I've never prided myself on being a camper - in fact, it's safe to say that being out in nature 24 hours a day with bugs, dirt, and no electricity or running water is not my favourite situation to be in. I camped a good deal when I was younger because my Dad loves it and my Mom went along with it, but as soon as I grew old enough to realize the joys of an easily accessible toilet and showers, the camping excursions ended.
Well, this past weekend I went camping with my friends to experience the more adult side of camping - for me, the drinking and telling inappropriate jokes part. We ventured up to Algonquin Provincial Park where we had a really nice campsite that Heidi's friend secured for us, and proceeded to pitch the tent. I was pretty confident in my ability to set up the tent, as Daddy Bella had taught me the night before, but about 2 minutes into the setup I ended up standing beside the tent while Heidi and our friend set it up. Worked for me!
Perhaps one of the most eventful things to happen this weekend was my experience with fire. Daddy Bella supplied us with a lantern that is gas powered or something like that, so I thought that I would add a little more light to the campsite by turning it on. After many attempts at lighting the lantern, our other friend took over and discovered that I hadn't even turned the lantern on (however you turn on a gas lantern), so if the flame wasn't catching it was because there wasn't any gas to ignite a flame. Oops. This revelation came after I decided to fill the lantern with more gas because I thought it may have been empty, and then I spilled the gas all over the place because it was full. Oops again. Pretty excited to have the lantern ready to go, I put the flame into the hole where it's supposed to connect with the gas and, well, it did, except that the flame also connected with the gas on the outside of the lantern, causing the actual lantern to go up in flames, along with gas residue that had dripped onto the picnic table. Major oops.
After screaming and throwing the lantern onto the ground, I blew out the fire on the picnic table and started to frantically throw dirt on the fire (Heidi said to put dirt on any gas that spilled on the table - obviously I missed some spots - so for some reason I thought dirt would also put out the fire). That didn't work. Eventually, I just stood there watching the flames engulf the lantern, trying to get it to stop with my mind, apparently. Thank goodness for our buddy, who ran up and threw water on the lantern and turned it off (I didn't want to try to turn it off, the button or whatever it was under the flames!). Essentially, if it wasn't for my friends, I would have burnt down the forest.
Add to that incident my igniting my marshmallow on fire, and I was not allowed around open fire or anything that could potentially be set on fire for the rest of the weekend.
I have to admit, though, that camping WAS fun. The not showering/smelling bad part was not so much fun, but hanging out with my equally dirty and smelly friends in a chill setting and laughing and talking was pretty awesome. This, however, does not mean that I will camp all the time (that's directed at Heidi). I was extremely worried that my nails were going to break, and that stress is not something I can handle on a regular basis.
Love,
Bella
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