Beginning :: first there were tents

The weather was good.

We were feeling full of optimism.

Camping, real, wild camping seemed like a good idea.

And it was.

For three glorious days the sun shone and the sky stayed that spectacular blue that you only get in Summer.

I cooked each meal on an open fire using a home made tripod, I felt like a frontier woman as I fried eggs and toasted bread whilst perched over our hastily made stone ringed fire pit.

We had modest bathroom facilities.  A large metal basin for washing and long grass for, well, other stuff.

We built a shed and a shelter, and as the last few nails were hammered in, the heavens opened.

My goodness.

They really opened.  We watched from inside the shed as the fire pit sizzled and gradually filled with rain, and then we watched some more as the rain puddled and poured down the hillside, and gushed out of springs in the ground.

It rained for two days, and for those two days we huddled under the shelter or in the shed, or occasionally in the car.  

By the end of it we were all soaked through and there wasn't a dry item of clothing between us.  We packed away wet tents and wet sleeping bags and wet children, and were promised by neighbours that it was a freak summer storm.

There were good bits though.  Sitting in the shed with steaming mugs of tea (at this point I stopped the frontier lark and used the small camping has stove) and playing parlour games is a memory I'm sure we will all remember. After having only tents the shed felt like a luxury, and we were all grateful to have a dry space to sit in, even if our clothes were soaked through.

We returned to the house full of plans and ideas.  Our clothes were damp but our spirits were high.