In my last Exciting Adventures in the Wilderness post (“Two Creeks in our Wilderness, Both Annually Drying Up!”), I finished with Greg set fire to the tent – The whole point of a tent was to keep us dry and protected from whatever wildlife might come snooping around at night, insects more than animals, but animals, too – nothing wrong with wanting to sleep soundly and unbitten, especially when you don’t know exactly what might be out there.

The caravan was to provide us with a twin office and a kitchen of sorts. It was there to protect our computers and also to provide a work station where I could write science fiction while acting as Land Manager and Guard Dog over our camp. As we couldn’t run to two caravans, that meant our bedroom had to be elsewhere. A tent it was.

So, we ripped out the bed that had come with the caravan and set it up in our canvas dwelling, a two-room tent, then settled in with great enthusiasm. On the first night, however, Greg set some candles on the tent floor to light our way to bed. A lovely thought, but before we turned in, the wind billowed in the walls and the canvas set on fire.

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I was heading towards the tent when I saw it go up. It happened very quickly and had I not been right to hand, we would have lost the lot. As it was, I hit the burning wall with a stick, and the “whoof” of wind that caused actually blew the fire (and the candle) out.

The hole left by the brief tongue of flame was large enough to crawl through, so, so much for keeping the bugs and the animals out. It was in the bedroom side of the tent, too, right next to the bed.

Undeterred and with no other choice anyway, we wedged an open umbrella in the hole and went to sleep.

After that came the Night Noises…

😀  Cheers, everyone!

Allyson