Call Me Ishmael... No, Just Crazy...

Okay... one of my main plans this past summer was to go camping. Unfortunately, that didn't happen but once. That occurred just a couple of weeks ago with co-workers. This past Friday I decided to go it alone. I found a book that looked interesting and away I went.

Well... I should have known with the way things went before leaving town that trouble may be lurking. I had to turn around and do the things I planned to in the first place 3 times thinking that I was ready to go. The plus about one of the turn arounds is that I saw my landlord at the Safeway and I gave her next month's rent. Hooray for me!! I'm housed for another month.

Upon getting to Roubaix Lake, in between Pactola Lake and Deadwood, I noticed that where I wanted to camp had a fucking closed sign at the entrance. Not to get discouraged I found a semi alright spot at the entrance of the campground that was opened farthest from the lake.

I'm going to kinda get off of the camping subject [kinda] to bitch about the way the forest service closes campground too early. What the hell do they do that for. If you agree to pack out what you pack in they shouldn't close that premo spots. And so the fuck what if the stupid campground host has left to go back to Arizona or Florida. We are adults and can police the campground for young punks and their all annoying little bitches. Just lower the age in which you can slap these little fuckers and they will stay in line. To my understanding, Isn't the campgrounds Forest Service property thus making them owned by the United States Government to which we own because of the anal raping that happens when they take taxes from me. So in essence, WE own them and should be able to use them anytime we goddamn well want to... I'm I correct on that diatribe? Let's write some rich white man who represents [sic] us and give him or her a railing!!!

Okay... I unload my stuff from the short bus and begin setting up my site. I set my tent and stuff. Now comes the hunt for firewood. I find a downed tree over a little hill, take my $3.60 hand saw, purchased from Menards, and cut 8 logs approx. a foot and a half long and ruck them back to my site. Using the hatchet borrowed from Rosie, [thanks Rosie, I need to buy my own hatchet] I decide to split the logs to make more kindling to burn. I give the first log a healthy whack and it splits down the middle. As it splits, there must have been at least a cup and a half of rain water in the middle of the fucker. Hence.. wet wood doesn't burn very good. So I whack the rest of my haul in two which produced a little under a gallon of rainwater. I thought to myself, "Only in the Black Hills..." I tried to get that wood to burn to no avail. I did smoke the fuck outta the campground. Good thing I brought a propane stove. Once the sun went down I retired to the tent to read a book. After 12 pages or so, I fell asleep reading with both headlamps on. I wake an hour later to dim lights. Again... lucky I brought extra batteries.

If you have never camped in the Black Hills in a designated campground, you will notice that the ground is covered with sharp little rocks and shale shards. I thought I found a relatively safe, even spot to pitch the tent only to be woken to a sharp pain in my hip and back. Little sharp rock!! No biggie, I just rolled the rock by pressing it to the side of the tent. Fine... no more rocks. I didn't see that my tent was at a slight incline and as I slept I kept sliding to one end on the tent. Finally, morning... My adventure ends. The guy across at another site stops on his ATV and asks me, "Did you sleep good last night?" I reply, "Yeah, it wasn't too bad." He procedes to tell me he could hear me snoring clear over at his camp site a good 75 feet away. How embarrasing.

Anyways... camping should be done with more than one person. It makes the experience a lot better. Here are some photos of the little campsite that could....








I'll start camping a little earlier next year...