Apparently So

Every other black person who I've told about this past weekend (Thursday through Monday) seem to all ask me the same question. Do black people go camping. Well, since I'm black and I went along with some others, I guess the answer has to be a resounding yes. I was a camping virgin, but I actually had a great time. At first when some friends bought the idea to me, I did Diva's infamous ::sideeye:: because I was not really feeling giving up the Sealy Posturpedic in exchange for ingrown tree roots and gravel.

We went to Wally World to make preparations and purchases. As God would have it, we bumped into a black lady who was a camping expert. She told us everything that we needed to do. Oh I left this part out. Of the three guys, none of us had been camping before. She even took us to her car and gave us three checklists of stuff to bring and directions to a local camping site. The place was only about 1.5 hours away. So, we had no camping experience and didn't even know where we were going to go to camp. I'm so glad we ran into Marcia for two reasons. One, she was able to share her wisdom about camping with us. She absolutely loves it. That totally came across while she was speaking. ::Sidebar::While I was listening to her--the passion with which she spoke about camping, I kept thinking to myself that she should start a business. I told her that. She told me that her father had been trying to get her to do that for a while now. I told her that my being a complete stranger and delivering to her the same message was confirmation of the vision. Habbukah, baby.::end sidebar::The second reason I'm glad we ran into her is that it reassured me about the feasibility of this whole endeavor. Prior to hearing her share her positive experiences and give us tricks-of-the-trade, I was still kinda leery about going. When we parted with her I was kinda hype.

So we arrive on Thursday around three in the afternoon and pitch the tent. The setup with quite simple. I had no idea that the tent was just one piece of material sewn together. For some reason I thought we were going to have to put on multiple pieces, but whatever.

That night we previewed the hiking trails and came back to fix something to eat. During the time there we ate chicken breasts, pork chops, hamburgers, zucchini and yellow squash. One night we took the chicken breasts, zucchini and yellow squash and put it in some foil with some Italian dressing. Banging! Here's a fire from one night with some food on the grill.

The next morning we went on a 4.5 mile hike that took us across the summit of a mountain. Yes, we went all the way up the mountain and back down again. Fortunately, for me and everyone else, while in the woods, I didn't see any bright eyes.

In this picture, notice the sign. Almost a mile high. I know that's nothing for a mountain, but I had to show proof.


I decided to stage a fake rock climbing picture, just in case I wanted to revel friends and acquaintances with tales of danger. Notice the strain on the face.

At some point during the hiking trail we ran up on a waterfall.

Somewhere during the course of the stay we went fishing. I didn't catch anything, but Dre did. Trav caught two fish but threw them both back. No picture for that. Actually we went fishing twice. The second time we went fishing I saw a water moccasin. It came up to the edge of the pond and I assume turned back. I say assume because as soon as I saw it swimming my way I straightway dropped my rod and put Carl Lewis to shame. If he saw me running from the snake, he'd give back his medal.

On a lighter note, I did manage to snap some Bambis who were all up and through them woods.

One night out there we ran into the lady from WalMart. We knew she was going to be at the same camping site because she mentioned it in the store. She invited us to dinner one night. We turned down the dinner invitation but agreed to come back for dessert. She made a strawberry cobbler. She was with two others. We all sat around the campfire laughing and telling tales. Good times indeed. Marcia asked us if we had made smores. I told her no and she absolutely insisted that we have some smores. They were a bit sweet, but at least I can say I've had them.

Somewhere during the camping adventure my phone got messed up. No one knows what happened. I've been in negotiations with Sprint for two days. My new phone should arrive by Friday. The whole Sprint fiasco is another blog post unto itself. After looking at my phone, they said they weren't sure if they'd be able to fix it. I was flabbergasted. Look at that picture. Does it look like I was interested in a repair? I've caught up on a few blogs. I should be making the rest of my rounds today.

I can say that this was fun for me. I'll do it again. Now I want to go ahead and cross some more stuff off my list. I need to skydive, hang glide and ski. Anybody wanna go?