Saturday, January 21, 2017

Day Camp In The Rain

This is an entry from Monday, January 16th; a day off of school in honor of Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday.
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            The pitter-patter of rain on the tarp reminds me of dreary days, when my sisters and I would get out of the house and go play in the barn.  The rain on that metal roof of the barn was loud; sounding like a torrential downpour even when it wasn’t.  Today is nasty; cold, wet, cloudy, and full of perpetual rain.  I am hiking out in it anyways; probably to say I did, and probably because I wanted to see if I could set up a little “Day Camp” to match the picture I had set in my mind’s eye.
            Luckily I had stacked some dry wood in the garage yesterday in case I went out today; a pile of little sticks from our front yard included as kindling.  I placed all of this into an old plastic dog food bag, lashed it to an old sled (after drilling holes in its sides for the rope that held the bag down), and hiked back into this bottom-land, old growth forest.  I cut a ridge pole for a tarp that I brought, and four skinny sticks that I am using to hold up its corners.  It’s not a perfect set up, but it’s on relatively high ground and with the resources I have it’s the best that I can do.  I’ll learn what works, and what needs to be tweaked so I can improve upon it the next time that I hike and cookout in inclement weather.













            My dog Kora is wet and shivering now, and puddles are forming in the low spots on the frozen ground.  Luckily the wood that I brought is dry, because it’s hard to keep the fire going.  In fact, I have to continue blowing on the embers to keep it cooking my potatoes and eggs.  I did manage to get the fire going with one small piece of char cloth and a little nest of material from a splayed section of twine, since no dried grasses were available for the spark from my flint and steel.  It was nothing less than a miracle.
            Laying out a flannel lined ground cloth under the tarp we had as a roof, allowed Kora to curl up on it and begin warming up.  I gave her some remnants of my meal after I had eaten what I wanted.  I am sitting next to Kora now as I watch the fire (after laying an extra jacket over the top of her), and then I pull out my journal to write for a while.  Due to the fact that the air is chilled, it’s hard to sit for long and write, think, or meditate without getting up to move around, readjust while sitting on the ground, or tend to the fire.  Water from the rain and melting snow is also soaking up through the ground cloth that Kora and I are sharing, and I am starting to get wet.
            Since I first parked the Jeep and started this adventure, it’s been over four hours.  It’s time now to break down the camp, repack everything onto my sled, and begin the hike back.  Since I’ve burned all of the wood I brought in, this time I’ll fill the large plastic bag with both my back and hip packs so I don’t have to carry them out.  I will pull them instead.  It will give me a bit of a break.  Although far from pleasant for most people, it’s been perfect; having the droning of the rain in the woods to myself.
            See you along The Way…

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