Off the grid

I honestly cannot remember ever camping. Like actually cooking fire over a fire or hotplate, sitting on giant logs swatting away the mozzies, or even sleeping in a tent that was pitched by someone in my company. I’m sorry, Dad, if we did all this and I just forgot, but the closest remember to “roughing it” is the log cabins that I slept in at Daddy-Daughter Girl Scout retreat. So needless to say, I was anxious how this would turn out.

Thank lord Matt and Keegan (Meegan?) purchased a bundle of camping equipment from an online ad because they graciously shared their stove, table, chairs, pasta, sleeping mats, tent, etc.

We drove (Matt had bought a car and did all the driving, again thank heavens for that) out to a random campsite. Of course we had a vague map and no cell service so by the time we got there, the sun was beginning its descent. We boiled some noodles and topped with dollar pasta sauce for dinner...yum..and set up our tents haphazardly. The kookaburras laughed us to sleep, and if you have never heard the sound a kookaburra makes, please click here. Then imagine them all around you as you try to sleep through rain and wind in the middle of nowhere. Creepy.

We packed up and went to climb the “1000 Steps.” It is a memorial to the Australian soldiers who, in WWII, had to march the 96 kilometer Kokoda Trail in Papua New Guinea amidst their grueling fight.

We also were able to wander the William Ricketts sanctuary where, in Thoreau fashion, a man lived in a cabin in the woods and dedicated his whole life to creating sculptures that embrace Aboriginal spirituality and respect for nature.

For the next two nights we camped in an abandoned town hall lot, which was sanctioned on their website as a camping ground due to its disuse (we’re not bums, mom, I promise). It was crazy windy, dropping the temperature. I could have sworn I came to Australia so that I never had to wear a jacket again, boo. We ventured during the day to Wilson’s Promontory National Park. As the clouds cleared up, I was able to snag so gorgeous panoramas. Now this is the Australia I was hoping for!

As my computer is dying, our camping adventure will continue in the next post. I’m missing all my friends back home and sending warm thoughts your way. I can’t wait to see the American parties that AU throws for the superbowl, which airs live at 10:30am (getting my day-drink on!) Go Patriots!