Patch of grass

This weekend we went camping with Richard and Fiona, and Fiona's friend Katherine. A guy from work lent me some 'bear bangers', we were a bunch of English folk heading up into bear country!

A few events, namely our house move and lack of preparation for camping, coincided to make us all set off a bit later than was ideal. We were heading up to Taylor Meadows in Garibaldi Park. When we arrived at the bottom of the trail we discovered that the rest of Vancouver had the same idea. There were signs up saying both camp grounds (9km up a hill) were full. We heard tales of rangers turning people back part way up the trail.

That's when being out without a map seemed not such a good idea.

We drove around and discovered that every camp ground in a significant radius was full. That's when Richard and Fiona brought up 'Patch of Grass'. A previous, potentially unreliable source had told them about a patch of grass beside an apartment building in downtown Squamish which allowed trespassers, and so potentially campers. We didn't need anymore encouragement, right next to the river it was a lovely spot. We cooked our dinner on a large flat rock (later when we met the man who owned the land he told us that he got married on that rock!), enjoyed the view of 'The Chief' and treated ourselves to a trip to the public toilets. I wouldn't usually mention such a trip on blip, but a small boy decided he just had to pelt me with a minimum of two pine cones when I came out the loos. The first one hit me and so I ran. It was the most hilarious chase I've had in ages!

A little nervous of bears (they aren't uncommon in Squamish), we put all our food and the clothes we cooked in into the car and turned in for the night.