Yours truly is now a bona-fide, Girl Scout-trained tent camper. I spent 27 hot, sticky hours this past weekend with about two dozen other women learning how to use a hatchet to cut up kindling and make tinder, tie a clove hitch and tautline for hanging up dunk bags full of cleaned and sanitized dishes, make an "A"-style cooking fire with the kindling we made and bake in a cardboard box covered with tinfoil. It's true.
I also set up my own tent all by myself for the first time, and survived the muggy, buggy night camping out in the grassy area behind the Girl Scout lodge, even though I did forget to bring my fancy-schmancy pillow.
This probably does not seem like a big deal to many people, but it was a good-sized step outside my comfort zone. Not to say I haven't camped before; we camped plenty when I was a kid, but in a trailer, with an oven, stove and refrigerator, and a shower and flush toilet. And Mom did all the planning and cooking.
To complete the Girl Scout training, each of three teams had to prepare a multi-course, balanced meal using two different types of fuel and four different cooking methods. Our team prepared chicken and vegetable skewers on a charcoal grill, 8-can soup over a wood fire, cornbread baked in a box oven, fruit salad, banana boats (a split banana stuffed with mini marshmallows and chocolate chips) baked in foil packets over charcoal, and for good measure, a dessert called "One Gooey Mess" baked in a Dutch oven over coals.
It was delicious, and everyone did their part to prep and clean up afterwards. A little later we set up our tents, learned about some activities to do with our Scouts, participated in a "flashlight fire" (the fire dept. had not given the go-ahead for an open campfire that night) complete with goofy songs and skits, and crashed about 9:30.
The next morning as the sun blazed through my tent at 7:30 a.m. I raised my head off the mini throw pillow I found in the trunk of my car and realized that my neck didn't hurt. My neck always hurts. I was sticky with a mixture of dried sweat and sunscreen, sporting a disturbing case of hat hair, and moved in a cloud of "eau du DEET," but my neck did not hurt.
I guess I was enjoying getting out of my comfort zone so much that I forgot to be uncomfortable. Go figure.
Photo of potatoes on campfire courtesy of Ironchefbalara via flickr, Some rights reserved
(I wish I had taken some of my own pictures from the weekend, but I: a) forgot my camera, and b) was too dang busy to stop and take pictures!)
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