Good Times (alternatively: Long Post is Long)
Yeah, I know there was promise of a camping update for when I got back last summer, but sad to say it was thwarted by the ineptitude that is IE7. Had a good couple-page long post written out, and it was whisked away in a browser crash.. and I never really felt like rewriting it. Excuses aside, you can now have a detailed account of it today, along with an update of whats been going on around here.
As for the camping trip, Conley and I did a fantastic job at getting up on time and packing my BEIGE FORD EXPLORER with all the camping gear two people could ever need for a 5 day trip. The third friend who was considering coming along in the end didnt, very fortunate for us; as the truck and the canoe were both very full with only us two. After packing up at around 8am, we headed to find where Conley's dad put the canoe. Bill (Conley's father, short for hillbilly not actually his name) has the reputation for being quite intelligent, but doing a lot of stupid things; probably due to not thinking through. We got lucky this year and only had to check 3 places to find it, at a cottage. Last year it was locked to a post in the middle of a swamp behind a construction site. Yeah, doesnt make sense to me either, haha.
I drove us down to Algonquin with the traditional barely tied down canoe on the roof. Arriving at park entrance at about 3pm, I parked at the dock and we loaded the canoe to the brim with gear, stuffing and shuffling things around so we could fit in afterwards. After parking and locking the truck in the lot, we were off, the brim of the canoe dangerously close to the water. Heres the funny part of the trip; the site we picked out ahead of time as the ultimate spot was pretty far away. In fact, it was 23 kilometers away. 19 worth of canoing, followed by 2 of portage, then another 2 back in the canoe.
Tired and sunburned, we reach shore as the sun is starting to turn the sky orange, probably around 9pm. With an awkward laugh, we decide what to do with the overstuffed canoe worth of gear for the 2km hike. Our original plan was to drag the whole load down the properly groomed, flat and grassy path to the next water. This was quickly ruined when after a brief attempt we find that none of those three things are true; rocky and rooty dirt path with plenty of warn steep slopes await us. We grab a couple packs, throw the canoe over our heads, and set off leaving the rest of the equipment in the woods for another trip. 2km of rough hiking with that much stuff, after 19km of canoing is incredibly tiring, let me tell you, haha. And the bugs were horrible! We eventually reach the far shore, drop off our canoe and start the hike back, the sun now at the horizon. Dusk is setting in when we make it to our stuff, and unfortunately, theres still more than we could possibly carry in one trip. So we grab all we can carry, a few garbage bags/packs full of gear(and our food) and leave the rest in the woods, hidden to pick up hopefully in the morning.
About half way down the trail, were both absolutely exhausted, having to sit on our bags for a rest every 5 minutes. Which normally wouldnt be bad, but the sun had fully set, leaving us alone, worn out, and only the moon-light through the trees to see the path (or bears) by. We do eventually reach the shore, tossing everything in the canoe and pushing off aimlessly into the pitch-black lake, laying back panting for air. After a rest, we sit up and aim ourselves for the tree-line in the middle of the water. Fortunately for us, the campsite we wanted was one of three on a decent sized island, allowing us to actually locate the site in the dark!
The 2km canoe went slow, but it was a lot better than the portage, and the water was calm and cold. Approaching the island, we paddle around looking for the little orange marking signifying a campsite, and we find one quickly, crashing ourselves into the shore. Then I see it. A triangle. A blue and green triangle. Someone else's tent. The spot was already claimed! After an attempt to read the map to spot another site location, and failing, we head around the island to the side with the most moonlight looking for another sign. And, after doubting our own eyes, we do spot one; but in a peculiar spot with no flat surface that seems camp-able, just a tree, and a cliff. We crash onto shore again, eying the sign from up close to confirm its existence, we climb up said cliff, and theres a fire pit with logs around it, and a decently flat spot. Even better, there was no tent set up here. It may have been 11pm, but we made it.
