My Daughter Will Be Motherless…
And other thoughts while camping
About a month into our relationship Natasha and I decided to take an early first step in determining how well we operated together. Packing up my Jeep with all of our camping essentials we put south Seattle in our rear view mirror for the very first time and proceeded via ferry to Orcas Island where Moran State Park awaited our arrival. I was only all too excited having never been to Orcas and seeing all this glorious nature for the first time while Natasha was quite familiar and comfortable with this particular island because of the wedding industry. I recollect her pointing out ‘her tree’ to me and immediately thinking how one day it could become ‘our tree.’ Situated on a speck of land within Cascade Lake, we snapped a quick picture of it in our background. Once we made our campsite, site number 28, I felt compelled to erect our tent as close to the lake as possible without actually being swallowed up by it. I even foolishly decided to set up our tent on uneven land which I will delve into later. We set to exploring these fresh environs by walking hand in hand with our travel trooper of a dog Wilson. He took to his new digs swimmingly, never missing an opportunity to stop for a cool drink. As this was our first trip together outdoors, simply walking together in this wonderland was sublime enough. I now know we would push ourselves to do and see more by hiking to the top of Mt. Constitution under heavy load just a year later no questions asked.
Back at camp we fired up the grill and made hot dogs and drank a few beers while lounging by the lake in our camp chairs watching the sun set. What we failed to do was properly secure the remaining buns as we retired for the evening. And by failing to properly secure the hot dog buns I mean we left them on the picnic table. That singular errorwould shake us to our collective cores later that night. We were already hemmed up enough in that the tent’s zippers were causing me all the fits, not to mention it felt as if our tent would topple over into the lake at any moment due to the ridiculous nature of its orientation. Why on earth I ever decided to position our tent at what appeared a forty five degree angle I will grapple with for the rest of my days. I continually used the phrase “We are in the weeds” the whole night through because in fact we were. Every movement inside the tent nudged us a little deeper to the point past the weeds and the very real possibility of being fully submerged and permanently part of Cascade Lake.
As we finally settled down to sleep remaining quite still not budging so much as an inch lest Cascade Lake drink us up the great outdoors spontaneously burst into life. It sounded too close. The rustling just outside our tent scared her more than me until it didn’t. The more Natasha squeezed hold of me in anticipation of immediate tent invasion the more I began wondering what exactly is out there making all that racket. Chances are raccoons but as we gripped each other tighter our minds wandered to the sheer hopelessness and sad realization that we were perhaps seconds away from becoming bear victims.
Note to self, happy camper/adventure seeker: please maintain positive control of all food stuffs and anything for that matter which may attract the local fauna to your immediate locale. I would further add there was indeed a black bear sighting on Orcas Island over Memorial Day weekend of 2017. We reluctantly awoke and exited the relative safety of our tent to a scene which made perfect sense. It was a rookie move. We left food out on a table in nature and the wildlife came scavenging.
Our first go at it filled us with all the hope and excitement of shared experiences and time well spent doing the types of things we loved. There is a learning curve. We made mistakes and rebounded from them. Make your reservations well in advanced. We lucked out in terms of our stay being a Sunday over Monday and we totally snatched up a last minute spot. But keep in mind that both campsite reservations AND ferry reservations are needed. Plan how to optimize your time once onsite as well as sticking to a healthy balance of relaxation and moments for spontaneity. We’ve found our best, brightest and most beautiful moments together spent walking hand in hand along a body of water with no agenda or expectations. Simply wake up and use all your senses to commune with our natural world.
