Caravaning Calamity of Course

It was a lovely summer's day. The air was bright golden and a playful breeze played around and the campsite, licking us with warm, sweet air.

However, after driving for hours in the shimmering heat towing a caravan, we were all rather parched. The slpendid views of those rolling hills, a-rippling with corn, passed by unnoticed: we wanted tea down our stiff necks, and we wanted it now.

We put the caravan feet down, threw up the awning, and legged it away to the tap with one of those water-barrels-on-rolly-tracks bouncing around behind us. Our mother was left on guard (since we had carelessly thrown everything in the awning) and was sitting outside reading a magazine.

But as we wrestled the stupid water thing back up the path, it quickly came apparent something was wrong. Was it the other campers barely-stifled giggling? Was it my mother's burning face, as she sat rigid and pretending to read her mag? Or was it our noticeably-absent awning?

Yeah, that would be it.

In our rush for life-giving tea infusion, we hadn't tied up or pegged down the awning. Apparently, a particularly playful gust of air had sneaked under the awning and inflated it like a jellyfish, causing it to float up and - rather gracefully - drape itself over our caravan like a giant canvas condom. Neat work, in fact. Totally inside out.

Mum was far too short to do anything but to determinedly pretend she hadn't noticed, and sat 'reading' while the awning resettled and the super-structure of poles gently fell apart behind her.

Later on, I would go on to tread in a cow-pat.
(IChewCandlewax, Fri 18 Dec 2009, 14:21, Reply)