We start unpacking the canoe, dragging bags up the cliff. Conley unloads, and I move them to the flat spot, with one bag left to move, I leave it up to Conley and start removing the tent from the package to set it up before collapsing. Poor Conley. After all this we already dealt with, he picks the bag up and curses. One of our booze bottles had broken at some point during the portage, and had sliced his thumb open good. With more cursing, he drags the bag more carefully near the fire pit, and as I set up the tent he grabs the medical box and cleans himself up. The tent goes up, and band-aid goes on, and after a brief clean up of the broken glass and licorice-scented alcohol we throw all the crap in the safety of the tent and take a well earned break on the logs around the fire pit. We decide a fire-less meal and drink (oh god so thirsty) was due, we break out the crackers and jube-jubes and propane cooker ourselves some hot-but-clean-lake-water-kool-aid. We scarf down the snacks and get the water boiled and mixxed, then set the ever-so-hot kool aid in the lake to cool down. An hour goes by, and it had barely cooled enough to drink. Gorging outselves on the hot drink, we have another short sit around the fire-pit, where I proceed to throw up bright red and jelly-chunk filled liquid, tie-dyeing the bushes. After a laugh, we go to our sleeping bags and crash for the night. Slanted, hard, bumpy ground never felt so good.
We awoke decently early, perhaps around 9 or 10. The muscle pain was ridiculous. My face and arms were peeling pretty good, Conley was just bright red. As tired as we were the day before, this was worse. Fortunately, there wasnt a 27km (23 two extra 2 portage) trek to do today, and we could take a break.. at least for a couple hours before we had to pick up what was left in the woods at the far end of the portage. Our hours of break consisted of exploring the campsite, which had some brush-cleared forest that was pretty nice, and a dug out shit-pit with wooden-box-seat. Cooked some instant noodles and ate a bit more of the crackers, and some now-cooled kool-aid to wash it down while sitting around the fire pit. Eventually, we set off the in canoe again to pick up our gear, muscle pain and Conley's cut thumb slowing us down, but it got done, and it went fairly well, all things considered. Getting back, we relaxed in our collapsible camping-chairs, have another cool drink, and enjoy the nature for the first real time, no more difficult tasks to worry about. We laze the day away, a bit of hiking on our island too, and start a fire with limited difficulty. We get better at it every year. Cooking ourselves some hot-dogs for the last meat dinner of the trip, nightfall comes and we head into the tent for an early night.
Another early morning, probably around 7 or 8 this time. Day three, the day of "enjoying" the trip was here. Standard morning things happen with food and drink, we do what we can to pass time without leaving the island for more than a short canoe trip with no purpose besides seeing the sights. Afternoon comes, and decides its late enough; Conley grabs our stuff from the tent and we investigate. Conley went and got us some quality Mexican shrooms from THE INTERNETS, and a fair quantity of them as well, around 6 grams. Now, we both had done shrooms before, me only once (the camping trip a year before), but we never really had a real trip; just the enhanced colours and music that comes with low doses. We split ourselves up 3 grams each into tiny pieces, which are mixxed into lemon extract to cover their horrible gag-reflex-inducing taste. Conley drinks his a few minutes before me, as I was more meticulous with the size of my pieces. We sit ourselves in the camp chairs, and toss on some MP3 player music, and gaze out on our amazing cliff-top view of the lake.
Now, for those who havent done hallucinogens, like myself at this time, Im going to describe this with a bit of detail. I always wondered, and was a bit skeptical, on how people see things when on drugs. Visualizing things that arent there with your eyes didnt make sense to me in the least. This experience let me understand.
Time passed, colours became brighter, music deeper. Our stomach's got progressively more nauseous. Peripheral vision fluctuates and bright colours creep out from out from around the outside range of your vision. And right at this point, a family of people start to row by in their canoe. Conley freeks and runs to the tent before they see us, hes a few minutes worse off than me so I follow casually. A few minutes pass, and I desperately want out of the tent, as bad as he wanted in, so out we went. The people had passed, and we went back to the chair. The music goes on again, still normal at this point to me. Conley heaves over the other side of his chair, and I give a good laugh, but still feeling pretty sick myself. I manage to keep it down a while yet, another 15 minutes of music go by before I start. However, this extra time was enough for my body to absorb a goood deal more of the chemical(s) than Conley. The music is very strange. If youve heard songs by Apex Twin, where notes are slowly drawn out and repetitive, small changes everywhere but still very similar.. this is what all music I heard was like at this point. Even people's voices were stretched beyond recognition, droning on in repetitive tones than I could never, no matter how hard I tried, begin to predict. The colours from my peripheral vision break out into snake or worm-like patterns, squirming around, moving in further from the sides. I still feel sick, and throw up occasionally.. but strangely, the experience of puking wasnt unpleasant.. you feel a little better, and the audio and visuals keep your mind occupied.
