Health & Fitness
Camping at a Different Degree
Hopefully soon, with the growing homeless population as we speak, a community campground shelter would be the only way and the best way to help out the homeless challenge get back on their feet.
It’s a joy to be camping out. It’s so peaceful at night. No problem with the skunks anymore. I’ve put out a variety of snacks for them. It’s a regular smorgasbord. The rest of the country is getting fried. I’m sure we’ll get a few good heat waves ourselves here.
If I please, my good friend Sandy Cam has a pool in her backyard and usually welcomes friends over to cool off on an extra hot occasion, plus a brand new barbecue, which I broke in last year.
I love to barbecue, it’s my favorite way to cook. I’m so good at barbecue, I could barbecue ice cream, that’s what I tell people anyway. It’s a joke. By the way, I hate gas barbecues. That’s not barbecue. My barbecue has wood and a little charcoal. That’s when you get the real barbecue touch and flavor. Our ancestors never had charcoal. Wood was their fuel for everything. Which back in the day was plenty to go around.
Find out what's happening in Campbellwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
That reminds me, I'll never forget when two of my good friends and I went on a camping trip to Yosemite in my ’66 Volkswagen bug. Two ice chests: one with food, one with beer, three sleeping bags, paper plates, silver ware, a few cooking utensils and a screen grill I took off my old barbecue. I figured I’d get some large stones and wood with the grill on top and that’d be sufficient.
It was late September and when we approached the gates of Yosemite, there were a few scattered thunderstorms. When it was time to make dinner, I had no problem finding stones to balance my grill on. Little bit of wood I found was damp. I looked around and noticed people in a large motor home, about 60-70 yards away, had lighter fluid and were done cooking and in home munching down in their the mansion on wheels.
Find out what's happening in Campbellwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
So I cool and calmly walked toward my prize. You see, I had 200 friends and I was the chef. I couldn’t let them down. Besides, I was hungry also.
I don’t mess around when it comes to cooking, even out on the woods. I mean, the menu that evening was peppered hickory, grilled T-bone steak topped with sautéed garlic mushrooms, asparagus, backed beans with red peppers and union and some more added bacon chunks. My friends love me. I always made a good meal.
You see, I was a natural at cooking. My full blooded German grandmother was a brilliant cook. She was one step beyond, with talent. I used to watch her when I was very young, 5 or 6 years old. I began to take interest in what I was observing. We would have family gatherings on certain Sundays in Modesto. Five families all on my mother’s side would gather at Anna Albee’s, my grandmother, and on the table would soon appear roast beef, ham, turkey, mashed potatoes, real mashed potatoes, yams, stuffing, green beans, scalloped potatoes, broccoli and cheese, two gravies, rolls, relish tray. Grandma was a large, strong, cold-blooded German. My great grandparents and beyond settled in Wisconsin dairy farming and then migrated to California.
Grandma did everything on that menu that was important. She would recruit my aunts and mother for dishing washing and whatever. Her timing was incredible. She would have all the food on the table, after cooking of course, in 20-30 minutes. She always made sure that everything was hot. I inherited her senses and her talent for good talented cook. Back to Yosemite.
The fluid did what I wanted. Put on the wood, mind you I put the fluid back to my neighbors and their castle on wheels. Soon, my friends and I were gorging on this wonderful cuisine that I had done with pride.
Half way through the meal, looking over toward my kind neighbors, that didn’t know they had loaned me their lighter fluid, they started to come out of their estate on wheels. One of the elder ladies had a plate in her hand and started to make a beeline toward our camp. She had a smile on her face and was getting close to us by now. I thought she had seen us take the lighter fluid and was being cool about it.
“Hi guys, how are you doing?”
What we saw on her plate was hot dogs and beans. She was gazing at our happy meal and said, she was wondering if we were hungry.
“It looks like you’ve got dinner all figured out.”
She obviously was going to offer us hot dogs and beans. She said: “What is it that you young gentlemen are dining on tonight.”
I told her and she was laughing and said, “Just wait until I tell my family.”
“Truth is, my family thought you were homeless and hungry” she said, and we were eating gourmet food. “They wanted me to offer you some hot dogs and beans but it looks like you’re eating at a gourmet restaurant.”
She walked away laughing and couldn’t wait to tell her family what she had found. Five or six minutes later, we heard a small burst of laughter and they were all looking over and waving.
It’s a time I will never forget. I love camping and that’s what I’m doing right now. Its a whole different format from a legal campground. No picnic table, no barbecue, no cement bathrooms and no beautiful sights that can ever come close to the beauty that Yosemite has to offer. Although the Los Gatos Creek Trail has some nice wooded areas to dig in, that are very peaceful and sooth me just fine, after all , most people work all year. And what do they do, they go camping.
Hopefully soon, with the growing homeless population as we speak, a community campground shelter would be the only way and the best way to help out the homeless challenge get back on their feet.
The opinions expressed here are the blogger's and not necessarily those of the local editor's or anyone affiliated with Patch.