around 10:30pm or so (yes, we were asleep before then. Remember that we weren't there with friends or anything, it was just us!). I got annoyed because there were at least two screaming children and inconsiderate parents who weren't even trying to be quiet themselves. As those people settled down, Luna settled back down to sleep.
After that I had a hard time sleeping. I kept waking up here and there, as did Clark, and we knew Luna wasn't resting very well because she kept pacing and moving positions. Then, around 12:30am, Luna started growling. It wasn't a, "Look, I'm barking to let you know more people are here!" it was a, "Something's up and I need to protect you," growl. She had a low bark to go along with it, but nothing like I had ever heard her do before. Clark unzipped the tent and used his Surefire light to shine it on the trees. While he didn't see what it was, we did hear a branch break as it ran away. A few minutes later we heard hissing. Assuming it was a nasty raccoon, and the people below us probably left food out, we didn't think much of it. I was worried about Luna, who was still on edge, but Clark did not want to let her in the tent.
Then, we heard noise again. More hissing, and it was coming from two directions. Clark jumped out of the tent flashing his light again, and this time it running off sounded much bigger than a raccoon. He didn't tell me that, of course, but I knew it. He gets back in the tent, "That's a nasty a** raccoon!" I asked him if he saw it, and he paused before saying, "I got a glimpse of it." There was no confidence like there was with the snakes, so I knew he wasn't telling me the whole truth.
Finally, there was a third time. At this point Luna was growling so incredibly loud we were afraid she was going to freak out the people below us. Clark jumped up with his surefire and caught a deer straight in the eyes with it. We heard hissing again, and more hooves running away from us.
I have to admit that before we knew what it was, I was freaking out a bit. I had visions of "Where the Red Fern Grows," running through my head. I did not want my puppy to be attacked by a mountain lion, cougar, or whatever it is we have around here in the Appalachians. So, after this third time, we let Luna in the tent. She circled here and there until she settled right beside me, and that's when I noticed she was shaking. She rested her head on my stomach and looked at me like, "Can't we go home?" So I decided yes.
Around 1:30am we packed up our car, which was conveniently located down the hill between us and the other campers. Clark was a good sport about understanding that the events of the night had, once again, not lead to a great sleeping experience. We knew then that next time we go, Luna will be staying at home. While she was an amazing guard dog, she is obviously not cut out to be a full-time camping puppy. She's too high maintenance for that!
We came home and ended up staying up until 4am watching a movie and talking about the night's events. I kept making sure Clark was disappointed with me and Luna, and he kept making sure I would do it again without Luna. So, all went well in the end. We survived a camping trip of a snake-infested fire pit, burned food, hissing deer, and a scared puppy. I did look it up, and apparently deer hiss to warn other deer that there's danger. Clearly our puppy was a threat to them, but if so why did they come back more than one time? I don't know. Maybe we were in their kitchen or something. Hopefully they were able to eat once we left!
Until next time.
We've all got our junk, and my junk is you!
We spent Friday finding all of the things we needed from the storage below the house, packing this and that in simple packs, and preparing food that would be cooked in the camp fire. We bought a cheap cooler, since we have yet to own a real one, and loaded up the car. While I was somewhat against it, we did decide to bring Luna, our puppy, because she goes on all of our hiking adventures with us-- and we couldn't go camping for the first time without her, could we? Well, you'll see what the answer to that question should've been later on.
Around 4pm we left for our campsite. When we got there, we settled for the one that was most likely to have a few other campers join us at first. However, as I started looking for fire wood and Clark started setting up the tint, I went up a hill a little ways to discover a "better" campsite. It was more secluded and we would have a wide open space all to ourselves, since there was only one fire pit. I yelled down and got Clark and Luna to come up where I was and start making camp there.
My search for firewood was rather useless, but since I knew we only needed some for that night I did successfully find enough to keep the fire going for the short amount of time we needed it. I then came down and helped set up this and that and keep the puppy calm, who had been running all over the place before we tied her up since some others had showed up at the campsite below us.
At first we decided we'd just hang out, since we weren't hungry and wanted the fire long enough to roast marshmallows and things like that. So we got Clark's crash pad for climbing and used it as a sort of hang-out matt to play cards on. We played Phase 10, and although we didn't really keep score, we had a lot of fun just keeping track of who was on what phase. At one point I got two phases ahead of Clark, so you can imagine who won the game.
When we finally started getting hungry enough to cook our camper's meatloaf and corn on the cob, Clark began moving things around in the fire pit to make a fire. I was throwing the Frisbee around with Luna, when Clark says, "Oh, there's a snake!" Thinking it may just be a dead one, I go over to observe, and as I do such it MOVED!
I screamed, jumped, and ended up behind the tent-- which kept me a nice distance from the fire pit. Then I hear, "Oh, there's two of them! No, there's a whole nest of them in here!" He looks up at me. "Do you want me to kill them?"
"No!" I exclaimed, not entirely sure I meant it. "Just, get rid of them."
So soon I see Clark with a stick poking the snakes and throwing them this way and that away from our campsite and down a hill. "What if they come back?" I asked.
"They won't once we make a fire," he said with some confidence, so I believed him.