This was all I was expecting. I wasnt seeing things, but music was messed up (Conley's voice however was not), and there were a lot of colours and blurred/fluctuating vision. I later find out at about this time, Conley was starting to come down from the drug since he threw up so soon. But for me, it had hardly started. I began to see things. Not see them with your eyes the way we normally see, but imagine them so vividly you dont realize youre imagining, and not seeing. You play out stories in your head that you truly think are real and happening to you, then occasionally snap back to reality for a moment, for me just long enough to say "fuck, none of that was real" before slipping back into your subconscious. I spent a while out in the chair, then went and had a lay down in the tent. Trapped in my mind for long intervals, coming to long enough to worry about the sick feeling and fighting the good fight into not falling back into fantasy. More time passes, Conley recovering outside thinking Im done and just sleeping. I go out and join him, do my best to strike up conversations; interaction was keeping me in reality. But, he didnt know this, and led me into the woods for an off-trail hike. I remember watching him in front of me, lifting my foot to step over a fallen tree or rock or root or whatever there was to step over, and playing though an entire story in my mind; full length dreams, before lifting the other foot over to meet the first. We almost stopped by to talk to the neighbors (the first campsite on the island that was full) but in the end Conley didnt. Which was a very good thing, considering my condition. We made it back to the campsite, I forced myself to toss it once more in the tie-bush from the first night, Conley laughed at said Im probably empty by now. I told him I didnt care, I wanted the trip to stop.. and he realized I didnt come down with him. Fortunately, from this point I did start to come down. Conley talked with me, and started a fire for the night as dusk was coming, and with effort I could keep myself with him. The rest of the night focusing was difficult, but we ended up cooking some corn on the campfire and relaxing with a beer (and some whiskey later) as the sun set, before bed. I feel confident to say, I had experienced what insanity was like for a few hours that day.
Now, I feel I should say a few things about drugs in general. I dont try to get people to take them. Most soft drugs like pot and shrooms I dont care in the least if people use them. Personally, I do pot, rarely, and this was the most recent of 2 or 3 times Ive used shrooms. I dont plan on ever doing shrooms again. I do, however, suggest people that arent particularly at risk using drugs (those with a diagnosed chemical mental imbalance perhaps) to try them, once. Take a decent dose, but take it somewhere SAFE and with a FRIEND, sometime when you dont have a lot of to worry about or stress over. A good trip is quite the life experience, one worth having in my opinion. I feel I had a bad trip, I was stressing and worried and out in the middle of nowhere, but Im still glad I did it. I wont ever forget. Putting the aside aside, back to the camping.
We woke up on day four a little later, 10 or 11 I believe. We paid to camp in he park for another night, but were dreading the 27-31km trip back, especially weakened now from the previous trip and the substance abuse. So, we relaxed a bit until around noon and packed up our gear, deciding we would start the trip back today, at least doing the hard part (portage), and if we dont make it back we would toss up the tent on a site along the way. Over the time we spent, we ate some food, burned a lot of cardboard (and toilet / fire paper), and collapsed packaging to smaller sized, so we had less to take back with us. We still ended up making 3 trips at the portage, but they were much smaller and easier, and we managed without tiring ourselves out. We had plenty of drinks, since we made a kool aid and left the container on the island side for a drink every trip, taking it with us empty on the final one. Making it to the far side the last time, we were greeted by nature. A mother moose and its child wading out of the water and into the woods. As good an end to our adventure on the far side as we could have asked for. We started canoing back towards the dock, still 18km left on our trip. The water was flowing with us for a large portion of the trip, making it easier than on the way in. In the end, we did make it to the dock that day, but it was getting late for the long drive back. Neither of us cared though, so at around 5 we unloaded, tied up the canoe, and checked out of Algonquin. The drive back to Conley's was uneventful, besides me being so tired I left the gas cap on the roof after filling up and lost it. Unloaded the canoe at the cottage where we got it, and I dropped Conley and his gear off at his house, heading to my rents to leave things there and get a meal, then back to the apartment. The leftover snacks from the trip lasted me and Kinjry a long while, since we didnt eat much while out there.
