The Legend of the Grassy Campsite

As any long-time camper knows, finding the perfect campsite is the ultimate quest for most tent campers. A beautiful campsite, set by a stream (but not too close so the mosquitoes don’t love you to death) is one of the requirements for a perfect campsite. Another is to have a wonderful grassy site at the front to give your campsite that soft verdant look. Let me tell you about my adventure to find the perfect campsite a few years back in Florida.

Now, I was living north of the area, at the time. Living very north, in Canada, to be exact. But I loved to camp, and if I could get my hands on some cheap camping equipment, especially a low-priced (and usually second-hand) tent, then I could be counted on to find my way south for a few weeks of R & R in sunny Southern Florida. The drive can be long, but I am always up for a road trip, and to make matters more interesting I had some friends who were interested in investing in Southern Florida Real Estate, so I had promised to do a short side trip into the Keys area to see what was around that they might be interested in and send them some information. I guess that was my first mistake.

Now, for anyone who has never been to the Florida Keys, you need to know that most of the real estate down there is close to being underwater a good part of the year. One giant bridge connects the keys all together, like a giant pearl necklace, although one not exactly well-knotted and kinda on the shaky side. But you get the picture, a whole little arm of islands dotted down the coast that swing out into the Atlantic Ocean just waiting for the next big hurricane to wipe them off the map. And my friends wanted to buy some real estate there. But I had promised to check this out, and I thought that camping on the keys might be pretty interesting. So off I went, down this long snaky bridge with my back seat full of patched together second-hand tenting and a map that was missing the last part but what the heck – I was off to see Florida!

The first two places were ordinary enough, nice big houses on fair sized lots with an ocean view and plenty of room for fun and games. The last place though, was in a class by itself. The realtor just gave me the keys, said she would be by the next day to pick them up, and left. It was on it’s own little atoll, surrounded by a short wall that I supposed was to keep the ocean from coming in the front door. I looked around, took some pics and decided that the nice big lawn on the back would be as good a place to pitch a tent for the night as any campground. I was pretty isolated, felt sure that no one would care if I camped outside an empty house out in the middle of nowhere. The lawn was the kind you see in fancy magazines, soft and luxurious. They probably had it the lawn’s grass seed re-seeded every year just to keep it like this. I thought about my back-breaking air mattress pump and decided the lawn would be fine for tonight. It was just me, my little tent, and the great Florida outdoors.

Well, needless to say, the water brought in more than just the wonderful sound of the ocean. At some point in the night I heard the sound of something dragging itself very distinctly by my tent. I could see the dent as the snout of a huge alligator tried to push its way through the mosquito netting to the “lovely morsels” inside. Lucky for me, he got distracted by a sound nearby and left me to explore some more on the other side of the house. I was out of that tent and into the house before you could cry “oh Canada!”. And there I stayed for the rest of the night. The next morning I found my tent, torn down and looking pretty badly mauled. It didn’t help when I read online that day that alligators can run at a speed of 35 miles and hour. All I can say is – be careful where you set your tent!

Tungsten Rings

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