Jayne and I got up Thursday morning and started to load up the Forester. We didn’t have a lot to go off of on what to pack. We knew we were limited to the back end of the Forester and I wanted to be able to see out of the thing. We also knew we wanted to go on vacation and not be washing clothes every other day. With that in mind, we filled up the two biggest suitcases we could find with enough clothes to last us a while and decided to revert back to the college “is it really dirty?” policy.
We really didn’t pack much else except for the few camping supplies we bought on Wednesday which we have yet to even test out. The dude at Scheel’s was pretty helpful and excited. I felt like a few more minutes of picking out gear with us and he would be begging to go. He told us about a breakfast place we have to eat at in Washington and whenever we mentioned another destination on our list he’d talk faster. He ultimately talked us in to a combo that we feel pretty happy with. We went there looking for warm sleeping bags and Thermarests. These were recommended to us by the Knutsons who are both a bit closer to that Bear guy than us. Our main goal was the Jayne comfort factor. I kinda married the princess and the pea girl. But she suggested this camping trip and I’m damn proud we’re doing it. Well Matt at Scheel’s talked us in to a good kind of Sanderson family meets Lady family package. We went king sized air mattress and big, sleeps-5 tent in lieu of the lighterweight, hiking-into-basecamp Thermarest and mini-igloo. The Sanderson family could be proud of the cousin Eddie (from Vacation) cheap-yet-gaudy traits while the Ladys could be proud to know their daughter is sleeping on a luxurious king-sized bed at the foot of such majesty.
To round out the mess we got my usual camera, laptops and lunchbox full of various cords, and whatever random camping stuff I’ve used in the past: camp stove with liquid propane that I don’t know how to operate, paper bowls and plates that Mom didn’t know she had and some plastic flatware we bought when we were refinishing the hardwood floors in the house and didn’t have any silverware. The usual.
All we need now is a cooler to keep a hot dog and a soda cool.
By the way, that’s Marti, me and Rihanna (from left). Marti is my old Forester that is no longer with me. No, she was not a “clunker” because she got bitchin’ gas mileage for AWD. We traded her in (along with several thousand dollars) for Rihanna a few days ago. Rihanna is a 2007 Subaru Forester Sport(s). She had 165000 fewer miles on her than Marti plus check out that scoop. I didn’t stray far though. Packing her up Thursday morning was just like packing Marti full of crap from my dorm back in 2002.