As for the camping trip, Conley and I did a fantastic job at getting up on time and packing my BEIGE FORD EXPLORER with all the camping gear two people could ever need for a 5 day trip. The third friend who was considering coming along in the end didnt, very fortunate for us; as the truck and the canoe were both very full with only us two. After packing up at around 8am, we headed to find where Conley's dad put the canoe. Bill (Conley's father, short for hillbilly not actually his name) has the reputation for being quite intelligent, but doing a lot of stupid things; probably due to not thinking through. We got lucky this year and only had to check 3 places to find it, at a cottage. Last year it was locked to a post in the middle of a swamp behind a construction site. Yeah, doesnt make sense to me either, haha.
I drove us down to Algonquin with the traditional barely tied down canoe on the roof. Arriving at park entrance at about 3pm, I parked at the dock and we loaded the canoe to the brim with gear, stuffing and shuffling things around so we could fit in afterwards. After parking and locking the truck in the lot, we were off, the brim of the canoe dangerously close to the water. Heres the funny part of the trip; the site we picked out ahead of time as the ultimate spot was pretty far away. In fact, it was 23 kilometers away. 19 worth of canoing, followed by 2 of portage, then another 2 back in the canoe.
Tired and sunburned, we reach shore as the sun is starting to turn the sky orange, probably around 9pm. With an awkward laugh, we decide what to do with the overstuffed canoe worth of gear for the 2km hike. Our original plan was to drag the whole load down the properly groomed, flat and grassy path to the next water. This was quickly ruined when after a brief attempt we find that none of those three things are true; rocky and rooty dirt path with plenty of warn steep slopes await us. We grab a couple packs, throw the canoe over our heads, and set off leaving the rest of the equipment in the woods for another trip. 2km of rough hiking with that much stuff, after 19km of canoing is incredibly tiring, let me tell you, haha. And the bugs were horrible! We eventually reach the far shore, drop off our canoe and start the hike back, the sun now at the horizon. Dusk is setting in when we make it to our stuff, and unfortunately, theres still more than we could possibly carry in one trip. So we grab all we can carry, a few garbage bags/packs full of gear(and our food) and leave the rest in the woods, hidden to pick up hopefully in the morning.
About half way down the trail, were both absolutely exhausted, having to sit on our bags for a rest every 5 minutes. Which normally wouldnt be bad, but the sun had fully set, leaving us alone, worn out, and only the moon-light through the trees to see the path (or bears) by. We do eventually reach the shore, tossing everything in the canoe and pushing off aimlessly into the pitch-black lake, laying back panting for air. After a rest, we sit up and aim ourselves for the tree-line in the middle of the water. Fortunately for us, the campsite we wanted was one of three on a decent sized island, allowing us to actually locate the site in the dark!
The 2km canoe went slow, but it was a lot better than the portage, and the water was calm and cold. Approaching the island, we paddle around looking for the little orange marking signifying a campsite, and we find one quickly, crashing ourselves into the shore. Then I see it. A triangle. A blue and green triangle. Someone else's tent. The spot was already claimed! After an attempt to read the map to spot another site location, and failing, we head around the island to the side with the most moonlight looking for another sign. And, after doubting our own eyes, we do spot one; but in a peculiar spot with no flat surface that seems camp-able, just a tree, and a cliff. We crash onto shore again, eying the sign from up close to confirm its existence, we climb up said cliff, and theres a fire pit with logs around it, and a decently flat spot. Even better, there was no tent set up here. It may have been 11pm, but we made it.
