No Lights, No Phone, No Motorcar…Not A Single Luxury!!!!!!

For those of you too young to recognize it…that would be from the theme from Gilligan’s Island…and except for the island surrounded by water part, that is exactly how I lived for a few weeks while I was off in Virginia with FabTeen, being mountain men!

We lived in a camp, learned 17th century crafts and even had to dress the part or we were considered “naked” and couldn’t participate!

This was my home away from home:

My cot is the one on the right without the mosquito netting!

See how the walls of the tent don’t go all the way to the floor…and the slats in my wooden pallet floor?  These were welcoming open doors for my multiple roommates!

  YES!   They are as big and scary as they look!  I HATED them!!!  and I HATED going to bed! 

Susanna (my human roommate and much preferred to the spidery ones) and I had a nightly bedtime ritual that sadly did not include hot cocoa and bedtime stories.  Instead we would call in one of the nonspider fearing men to remove by hand a dozen or so spiders from our tent….no matter…every single night, by the middle of the night, new ones had moved in! 

The closeup is the back of my tent…the little structure up hill is the bathroom!  No running water…and I always did spider and snake checks before I sat down!

This was our little “village” in the woods, with the fire in the center and the tents all around it:

We built fires and cooked all of our meals over it…

Showers were also very primitive…and were a 25 minute hike there and back into “town” which translates to base camp (where FabHubs and FabStepson were!) I even had company in the shower!Sounds like a lot of work and struggles…but still I had a lot of fun and did a lot of firsts…I learned how to blacksmith!   Like Mother, Like Son…   I learned how to start a fire without matches…using flint and steel! I filled my water bottle from this pump….I was surprised the water tasted really good..I am very picky about my water too!Learned some old-fashioned games:Learned to weave…and I am much better at weaving than blacksmithing!     Made a sheath, and then made a knife to put in the sheath:    Learned how to load and shoot a black powder rifle (and it turns out I am a pretty good shot too!)

 

        While I did dread the nights, in spite of the spiders I had such a great time! 

There is so much more that I did…but this post is getting long!  And since this is a food blog I know you are curious how I handled the food part!

So  I will be writing another post about how I managed too eat while I was in totally meat-based environment with no access to my yummy organics or grocery!

Spring Break 2010, Part One Continues…..

Sunday morning we had another full day planned.

We started off with a hearty breakfast.  Somehow over the last few weeks we ended up with over 10 pounds of organic russet taters and needed to start making a dent in them.   FabHubs packed them so we could use them…and use them he did!  He made these ridiculously massive (but delicious) potato pancakes!  We had those with the organic eggs I order alongside my weekly produce delivery.

Can’t forget the coffee!  We are double-fisted coffee people…Espresso in one hand and French press in the other…camping or not!

The rest of the day was spent shopping in the old part of the city!  My favorite find was some vegan organic deodorant which so far seems to be working really well! 

I didn’t take many pictures of us shopping..too busy browsing!

We had a ghost tour planned for the evening, so we decided, instead of eating dinner out, to eat lunch out and eat our snacks and sandwiches for dinner while we waited for our ghost tour.

I found a great little restaurant on the street we were on…I had some very unhealthy but delicious coconut shrimp.  I ordered the fruit salad alongside and I was very excited about this…but it turned out to be canned!   A big let down.

By the time we reached the end of the street the trolleys had stopped running and so we had a long but scenic walk back.  This is the day my pedometer logged my 6 miles!  Maybe!

We were early for our ghost tour, so we go the cooler out of the car and sat in the parking lot and had our sandwiches, fruits, and snacks while we waited. 

The kids had begged and begged for this ghost tour but I was not really thrilled about it at all.   It took us all around the city after dark…and (gulp) back into the jail at night.  I didn’t mind the city tour, but I was seriously not into the tour back into the old jail.  At night.  This was a place of horror that already creeped me out during the day…at night it took on a whole life of its own!

Thankfully we survived!

We got back to the cabin and while the kids zonked to bed…we had an adult beverage by a campfire!

The next morning was checkout time.  Breakfast was simple this day..cereal and fruit.  I had pictures of these but I can’t seem to find them!

After packing up, we went back to the old town to visit the fort!       After the fort we took a final ride on the trolley to hear about the reset of the historic parts of the city…then back to our car for the long ride home.

Leg one of the trip complete…we will be home for two days and then down to Key West for another few days of sightseeing!

Check out more of our Spring Break 2010  Sites and Eats:

Spring Break Part One, St. Augustine

Spring Break Home Again Intermission

Spring Break, Key West Day One