Monday, August 22, 2005

Biography - Chapter 4 - We go camping in a VW bug

I wrote part of my bio for a bboard last year and I lost chapters 1-3, so here's chapter 4. You'll get the rest eventually.

This was of course back in the days before car seats. My dad owned a VW bug. My mum didn’t drive. All 5 of us, my parents, brother and sister would go camping in that car. My sister was in a carrier cot or small bassinet in the back and my brother and I would squeeze in next to it. We’d take the ferry over from Dover to France and camp in farmers’ fields.

One time my parents started looking for a site a little late. As it was getting dark and starting to rain, they found an actual fee-paying camp-site. There was only spot left. What we didn’t do know was that it was the only spot left, because it was on top of a dry stream bed. My parents pitched the tent as it began to rain harder.

My parents had two camp cots and we normally slept on the floor, but water started streaming into the tent. Suitcases started floating in the water. We were all starving, so my mother had to stand in the tent in the stream cooking on a camp stove while the rest of us piled into the car. She made Beef Bourguignon with local French red wine. I can still remember the wonderful smell mixed with the smell of rain and the sound of the rain sloshing against the car. My brother and I slept that night in the camp cots, which were fortunately just above the water level and my parents kinda slept in the VW bug. We thought it was a great adventure.

No comments: