I always seemed to get talked into going camping at the worst possible time of the year and the worst climates, with what turns out to be inadequate equipment.
I remember, during my misspent youth, waking up, freezing, in a collapsed tent, wet through and soaked from the relentless rain all night.
I had not helped matters the night before, once we realised that we had left one of the two tents several miles back in the car park where we had been dropped off.
I was supposed to have carried it, apparently.
So myself and one other had to walk all the way back to the car park to retrieve the tent. Thankfully it was still there, but I was about as popular as
The Wicker Man remake.
By then the rain had started.
And did not stop until the morning.
The late arrival of the tent was even less appreciated at this point.
I watched, full of sympathy, as other souls struggled and failed to erect the second tent, which was eventually given up on and left looking like a low budget, canvas version of
THE BLOB on the muddy ground.
I was one of the souls confined to this tent of course.
A surreal touch was added the next morning when I woke to the sound of a sheep bahh-ing outside the tent, obviously curious as to why a flat pile of canvas with several large lumps in it was next to a pristine erected tent.
Not been keen on camping since.
But I will go again one day.
)
