Chapter 2. Preparations

Dear Grands: When we first married, Grandma took me shopping with her all the time. At least shopping for an orange and green tent was ‘bear-able’ (Get it?).

Side note - the tent had to be orange and green to match Grandma’s new orange and green bikini.

Another side note - I was always glad to help pick out running shoes for Grandma, hoping she would join me in jogging. But, Grandma always said she wasn’t a jogger unless she was ‘jogging my memory’ with remarks like, ‘the floors haven’t been vacuumed since your vacuuming injury – surely it’s healed by now,’ and ‘the dishes won’t put themselves away.’

Anyhow, with new tent stowed in our little brown Toyota, the next question was ‘where to pitch it?’ My thought was ‘the back of the closet behind all the other stuff we didn’t use,’ thinking of the dangers ahead. Sometimes, it’s better to keep your thoughts to yourself.

You’ve been to Algonquin Park right? Well, that’s where Grandma decided we should try out our little orange and green tent. (We still have that tent. You can borrow it. You might wonder ‘how did you fit in?’ But, it was fine for Grandma and me. We were the size of Munchkins at the time.)

Once at the park, we got a park map at the main gate. It was a good map but it neglected to show the location of ‘bear country.’ Turned out the map-makers decided not to mark out ‘bear country’ because those words would have to be plastered all over that darned map… which nobody bothers to tell you. Maybe they do now. But not in 1974. Here’s the thing - The map also did not identify the ‘bear convention centre.’ Turns out the human name for the centre was ‘Rock Lake Campground.’ Wouldn’t you know it - that’s where we were headed.

Writing this story, even after all these years, gives me the willies. I think I’ll take a break here to catch my breath.

Here’s a picture from bear country. You may think that’s a bear. Easy mistake. Same colour and all.

Love Grandpa.