We Went Camping, And It Was Good
Thursday, July 30, 2009 Before the Palinode and I went to the BlogHer '09 conference in Chicago, we spent a few days camping in heaven Cypress Hills, where this — THIS — is what sits ten feet outside your tent:
Personally, I'm a fairly areligious person, but something about nature removed from urbanized humanity makes me want to fall to my knees. Even a simple pie fry over a campfire traces patterns of wonder on my brain:
This is how I found myself crawling on elbows and knees over carpets of pine needles:
and along cattle paths through scrub brush:
Thanks to our travelling companions, C and G, we ate decadently and with abandon. I grew a rather impressive food baby out there in the woods.
Have you ever eaten smoked Shropshire blue cheese? No? Your tastebuds are VIRGINS.
Please enjoy the following photograph, because it is the one that has probably ended my life. Palinode, I love you.
Strangely, the forest we were in was rife with cows. You'd be hiking along, silently thinking ticks, omigod, is that a tick in my pants? holy crap, ticks, and suddenly your sneaker would land in giant, warm pile of fresh cow shit.
On the drive home from our camping trip, we decided to turn into our parents and visit a museum dedicated to a piece of Canadian history, Fort Walsh. We went on this guided tour of the fort lead by people in period costumes, and they pointed at various period items and told us a very cleaned up version of the history of the beginnings of that part of Canada as it pertained to our aboriginal brothers and sisters. Apparently everyone was treated equally and there was no racism and the government just wanted the best for everyone concerned.
It's weird to hear lies like that. It's inappropriate. We know better. It's like watching an entire community willfully deny that there's a pedophile in their midst. Lies are a continuance of the crime.
Anyway, I always find historic sites that have been rebuilt and outfitted to look like a specific time period to be really creepy. Creepy in the way that those dolls with eyes that open and shut are creepy. There is never any dust, and everything is lined up at right or 45-degree angles just so, and the pantries are filled with plastic food so that the people with the plastic heads don't get hungry.
Maybe it's just me. It's probably just me.
I shouldn't harp on period reconstructions for creepiness, though, because I can be pretty damn creepy all on my own.
We walked up the hill when we left the fort and visited an old graveyard. When a camera is in my hands, I often forget where I'm walking and, apparently, WHAT BABY'S GRAVE I'M LYING ON. If it helps, that baby probably died in the 1920s, but it didn't help my creep factor at the time when I got the shot and rolled over to see another cross with baby-something painted on it and I realized that I was lolling about on the graves of children.
And some people wonder why I am in therapy.
And then our camping trip was over, and we did not even die from the lack of running water, electricity, or flush toilets.
The End.
Reader Comments (24)
Poop photography? On a non-mommy blog? Isn't that cheating?
Poppy Buxom, without a baby around here, I've got to seek out my poop opportunities.
That first pictures is spectacular. Just wonderful.
I haven't been to Cypress Hills in years, and now I want to again. Very badly.
It sounds like a great trip. It makes me want to go camping! Or maybe think about going camping, as I am not really much of an actual camper. It's fun to pretend, though.
Considering the diet I've been on, looking at that photo of that bleu cheese sandwich feels a little like looking at porn. I'm kind of aroused and a bit shameful.
Damn woman, I keep checking to see if you'll have posted a BlogHer recap, and then this - I gasped in awe with you at the bounty of nature and doubted my religious doubtyness, then I ogled your food, then I snorted with laughter at you rolling on baby graves.
Well, OK then.
Kelly, get thee to Cypress Hills. It was the most gorgeous and inexpensive vacation I've taken in years.
Leslie, the Palinode and I aren't major campers, either. We've only gone twice before in the last eight years, and both times were a bust. We actually neglected to bring the tent poles one time.
PS. You should completely blow your diet with some smoked Shropshire blue cheese.
GingerB, the BlogHer entry is coming, I swear, but I haven't even gotten around to the photos yet. *hangs head in shame*
I love these pictures, especially that second one. Very cool.
I'm glad you had no Blogher post up yet. I am absolutely bloghered out. And I didn't even go.
I figured I had a problem with other day when I wanted to take the kids with me to the old graveyard to take pictures, and it occured to me that it's odd someone might find it creepy and weird...
Great, great pictures. They really made me want to go camping. Or, at least, go outside.
Gorgeous pics. Absolutely beautiful. I agree completely with your comment on being areligious, but in the face of such natural beauty.... it is hard to deny some kind of higher power at work.
Thank God there are photographers that can capture it to share with everyone. ;)
Those pictures are fantastic!
Except for the cow shit. That's just cow shit.
But the rest of them are fantastic!
He's a fly fisherman? Swoon. Everyone looks good in waders, I tell you.
The Holmes, thanks! That second one surprised me. I was sure that it wouldn't come out.
thordora, I've always had a bit of a thing for graveyards, but the rolling around on babies' graves thing was one step I never thought I'd take.
notquiteawake, you just made me realize that I've barely been outside since. Yikes.
Amy@Bitchin'WivesClub, when you live in Saskatchewan, pictures of beautiful summer can help get me through the darkest winter days.
Imnotbenny, do you have a problem with photos of crap?
Magpie, the Palinode just took again that weekend after decades away from it. He's cute, no?
That is some seriously runny cow poop. Maybe it had some Shropshire...
i am struck by the comprehensiveness of your post. a little bit of something for everyone (even the creepy baby grave stompers).
and no, it is not just you who is taken aback by the whole "let's rewrite history so we will look good in our bonnets" thing. it's everywhere and i hate it.
I can't believe they tell the story like that!! So false. Those villages creep me out too. It's just weird.
Hi. I have a blog at www.picturecamping.com where I feature people's posts about camping, and I would like to send my readers your way. Of course I would give you credit for quotes and would link back to your site.
Thanks for considering this,
Jean B. in SC
I feel exactly the same way about nature and spirituality. I belong to the Church of Mountain, where the doctrine is gratitude.
Lift thine eyes to the hills.
Gorgeous photos, as usual!
Even if it IS the picture that ends your life it was probably worth it.
I laughed out loud, and not in a LOL way either, in the loud "HA!" way that frightened my children.
Absolutely fantastic photos, especially the third one. Non-photogs never understand why we do things like crawl in the dirt. Glad you had a good camping trip. I'm hoping to get out this summer but it's not looking good.
That headlamp/blue plate shot is just about the coolest thing I've ever seen. I love it. It makes me hungry.
What business do you have eating something that looks so gourmet and delicious while camping? You're making me hungry.
Very true and justified creeped-outedness at the tidy living diorama. Quit making me hungry.
Oh, and I'm still all glowy from having met you in Chicago. Right this moment is where I was about to whine about the two of you coming east to visit someday, but then my psychic flux capacitor kicked in and told me not to worry, that you will, someday. It's only fitting. I will stock blue cheese.
Cypress Hills is now on our list of camping places to check out. Thanks!
Jesus H. Christ but thems are some beautiful photos - I know I've already commented on them but they're so good I had to comment on them again. Looking at them give me tingles.