12 June 2011 (Sunday) - Rained Off

 

I didn’t sleep very well, and despite a good gutful of ale and port, I only slept for two hours, opening the gate at 6am. I then spent a little while tidying up the wreckage of the previous evening’s drinking session. Being rather “oiled” at the time myself, it never occurred to me to wonder how my nephew’s idiot mates had gotten that oiled as well. I found out as I tidied up. Our half-bottle of Southern Comfort was empty. As was our quarter bottle of vodka. And the full bottle of home made wine the park ranger had given us. And most of the bottles of lager that my brother had brought along. And I’m sure my barrel of home-brew was a lot emptier than how I’d left it.

After brekkie I refilled the water container and gossiped with Simon. And then I had a look at Bryan’ event shelter. For all that I’d spent thirty-plus quid on new gazebos, they weren’t really standing up to the wind and rain that he weekend was throwing at them. And our old folding gazebo has seen better days. A Coleman’s even shelter might just be the ideal solution for a covered area outside our mess tent, or even to replace our mess tent.

Simon then roasted a Camembert for our lunch, and we played Blokus as we listened to the rain of the tent. ‘er indoors ^TM was about to go shopping for the makings of tea when we stopped and had a think. The weather was awful with no respite forecast. With “Daddies Little Angel ^TM ” ill and going home with the next transport, were we to stay overnight there would be four of us to take down a wet camp. At that moment there were eleven of us. So we decided to abandon ship. Normally taking down the camp takes most of a morning. With the concerted effort of eleven of us we were packed up and  on the way home in less than two hours.

We’ve still got a wet mess tent and our tent and it’s groundsheet to dry off, but were we to stay we would probably have had that anyway. Much as I enjoy camping, when camping one is seriously at the mercy of the elements, and today (and all this camp really) the elements had not been kind to us. Which was a shame….