We start unpacking the canoe, dragging bags up the cliff. Conley unloads, and I move them to the flat spot, with one bag left to move, I leave it up to Conley and start removing the tent from the package to set it up before collapsing. Poor Conley. After all this we already dealt with, he picks the bag up and curses. One of our booze bottles had broken at some point during the portage, and had sliced his thumb open good. With more cursing, he drags the bag more carefully near the fire pit, and as I set up the tent he grabs the medical box and cleans himself up. The tent goes up, and band-aid goes on, and after a brief clean up of the broken glass and licorice-scented alcohol we throw all the crap in the safety of the tent and take a well earned break on the logs around the fire pit. We decide a fire-less meal and drink (oh god so thirsty) was due, we break out the crackers and jube-jubes and propane cooker ourselves some hot-but-clean-lake-water-kool-aid. We scarf down the snacks and get the water boiled and mixxed, then set the ever-so-hot kool aid in the lake to cool down. An hour goes by, and it had barely cooled enough to drink. Gorging outselves on the hot drink, we have another short sit around the fire-pit, where I proceed to throw up bright red and jelly-chunk filled liquid, tie-dyeing the bushes. After a laugh, we go to our sleeping bags and crash for the night. Slanted, hard, bumpy ground never felt so good.
We awoke decently early, perhaps around 9 or 10. The muscle pain was ridiculous. My face and arms were peeling pretty good, Conley was just bright red. As tired as we were the day before, this was worse. Fortunately, there wasnt a 27km (23 two extra 2 portage) trek to do today, and we could take a break.. at least for a couple hours before we had to pick up what was left in the woods at the far end of the portage. Our hours of break consisted of exploring the campsite, which had some brush-cleared forest that was pretty nice, and a dug out shit-pit with wooden-box-seat. Cooked some instant noodles and ate a bit more of the crackers, and some now-cooled kool-aid to wash it down while sitting around the fire pit. Eventually, we set off the in canoe again to pick up our gear, muscle pain and Conley's cut thumb slowing us down, but it got done, and it went fairly well, all things considered. Getting back, we relaxed in our collapsible camping-chairs, have another cool drink, and enjoy the nature for the first real time, no more difficult tasks to worry about. We laze the day away, a bit of hiking on our island too, and start a fire with limited difficulty. We get better at it every year. Cooking ourselves some hot-dogs for the last meat dinner of the trip, nightfall comes and we head into the tent for an early night.
Another early morning, probably around 7 or 8 this time. Day three, the day of "enjoying" the trip was here. Standard morning things happen with food and drink, we do what we can to pass time without leaving the island for more than a short canoe trip with no purpose besides seeing the sights. Afternoon comes, and decides its late enough; Conley grabs our stuff from the tent and we investigate. Conley went and got us some quality Mexican shrooms from THE INTERNETS, and a fair quantity of them as well, around 6 grams. Now, we both had done shrooms before, me only once (the camping trip a year before), but we never really had a real trip; just the enhanced colours and music that comes with low doses. We split ourselves up 3 grams each into tiny pieces, which are mixxed into lemon extract to cover their horrible gag-reflex-inducing taste. Conley drinks his a few minutes before me, as I was more meticulous with the size of my pieces. We sit ourselves in the camp chairs, and toss on some MP3 player music, and gaze out on our amazing cliff-top view of the lake.
Now, for those who havent done hallucinogens, like myself at this time, Im going to describe this with a bit of detail. I always wondered, and was a bit skeptical, on how people see things when on drugs. Visualizing things that arent there with your eyes didnt make sense to me in the least. This experience let me understand.
Time passed, colours became brighter, music deeper. Our stomach's got progressively more nauseous. Peripheral vision fluctuates and bright colours creep out from out from around the outside range of your vision. And right at this point, a family of people start to row by in their canoe. Conley freeks and runs to the tent before they see us, hes a few minutes worse off than me so I follow casually. A few minutes pass, and I desperately want out of the tent, as bad as he wanted in, so out we went. The people had passed, and we went back to the chair. The music goes on again, still normal at this point to me. Conley heaves over the other side of his chair, and I give a good laugh, but still feeling pretty sick myself. I manage to keep it down a while yet, another 15 minutes of music go by before I start. However, this extra time was enough for my body to absorb a goood deal more of the chemical(s) than Conley. The music is very strange. If youve heard songs by Apex Twin, where notes are slowly drawn out and repetitive, small changes everywhere but still very similar.. this is what all music I heard was like at this point. Even people's voices were stretched beyond recognition, droning on in repetitive tones than I could never, no matter how hard I tried, begin to predict. The colours from my peripheral vision break out into snake or worm-like patterns, squirming around, moving in further from the sides. I still feel sick, and throw up occasionally.. but strangely, the experience of puking wasnt unpleasant.. you feel a little better, and the audio and visuals keep your mind occupied.
