The call of the canvas

Fife Free Press, October 4, 1996

I think it's a male thing. While the average ‘guy’ is supposed to like his beer and his football, I believe there is another dark secret he carries within him… camping

Anytime I have ever mentioned a summer break under canvas, my wife has looked at me as though I've grown horns. To her it is unthinkable, an unbearable and uncomfortable prospect. She is, of course, right.

Yet, for some reason, whenever I pass one of these outdoor-type shops and there is a tent pitched, I always peek in with a Peugeot gaze: “Nice tent, want to show me what it can do?''

I've put up with the verbal slapping around the head for years now and the kids have left home and, well, it may be a mid-life crisis but I've got that urge again, I want to buy a tent.

Looking back at past experiences, It is kind of nutty but the outdoor dream of pulling open that canvas door and stepping out into a Highland morning always wins out against the reality of being unable to straighten up and world of dampness that reaches from the groundsheet into your soul.

But it is in us all this camping thing, it must be. Even the women. What is the womb but a single-man-er?

My first pitch was in my bedroom with a travelling rug stretched over the clothes horse. From there, clothes horse and blanket made it out to the back green and the fascination really took hold.

One birthday my parents either bought, or got with cigarette coupons, a green and white two-man-er that we used to pitch by the beach and wriggle in and out of our swimming gear. It must have rubbed off on the old man because the next thing was he upped and borrowed us a tent for a summer holiday in the Highlands.

That was the time when the first orange and blue cottage-style tents, basically canvas homes, were on the market and camp sites were littered with these luxury tents and big calor gas cookers.

Not us. Dad had managed to get us what can only be described as a field tent from the American Civil War - the sort you kept expecting the WRI to wander into and display their jam.

Anyway, armed with this, our Primus, picnic table, three Lilos, three sleeping bags and an endless supply of instant potato, we set off for the great outdoors.

First stop, Aviemore. It had rained all the way there and was pouring as we set about erecting our canvas monster. The pitch was so close that your guy ropes overlapped with the tent next to you and the walls of their tent touched yours. This was to prove important.

Anyway, after a veritable feast of instant potato we snuggled into our sleeping bags and tried to get off to a wobbly sleep on the Lilos.

Around midnight, the occupants of the tent next door splish-splashed their way home. They were two girls and they had a carry-out...a half bottle of `voddy' and two guys. And boy did they have a party and I was just about invited since there was only two sheets of sodden canvas between us.

Thinking back we should have coughed or something. Maybe we did and they just didn't stop. But for four hours in perfect silhouette because of their torch my embarrassed parents and I witnessed courtship and consummation, and it is to my father's credit that he waited until the final scream of ecstasy had echoed down the glen before he jumped up with a few expletives and insisted we broke camp, stunning himself on the central beam which was akin to a railway sleeper.

So at four in the morning we hauled our sodden tent into the car while the lovebirds slept, oblivious to the Polish cussing and canvas commotion outside.

There's a Bobby Goldboro song ‘Summer The First Time’' which can be adapted for this experience, about seeing the sun go down as a boy and seeing it rise as some sort of shadow puppet voyeuristic pervert.

It was never talked about, other than me being reassured the girls' screams didn't mean they were being murdered, though I scanned the Daily Record the whole time we were away.

There were few other highlights on this ill-fated expedition. The midges drove us off from Loch Maree, we almost got blown away in Findhorn and slept in the car, Jim Reeves was killed, and dad finally gave up on the sodden tent and we spent the last two night in B&B.

So, mildewed, weary and with burst Lilos we made it back to Fife and the tent was dried out and returned with our gratitude.

But dad's camping days weren't over and a plan was already hatching. That plan was the dormobile. A word to this day that still strikes terror in me.

Let's set the scene. Imagine an isolated corner on the Isle of Skye in the summer of '68. Just then a dormobile pulls off the road and trundles away to the far edge of a field. A mist is pulling in from the sea and it is starting to rain. We'll return five days later and visit the occupants.

But before that, I have nothing against dormobiles per se, it was just the way my dad used them. I think for travelling from A to B, it's the perfect way for a family to save on overnight costs. Even for touring, it is a tin tent and a darn sight more comfortable and you really can be a happy camper.

But it is not a portable chalet. That was how my dad envisaged it. Drive to somewhere remote with a view, park it and then not move for a week or so. I can see an appealing side to that now but throw in a 12-year-old kid to the equation and the psychological trauma is immense for everyone.

It was a mistake from the start. A dormobile for a family car was not a good idea. My sister, all five-foot nothing of her, had to learn to drive in it and I remember that was the first time I heard the phrase “A coo wi' a gun”. Still she did pass her test but the downside was she had arms like Popeye.

It was also the first time we ever had a car with a radio. Radio 1 was on air which was good. It was dad's car, therefore his radio, whichwas bad. So we would load up, lots of books, and I mean lots. Extra water and gas was hauled aboard because you never knew just how far we would be from civilisation.

Then it was on the road and head for the wilderness. Plastic plates and cups and lots of instant potato and canned food. But the irony was it was us three who were in a tin: tinned souls ready for the devil to torment.

So let's return to our canned comrades after five days beneath the Skye rain. It's exciting when you need the toilet because you get to venture out for a few minutes to nip behind the dyke. All the books are read and there is a silence you can cut with a knife. You all sit listening to the rain pit-pat on the tin roof, hour after hour after hour after hour.

Negotiations about starting the engine and driving into Portree broke down two days ago. I'm on a final, final, final warning. I've pulled the knob off the radio. The row was worth not having to listen to Sing Something Simple. I've knocked my dad's Embassy Tips in the sink getting out of the bunk and they are now drying on the dashboard. I spilt Coke over dad's summer slacks and he's now reduced to just one pair of trousers. He's stopped shaving to conserve water and looks mean.

Mum watches us both, like a referee who knows things are about to turn nasty.

Meanwhile, all you hear is pit-pat, pit-pat on the tin roof.

“What about a cup of tea?” says the old man, trying to lighten the atmosphere.

“Can we stand the excitement?” I mutter from my bunk in the tilted roof

“What was that?” barks dad

“Nothin'.”

What happened next I remember as clear as day, and all in slow motion.

The tea was duly made. Oh goody, even a chocolate biscuit with it and I descend, carefully, from the bunk. As I turn round though, I catch the table with my leg. Three cups of scalding tea hit dad in the crotch. He springs up in agony, cracking his head off the bunk and sending the milk splashing down his legs and into his shoes.

His next move is to reach for me, but I'm ahead of him, opening the sliding door and diving out into the rain and sprinting into the wilderness..

Goodness knows what anyone would have thought if they had witnessed the scene.

A 12-year-old lad in tee shirt and jeans, running stocking-soled over the marshy Skye machair chased by a purple-faced, arm-flailing cursing man with steam rising off his trousers.

After a mile or so, he gave up. Eventually, drenched and muddy, we cautiously made our peace and were forced to retreat to the bright lights of Portree where dad could get cleaned up and I could buy some comics.

Our journey was made in an uncomfortable silence but at least we were on the move. It was the last time I was taken on one of these ‘holidays'.

That was to the relief of everyone.


Picture: Pexels