After Clark had disposed of six snakes, yes... six, I crept back over to the pit to help him. As I did, a toad hopped out from under one of the rocks. Apparently he had noticed the snakes too late and was hiding from them, just waiting for Clark to rescue his situation. At least, that's how I look at it now. Mr. Toad hung out with us until we lit the fire, and then he hopped away, not a fan of the heat or flames.
I helped start the fire and kept it going, which I was very proud of. Luckily someone had left some sort of grill for us to use so we were able to put our corn and campers meatloaf safely on that piece of metal to cook ever so nicely. They still got a little over done, but that's because we both weren't exactly sure how long they should cook. The burned parts on the peppers tasted surprisingly good, but burned corn ends up tasting like charcoal.
To make campers meat loaf, you take a bell pepper of your choosing and hollow it out from the top where the stem is. I used water to wash it out so no seeds were in there. Then you take prepared meat, usually beef mixed with onion, seasoning and breadcrumbs, and stuff as much as possible in to the hollowed out pepper. You wrap it up in tin-foil and make sure you know which side is the top that has meat spilling out-- because you want that side to be face down while you're cooking it. We cooked if for about 45 minutes and it turned out perfectly. For the corn we just put butter, salt and pepper on it and wrapped it up in the tin-foil as well. I would suggest not cooking it as long, or moving it around and not just leaving it face the same direction. We did that and a part of it was black, but still good!
After we ate our dinner there was enough ash and such to still roast our marshmallows. We decided to be "lazy" so to speak, and we didn't make s'mores. We just roasted marshmallows and ate those, which was still delicious! We played with Luna a little after that. There was a lake below our campsite so we walked down there and allowed her to play in the water as much as she wanted, then went back to the campsite and tied her up-- where she was to stay for the night. We put the crash pad right in front of the tent "door" and left the screen open so she could see us. After a little bit of whining she figured it out, and lay very protectively in front of us.
We played poker in the tent until it got dark. Clark gave up because he taught me how to play and I seemed rather ignorant, so there seemed to be a good chance he would win, but I kept ending up with full houses or two, three of a kinds with Aces. So, we stopped playing poker after awhile and just talked, which was wonderful. One good thing about camping that I learned is that it's an amazing escape from appliances. Phones, iPods, computers, TVs, video games... we were away from it all and I LOVED it.
As it began to get dark and we fell asleep, we were woken up by Luna trying to bound off and barking. We heard people pulling up at the campsite below us around 10:30pm or so (yes, we were asleep before then. Remember that we weren't there with friends or anything, it was just us!). I got annoyed because there were at least two screaming children and inconsiderate parents who weren't even trying to be quiet themselves. As those people settled down, Luna settled back down to sleep.
After that I had a hard time sleeping. I kept waking up here and there, as did Clark, and we knew Luna wasn't resting very well because she kept pacing and moving positions. Then, around 12:30am, Luna started growling. It wasn't a, "Look, I'm barking to let you know more people are here!" it was a, "Something's up and I need to protect you," growl. She had a low bark to go along with it, but nothing like I had ever heard her do before. Clark unzipped the tent and used his Surefire light to shine it on the trees. While he didn't see what it was, we did hear a branch break as it ran away. A few minutes later we heard hissing. Assuming it was a nasty raccoon, and the people below us probably left food out, we didn't think much of it. I was worried about Luna, who was still on edge, but Clark did not want to let her in the tent.
Then, we heard noise again. More hissing, and it was coming from two directions. Clark jumped out of the tent flashing his light again, and this time it running off sounded much bigger than a raccoon. He didn't tell me that, of course, but I knew it. He gets back in the tent, "That's a nasty a** raccoon!" I asked him if he saw it, and he paused before saying, "I got a glimpse of it." There was no confidence like there was with the snakes, so I knew he wasn't telling me the whole truth.
Finally, there was a third time. At this point Luna was growling so incredibly loud we were afraid she was going to freak out the people below us. Clark jumped up with his surefire and caught a deer straight in the eyes with it. We heard hissing again, and more hooves running away from us.
I have to admit that before we knew what it was, I was freaking out a bit. I had visions of "Where the Red Fern Grows," running through my head. I did not want my puppy to be attacked by a mountain lion, cougar, or whatever it is we have around here in the Appalachians. So, after this third time, we let Luna in the tent. She circled here and there until she settled right beside me, and that's when I noticed she was shaking. She rested her head on my stomach and looked at me like, "Can't we go home?" So I decided yes.
Around 1:30am we packed up our car, which was conveniently located down the hill between us and the other campers. Clark was a good sport about understanding that the events of the night had, once again, not lead to a great sleeping experience. We knew then that next time we go, Luna will be staying at home. While she was an amazing guard dog, she is obviously not cut out to be a full-time camping puppy. She's too high maintenance for that!
We came home and ended up staying up until 4am watching a movie and talking about the night's events. I kept making sure Clark was disappointed with me and Luna, and he kept making sure I would do it again without Luna. So, all went well in the end. We survived a camping trip of a snake-infested fire pit, burned food, hissing deer, and a scared puppy. I did look it up, and apparently deer hiss to warn other deer that there's danger. Clearly our puppy was a threat to them, but if so why did they come back more than one time? I don't know. Maybe we were in their kitchen or something. Hopefully they were able to eat once we left!
Until next time.
We've all got our junk, and my junk is you!
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