This was all I was expecting. I wasnt seeing things, but music was messed up (Conley's voice however was not), and there were a lot of colours and blurred/fluctuating vision. I later find out at about this time, Conley was starting to come down from the drug since he threw up so soon. But for me, it had hardly started. I began to see things. Not see them with your eyes the way we normally see, but imagine them so vividly you dont realize youre imagining, and not seeing. You play out stories in your head that you truly think are real and happening to you, then occasionally snap back to reality for a moment, for me just long enough to say "fuck, none of that was real" before slipping back into your subconscious. I spent a while out in the chair, then went and had a lay down in the tent. Trapped in my mind for long intervals, coming to long enough to worry about the sick feeling and fighting the good fight into not falling back into fantasy. More time passes, Conley recovering outside thinking Im done and just sleeping. I go out and join him, do my best to strike up conversations; interaction was keeping me in reality. But, he didnt know this, and led me into the woods for an off-trail hike. I remember watching him in front of me, lifting my foot to step over a fallen tree or rock or root or whatever there was to step over, and playing though an entire story in my mind; full length dreams, before lifting the other foot over to meet the first. We almost stopped by to talk to the neighbors (the first campsite on the island that was full) but in the end Conley didnt. Which was a very good thing, considering my condition. We made it back to the campsite, I forced myself to toss it once more in the tie-bush from the first night, Conley laughed at said Im probably empty by now. I told him I didnt care, I wanted the trip to stop.. and he realized I didnt come down with him. Fortunately, from this point I did start to come down. Conley talked with me, and started a fire for the night as dusk was coming, and with effort I could keep myself with him. The rest of the night focusing was difficult, but we ended up cooking some corn on the campfire and relaxing with a beer (and some whiskey later) as the sun set, before bed. I feel confident to say, I had experienced what insanity was like for a few hours that day.
Now, I feel I should say a few things about drugs in general. I dont try to get people to take them. Most soft drugs like pot and shrooms I dont care in the least if people use them. Personally, I do pot, rarely, and this was the most recent of 2 or 3 times Ive used shrooms. I dont plan on ever doing shrooms again. I do, however, suggest people that arent particularly at risk using drugs (those with a diagnosed chemical mental imbalance perhaps) to try them, once. Take a decent dose, but take it somewhere SAFE and with a FRIEND, sometime when you dont have a lot of to worry about or stress over. A good trip is quite the life experience, one worth having in my opinion. I feel I had a bad trip, I was stressing and worried and out in the middle of nowhere, but Im still glad I did it. I wont ever forget. Putting the aside aside, back to the camping.
We woke up on day four a little later, 10 or 11 I believe. We paid to camp in he park for another night, but were dreading the 27-31km trip back, especially weakened now from the previous trip and the substance abuse. So, we relaxed a bit until around noon and packed up our gear, deciding we would start the trip back today, at least doing the hard part (portage), and if we dont make it back we would toss up the tent on a site along the way. Over the time we spent, we ate some food, burned a lot of cardboard (and toilet / fire paper), and collapsed packaging to smaller sized, so we had less to take back with us. We still ended up making 3 trips at the portage, but they were much smaller and easier, and we managed without tiring ourselves out. We had plenty of drinks, since we made a kool aid and left the container on the island side for a drink every trip, taking it with us empty on the final one. Making it to the far side the last time, we were greeted by nature. A mother moose and its child wading out of the water and into the woods. As good an end to our adventure on the far side as we could have asked for. We started canoing back towards the dock, still 18km left on our trip. The water was flowing with us for a large portion of the trip, making it easier than on the way in. In the end, we did make it to the dock that day, but it was getting late for the long drive back. Neither of us cared though, so at around 5 we unloaded, tied up the canoe, and checked out of Algonquin. The drive back to Conley's was uneventful, besides me being so tired I left the gas cap on the roof after filling up and lost it. Unloaded the canoe at the cottage where we got it, and I dropped Conley and his gear off at his house, heading to my rents to leave things there and get a meal, then back to the apartment. The leftover snacks from the trip lasted me and Kinjry a long while, since we didnt eat much while out there.