Not A Happy Camper

My brother, sister-in-law, and I are about to go an extended camping trip in the Mountain West. I'm super excited, but I'm also re-posting this blog from last year as a reminder of how things can go horribly, though humorously, wrong....

I love camping. I've camped at Big Basin, Lake Tahoe, Bryce Canyon, and the Grand Canyon among other places. But after this weekend on the Russian River, my brother Kevin, his wife Lauren, and I put the tents and sleeping bags back in storage and vowed it would be a long time before we camped again.

It all started easily and innocent enough with the desire to get away for a Saturday night to a conveniently close campsite. I borrowed some gear from my mom, but it turned out that Kevin and Lauren's stuff was still at her mom's house. So our Saturday began with a trip up to the heavily mulleted suburb of Concord--a little of our way but really not a big deal. We arrived to find Lauren's mom sweeping the floor of her garage, which already looked to me to be immaculately clean, but whatever cuz Lauren's mom is just like that. Kevin got out the ladder and climbed up to get the gear, and he didn't fall down or anything so we were off to a good start.

From there it was across the bay into Sonoma County. By this time, however, we had already gotten stuck in a few inexplicable Saturday afternoon traffic jams. Something wasn't quite right and we just couldn't get a break. From my perspective, however, the foreshadowing of the disaster to come can be traced back to an ill-fated trip to Taco Bell, where I haven't eaten in years and won't be back anytime soon. I ordered 3 tacos that came drenched in sour cream that might not have been sour cream at all, and after one bite my crispy shell exploded in my hands, leaving me in the back seat with a giant mess of sour cream, taco "meat," and lettuce with the consistency of Easter basket grass. I could only make it through one and a half of these things before I had to wrap up the remaining mess, stuff it all back in the paper bag, and remove it from my sight.

Needless to say, my stomach was in a state of revolt by the time we reached the campsite, providing me with a good opportunity to check out the bathrooms. From there we picked out our site and starting setting up our tents. My mom had given me a very small backpacking tent, and being a very poor follower of directions I struggled to get it up and it just didn't look right but was still functional enough. The sites were very small and crammed together, but the campground master or whatever he's called had assured us that he strategically placed the young "party kids" at the back of the site and we wouldn't be disturbed. To our right there was a wholesome family of white people that I immediately suspected of being Christians. To our left there looked to be no less than 8 tents with a bunch of middle-aged guys milling about. I gave the patriarch of what I was sure was the Christian family an evil eye that attempted to say don't you dare take out an acoustic guitar or sing any of your damn Christian songs, but otherwise things seemed like they'd be OK.

With our tents set up, Kevin and Lauren and I looked at each other with that unspoken campers' recognition of "well the sun won't be down for several hours, now what do we do?" So down to the river we would go, or try to go as it turned out. The campground master or whatever he's called had told us about a path we could take to get down to the river, but on our way down things became increasingly thorny and bushy, leaving Lauren to wish we had brought a machete. We finally arrived to find only the tiniest of river banks that had already been occupied by--you guessed it--those damn Christians, as I was now certain they were (how else could they have beaten us down there if not for Jesus?) After exchanging some awkward and muffled hellos, we went back into the brush and thorns to look for an alternate path, but with no success. Now what do we do?

We walked back to the campsite and Kevin cracked a beer, but Lauren and I were determined to get to the water, so the three of us got back in the car and started driving. Well, it turns out that this weekend of all weekends was the annual blues festival on the river, which is cool and all but means that thousands of people had descended on this tiny river town. And so we got stuck in another traffic jam. And we still couldn't find another way down to the river, so we turned around. And then we got stuck in another traffic jam. Kevin, being the negative Nancy that he is, wanted to call it a day. Lauren and I were still determined. We parked near the festival and started down to the river, only to be blocked by security. As we walked the band was singing something about being "thankful," but Lauren heard it as "painful." You know you're in trouble when I'm not the most pessimistic and unhappy person in the group. Finally we got to a place with river access but by then the fog had rolled in and it was getting cold. Kevin and I skipped some rocks, and Lauren tried to skip some rocks, and that was pretty much all we had to do. Time to go back and sit in more traffic.

At least now that the sun was almost down we could do what good campers do, which is start a fire and do some cooking. Kevin cooked a bunch of crappy hot dogs but Lauren and I had picked out some pre-made kabobs at the grocery store, and they were hella good as the kids in No Cal are known to say. Kevin chopped wood without losing a finger, and we had a good fire that lasted for several hours. Time to get some shut eye.

Around 10PM some twentysomethings had rolled into the campsite in a Prius, and while getting stoned they started talking about the upcoming election, Clinton, Obama, etc. They weren't talking loud at all, but I guess one of the middle-aged guys to our left had heard enough and started yelling at them. Whatever, I thought, maybe these guys are Republicans, or maybe they just like their peace and quiet. To our right, the people I suspected of being Christians had 3 flourescent lights so bright they could have found a contact lens in the dirt, but they seemed to be playing scrabble and weren't doing any weird Christian shit. Throughout the night the middle-aged guys to our left had their radio tuned into the local classic rock station, and this was fun enough for awhile as Kevin, Lauren, and I rocked out to such staples as "Don't Fear the Reaper" and "In-A-Gadda-Vida." They still had the radio on when we went to sleep, but if they couldn't stand people talking about the election then surely they would be going to sleep soon, right?

It was becoming an increasingly cold night. I hadn't properly blown up my air mattress so I was essentially sleeping on the ground. I had a lot on my mind but eventually I drifted off to sleep. Then I was awake again. Two guys from the campsite to our left were having perhaps the most moronic conservation in the history of conversations. Turns out they were shrooming. With a tone that approximated the illegitimate fathers of Beavis and Butthead, I heard them exchange such barbs as "Man, I believe Jesus was a real person, but he wasn't no son of God." "Yeah, I think the prophets just made that shit up." Then they started talking about threesomes. The radio is still playing this whole time, and the sounds of classic rock have become instruments of torture in my ear as "Cats in the Cradle" comes over the airwaves. The next thing I hear is Kevin get up, unzip the tent, and walk over to say, "It's 5AM, can you turn it down?" Evidently they were so high they didn't even notice his presence until he was standing right in front of them. "Sorry man," they reply and Kevin says "It's cool" and then Lauren starts yelling, "It's NOT cool! You kept us up all night!" I chuckle. Poor Lauren: my brother's flatulence is legendary, and after he filled up on Taco Bell, ball park franks, and beer, he had a farting session that was so bad that she actually had to leave the tent at another point in the night.
The sun is starting to come up in that horrible way when you haven't gotten enough sleep and you know you won't be getting any more. Someone from the campsite to our left has bitched out the shrooming morons, packed up his stuff, and driven away. Then I hear, "Man, you guys burned all the firewood, now what are we gonna do? Ah, you've been up all night, I'm not even gonna try to reason with you." I am half asleep and cursing and muttering. Lauren asks me if I'm OK, and I yell out "I hate life and I wish I was dead!" Then I simply scream at the top of my lungs, "FUCK!!!" Yeah, that's how I roll when I don't get enough sleep.

We get up and start breaking camp. We promise to look back one day and laugh, but we also vow not to go camping for a long, long time. Lauren and Kevin need coffee, and I need a Red Bull, so we're off to Safeway. We pull into the parking lot and in the car next to us there's a guy just sitting there eating a bucket of chicken wings first thing in the morning. What the hell is wrong with this place?