The Beany Goodness of Campfire Coffee

Kayaking Lake Alice

A Blanding's turtle smiling at us right by our camp site.

A Blanding's turtle coming.



A Blanding's turtle going.

I love camping because it immerses me in nature.  Is it a pain to get up out of a sleeping bag at 4 a.m. and hike down a dark path to a smelly outhouse?  Yes, it is.  But the stars you see in the sky walking back to the tent are so numerous and so marvelous that you think it might be worth the hassle.  Do I sleep better on my mattress with individually wrapped coils and a memory foam top instead of this cot with side rails so unforgiving I had to sleep with straight legs all night?  Yes, I do.  But because I slept on the cot with hard side rails I learned that the tree frogs stop talking about 4 a.m. so I can better hear the spring peepers and the numerous green frogs who were also out there in the wetland.  I heard Virginia rail and sora rail calling from the same swamp.  Some how I assumed the two rails wouldn't mingle in the same swamp but I was wrong about that.  I heard turkeys gobbling in the night.  I heard trumpeter swans trumpeting and sand hill cranes bugling.  I saw a pair of red squirrels chasing each other up one tree and down another.  They ran lickety split across the forest network of branches across a road and down a path.  Another campsite has three customers and they don't use a traditional tent or RV. These campers attach ropes to trees and sleep in hammocks with covers that shed the rain.  I can see the outline of their hips and shoulders as they slumber. The squirrels run across the ropes and across the tops of the hammocks.  Do the sleepers realize the action?  What is the sensation of sleeping in a hammock and to be awakened by a red squirrel running across the top of you?  These squirrels had amazing coordination and acrobatic skill.  And I wondered what was the motivation behind this display of squirrel physical prowess?  Was it play, aggression, joy or fear?  Do squirrels even define their feelings?  I don't know but if I wasn't camping, I would not have stopped long enough to look up and notice.  I kayaked around Lake Alice.  The weeds were thick and showing red flowers above the water.  I saw painted turtles sunning themselves on stumps.  I saw a beaver lodge and was so busy looking at that I didn't notice the green heron standing there until it got scared and flew off while loudly complaining.  While in this campground privacy is limited.  You can see other people as they fix their food, brush their teeth, and organize their stuff.  One Hispanic family had sing a longs in the evening.  Another family had a father who played the ukulele.  Little kids enjoyed biking on the tar paths around the campground.  These kids probably don't have the freedom to bike by themselves like this at home. I think it's cool to see a kid doing wheelies on a bike with 10 inch tires while wearing a Ninja turtle bike helmet.  Some kids played catch with a football.  We watched one kid rub spit onto the football before throwing it back and we were glad we weren't playing catch with him.  One 4 year old boy had large mud boots on that were higher than his knees.  He was kicking water in a puddle at the side of the road and I know for a fact he had water in those boots.  But he was having a good time and that seemed to be the key factor.  People were having fun.  Making a meal takes 3 times as long as it does at home but it's fun.  Putting dirty dishes into a dishwasher is so much easier than heating up water that you carried from a well on a stove or over the file and washing dishes by hand.  We put the clean dishes on the old wooden picnic table as is that clean?  No, that table is definitely not clean.  But we were camping so it's all good. The food that is cooked over an open fire tastes so much better than food cooked in a microwave.  Cook some broccoli in tin foil with olive oil and salt and pepper long enough so it is crispy and brown?  Simply delicious!  Gourmet broccoli! Vidalia onions cooked in butter?  Awesome!  I figured out a way to make camp fire coffee without the mess of a french press.  I use a 2 inch silicone metal strainer to hold the coffee filter and the coffee over a cup and pour hot water through the top.  Yes, a Mister Coffee is quicker and I can walk away from it but camping coffee is more delicious because I can sit in my camp chair and focus on the beany goodness. I can be mindful. I can focus on the task of making coffee and let all the world problems go.  No cares.  No worries.  Coffee is all I think about. As we wash dishes some campers take the path by our camp site.  They see a turtle. We go to look and see a Blanding's turtle in the grass next to the path.  This one looks to be about 5 years old.  The shell has a high dome and a beautiful sheen.  The yellow chin is cheerful and bright.  This turtle doesn't reproduce as early as other turtles.  Many terrible things can happen to a turtle before it reaches the age of sexual maturity which is twelve.  We are lucky to see this rare turtle.  How convenient for us the turtle chose to stroll by while we were there!