We had yet another "fall" three day weekend, which incidentally corresponded with Canadian Thanksgiving, not that we're into that kind of thing. We teamed up with our favorite Canucks for a weekend of camping and merriment.
The Canadians, Courtney, Kass, and Todd, decided that we should go to Lantau because we would have a dog with us that wasn't up to any extreme hiking. Lantau is filled with extreme hiking, but no no, we were assured camping would be right off the bus. That's the kind of camping I'm talking about.
Until we actually got there. MTR to Central. 1 hour ferry from Central to Mui Wo. Stock up on ridiculous amounts of water, beer, ice, snacks, etc. then bus 45 minutes into the wilderness. We get out and apparently it's still a cab ride away. We cab down to this tiny village (I should mention there are like 4 cabs on all of Lantau) and walk to what we think is camping beach. Not so, not so. This beach gets wet, cannot. We obviously ask the creepy old Chinese man wandering through the farm land where the camping is. He points, with his blood soaked knuckles, toward an alcove seemingly quite far away. The beach is rocky, we have to traverse with mountain with rugged terrain. Did I mention we had really stocked up on beer and water??
We see a guillo and ask him how long it would take us, "Uhh, probably 45 minutes." Into the jungle. And then the next AM it would be a 45 min hike out, to a village where there's probably no cab, to a 45 minute bus..you get it. I have a mini melt down, and we all decide this is a poor poor poor plan. So we start hiking back out to the main road where the bus dropped us. Hitch a ride part of the way. Walk across the damn. Into a park right off the road, and finally, finally, finally to a camping spot. There's no beach but there's a reservoir, and it this point that's just fine.
Paul and I have the coolest Groupon tent. Open it out of the bag, throw it in the air, and POP you have a tent. Throw your backpack in so it doesn't fly away and it's good to go. [Confession, we have to watch a YouTube video-3 times- to figure out how to get it back into the bag].
The girls take a walk to the reservoir. The boys talk about boy things, and then it's time to feast.
Kass and Court are both vegetarians. I'm a 95% veg, although not this week, but we'll get to that much much later. And then Kass's colleague with dog is also veg. I made black bean burgers with hummus centres, Kass's colleague made hummus, Court made some amazing potatoes and veg, and Kass brought tons of veg as well. A Canadian cornucopia of vegetable goodness!
We had a BBQ pit, so we grilled, and grilled, and drank and drank. Then played card games. Saw ghosts (seriously), drank, snacked, grilled. But not necessarily in that order. Come probably midnight and we all passed out.
Courtney and Patrick are the coolest. Kass and Todd are the coolest. I think there were some other people there, but we all had a ball. Camping rules. Once a year.
Woke up at the ripe old hour of 9 (pretty good, eh?), had a nice quick break, and taxi-ed back to the boat. To another taxi. And back home to make a pumpkin pie sans oven.
Happy C-Thanksgiving!
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