Thursday, June 24, 2004
COMMENTS ON CAMPING BY CHRISTINA
I recently returned from a two week backpacking trip in Northern Colorado. Now I love to breath in the fresh mountain air as much as the next girl, but there is something about long term camping that I consider a turn-off. Of course, not everyone would agree with that assessment. For instance, a couple of my trip mates actually became teary eyed upon our return to the city (the natural order of life if you ask me), due to the fact that they missed being in nature. I say 'down with that'...let me clue you in on the cold hard reality of what living outdoors for two weeks really involves.
*Newsflash: You don't get to shower. That means for two weeks you smell pretty bad, starting at the end of day one. By the second week I had a body stench that I never knew I was capable of...it's really rather very sobering to realize how badly the world would smell if cologne, perfume, detergent, and deodorant had not been invented.
*Everything is a hassle. Making dinner is a process of fueling your wick, lighting your stove, balancing your pot over the flame so it's not too hot or too cold. And that's just one part - doing laundry in a stream with your camp suds really doesn't clean anything it simply wets your clothes thoroughly so that you spend the next couple of days praying they will dry before you pass out from the stench of the clothes that are currently on your body. Not to mention that water is suddenly a commodity. No more faucet to get that glass of moisture...now you have to hunt for standing lakes or trickling pools where you will spend a good hour trying to filter "drinkable" water out of the dirty pits. When your finished your water will still be yellowish, green and taste like a swamp. Or if you're really lucky you get to use iodine tablets. Let me tell you, nothing says refreshment like iodine water.
*Anything that has the potential to hurt you...you will run into. For instance, you will step over a rattlesnake without realizing it until after your whole group has passed by...then it will saunter up to you - just to freak you out. At which point some guy stuck in "life as a little boy" mode will catch it so everyone can have photos of the near death experience. Not to mention that your hands and feet will connect with a cactus that sits in the middle of a rock, or on the grass, or on a mountain your trying to paw your way up the side of...and you will spend days trying to get out the pricklies.
*Finally, you get the joy of having to have bowel movements in the great outdoors. That's right, digginig holes will become part of your bathroom routine and you will be disgusted at what you realize exits your unsuspecting body. No matter how hard you try -you will manage to pee on your leg (at least once) and you will hope that noone smells the urine as you get used to its familiar fragrance.
Oh good times...why is everyone so surprised that I don't miss it?? If people were meant to live in the great outdoors we would have never come up with cities, apartments, suburbs, mini-malls, etc. Our way of life is not an attack on nature, it was the way nature was meant to be - hence it won out. Anyway, all this talk has made me tired, I'm going to Starbucks.
Comments-[ comments.]
I recently returned from a two week backpacking trip in Northern Colorado. Now I love to breath in the fresh mountain air as much as the next girl, but there is something about long term camping that I consider a turn-off. Of course, not everyone would agree with that assessment. For instance, a couple of my trip mates actually became teary eyed upon our return to the city (the natural order of life if you ask me), due to the fact that they missed being in nature. I say 'down with that'...let me clue you in on the cold hard reality of what living outdoors for two weeks really involves.
*Newsflash: You don't get to shower. That means for two weeks you smell pretty bad, starting at the end of day one. By the second week I had a body stench that I never knew I was capable of...it's really rather very sobering to realize how badly the world would smell if cologne, perfume, detergent, and deodorant had not been invented.
*Everything is a hassle. Making dinner is a process of fueling your wick, lighting your stove, balancing your pot over the flame so it's not too hot or too cold. And that's just one part - doing laundry in a stream with your camp suds really doesn't clean anything it simply wets your clothes thoroughly so that you spend the next couple of days praying they will dry before you pass out from the stench of the clothes that are currently on your body. Not to mention that water is suddenly a commodity. No more faucet to get that glass of moisture...now you have to hunt for standing lakes or trickling pools where you will spend a good hour trying to filter "drinkable" water out of the dirty pits. When your finished your water will still be yellowish, green and taste like a swamp. Or if you're really lucky you get to use iodine tablets. Let me tell you, nothing says refreshment like iodine water.
*Anything that has the potential to hurt you...you will run into. For instance, you will step over a rattlesnake without realizing it until after your whole group has passed by...then it will saunter up to you - just to freak you out. At which point some guy stuck in "life as a little boy" mode will catch it so everyone can have photos of the near death experience. Not to mention that your hands and feet will connect with a cactus that sits in the middle of a rock, or on the grass, or on a mountain your trying to paw your way up the side of...and you will spend days trying to get out the pricklies.
*Finally, you get the joy of having to have bowel movements in the great outdoors. That's right, digginig holes will become part of your bathroom routine and you will be disgusted at what you realize exits your unsuspecting body. No matter how hard you try -you will manage to pee on your leg (at least once) and you will hope that noone smells the urine as you get used to its familiar fragrance.
Oh good times...why is everyone so surprised that I don't miss it?? If people were meant to live in the great outdoors we would have never come up with cities, apartments, suburbs, mini-malls, etc. Our way of life is not an attack on nature, it was the way nature was meant to be - hence it won out. Anyway, all this talk has made me tired, I'm going to Starbucks.
