There are countless reasons I love living in Clemson, South Carolina and one of them is the weather! It is always changing! Two weeks ago we had snow and the weather man is calling for snow later this week, but with South Carolina’s ever-changing climate it was warm enough to wear shorts last weekend! I took advantage of this warm weather and packed my back pack for a camping trip! On Saturday, a friend of mine asked me if I would like to go camping and I decided to take a chance and go. Let me tell you that I have never been camping in my entire life and I had no idea what to expect, but it was an adventure that I will never forget. Before last weekend I didn’t know the first thing about pitching a tent, starting a fire, or how to tie boy scout knots, but I am so glad that I decided to go! The weather was beautiful and the place we camped was literally a fifteen minute drive from campus. I didn’t even have to leave Clemson to enjoy Mother Nature!
I would like to share with you some of the things that I learned how to do this weekend. Some of this may be common sense to you, but you might learn something new just like me too! We rented our camping equipment from Fike Recreation Center on campus and then went to Wal-Mart and picked up some supplies like food, matches, and other bare necessities. I was told to pack light, but my load was definitely heavy! From the beginning of the day, the trip was an adventure. Just picking out our campsite and hiking our stuff down was a lot of work! The first thing we did was set up the tent and sleeping bags. Setting up the tent was nothing like you see in the movies where they spend three hours trying to stick the stakes in the ground and the tent ends up lopsided. Our tent went up with no trouble at all!
My next lesson was making a fire. We had to clear the land so we didn’t have to worry about catching things on fire! Then we had to collect kindling and firewood. I wasn’t very good at this…Ha-ha! I mainly sat back and watched this happen! I have a lot more observing to do before I feel comfortable building a fire by myself! Once the fire was blazing, my next lesson was to learn about different knots. Again, I wasn’t very successful with this…It took me A LOT of tries to successfully tie the knot I was being taught. It was definitely frustrating, but I finally got it!
For dinner we decided to cook steak with peppers, zucchini, and potatoes! Yum! We definitely bought too much food! I learned that the meal we cooked was called a Hobo dinner, like poor man’s food, but it didn’t taste like a poor man’s dinner! For the rest of the evening, we told each other pointless stories by the fire. We called it a night early, because it was starting to get really cold. This was something that I wasn’t prepared for! I had a few layers of clothes, but I couldn’t keep my face warm! Ha-ha! I spent all night rolling around trying to keep my face warm. After awhile, I got comfortable and fell asleep.
Around 8:30, I woke up to the sound of birds chirping and a wood pecker pecking away at a tree. That is an experience that I will never forget. It was such a peaceful way to wake up. No alarm clocks, just nature gently waking you. We cooked the rest of our steak for breakfast and made scrambled eggs and oatmeal. Another tasty and successful meal! We packed up our gear and headed to my car later that afternoon.
My first camping trip is something that I will always remember. This trip will be especially memorable, because I did it while I was a Clemson student and I took this trip with people who are important to my Clemson experience. Camping is something unique to Clemson University and it is an activity that most college students can’t participate in fifteen minutes from campus! I hope to go camping again this semester with more of my friends so that I can share what I have learned with them. Maybe I will even get more experienced with building fires and knot tying!
