I'll protect you

I do not count the backyard sleepovers in tents as camping. I had my fair share of them. They were usually miserable. There were always too many girls, freezing, half the time we bailed and ended up in the house. One time I was the girl flanking the tent door, it rained all night, the door leaked and to this day I can not forget how wet and cold I was. Another time it was my back yard and the tent had a hole in it the exact size of my labrodor retriever's head. We wouldn't let her in the tent so she spent the night with her head through the hole looking at us. This turned out to be a good thing becuase it kept out the swarms of misquitos that plague Minnesota in the summer.

My first real camping experience was after I had left home.
He and I were traveling to from South Central Colorado to meet up with friends at Lake Mead Nevada. We were on a kind of a farewell tour. Planning on going our seperate ways after Lake Mead. This is an account of the beginning of a road trip that changed course daily and to this very day is still going on. Being the perfect gentlemen he had an extra sleeping bag for whoever that lucky girl was. Turned out I was the lucky girl. We had to pick up a tent on the way., It was a three to five hour drive from where we started to a town where we could even buy a tent. Durango Colorado. This included crossing some 10000 foot passes in a snow storm at night. The sporting goods store would be long closed when we got there but he being the charmer that he is, called ahead and convinced the store owner to meet us when we got into town.

We left Durango in the late evening and continued west. Left the mountains and the snow behind us. Into the high desert. Somewhere, not sure if it was Colorado or Utah he drove down an unmarked road in search of a place to camp. "Do you know this road is on an Indian Reservation?" I said. "Yeah, I know." "Should we be here?" "Yeah, it will be ok." He pulled off the road and started zipping the sleeping bags together. "What about the tent?" "I'm tired, it's late, we don't need it." "Why did we make such an effort to get one?" "In case we need it." "But there are snakes, and spiders and...." "I'll protect you." Damn, I am such a sucker for "I'll protect you". I kind of melt when I hear that. So we crawled into our sleeping bags on the desert floor. I was sure I would wake up surrounded by Indians pointing their bows and arrows at me, a rattlesnack in my sleeping bag and a scorpian in my shoe. The stars were infinite. No moon in sight. I was protected.

It turns out you do not sleep late when sleeping under the stars. It also turns out our Indian reservation was part of a national monument. A geographical wonder. I awoke at that time of day as the sun was coming up. That time of the day when everything looks on fire. Strange rock formations jutted from the flat valley floor where we lay. It was amazing. Did this man I was lying beside plan this visual feast for me to wake up to? Is this how he wanted me to experience this eye candy made by God? Did this next to the last of the true romantics just get lucky steering down a random road in the night.
I like camping.