Quote of the weekend: "Well, if you really think about it, the earth is like a spaceship.  And the sky is the window of our spaceship."

Wise words spoken by Blake (aka Poo Deer during camping) while we were star gazing at about 11pm on the Pacific Crest Trail.  Poo Deer also pulled me (aka Meadow) aside after my scary nightmare story that I had told the group, to tell me that my condition was actually called 'sleep paralysis'.  A condition where you're literally paralyzed while in the process of waking up and according to him, can hallucinate (which explains the little gremlin I thought was in my room shaking my sheets).  

Poo Dear was also the only one who could remember an entire song during our music sesh by the campfire.  I don't know if it was the tequila or whiskey or the fact that we had been partaking all day, but none of us could seem to find the words to literally one song that we usually knew inside and out while not camping.

Brota and I got there late Friday night, but the trip started out right as we were welcomed into the campfire circle given gifts of beer, tequila, whisky, snacks that tasted like Life cereal and our camping names; Meadow and Leaf.  The leaders of the circle, Twig and Soil (formerly Sage) introduced us to the rest of our group...now, let's see if I can get this right: Willow, Cat Crystal, Hummer (or Hilbert), Little Fawn, Chestnut,  Ripple, Star Shooter, Bark, Rock, Grasshopper and of course, Poo Deer.

I was extremely tired and went to bed early in the Subaru that night (car camping is so much easier btw!) and the next day awoke to our neighbors playing loud hip hop songs of my youth down below.  Still tired, I asked Leaf to prepare me one of his special coffees with agave nectar that was sure get me  (somewhat cracky) on track for the day.  It did.  And seeing Grasshopper pop the top off of a bottle of champagne reminded me that I had brought the wrong beverages for camping.  We immediately went to the general store in town where we got water and more champagne and I forget what else, came back to camp and got ready to go to the meadow.

The meadow was glorious and there was a huge tree with branches like ladders that we climbed.  Props to Soil for taking the many lovely shots of our camping family in the tree.  After hanging out in the tree for awhile, we decided to head back to camp for more champagne and sitting around.  Our pilot friends came to meet us (sadly, I don't think they ever got camping names) and told us how they flew their own plane to Burning Man.  Pretty cool.

By late afternoon, a nap was in order for most of us, so Leaf and I went back to the Subaru where I tried to sleep and he played the guitar and we sang, and ended up taking photos and not really sleeping.

Then nighttime...

We made bomb vegan tacos and sat around the campfire for what seemed like many hours and talked about many things that I cannot remember clearly now.  I do remember telling everyone my freakish scary stories and then a small group of us went on a short walk to the lookout over Borrego Springs.  Twig kept mentioning that we needed to stay up all night and the skies seemed a bit cloudy which was a little disappointing.   We wanted to see the stars.  

Eventually we made our way down to the PCT (literally right under the lookout) and decided to lie down on our backs in the dirt to look at the night sky.  By that time the clouds seemed to have gone away and we could see stars for days.  We kept talking about strange things like aliens and parallel universes and Leaf kept seeing shooting that no one else was seeing.

When we got back to camp, it was time to sing.  Except that no one could seem to remember any songs.  We vowed that we would learn entire songs for the next camping trip (although I would say the chances of this actually happening are slim to none).

In all seriousness, you couldn't ask for a better group dynamic.  Everyone was on the same page, the food was great, awesome company and the weather was perfect.  Can't wait for the next one.