When I was 14/15 I went on a month long camping trip out West through Camp Interlocken (base camp out of New England). We all flew in to the Denver airport. 10 teenagers and 2 "adult" leaders. I say "adult" because they were 21-23 years old, lol. We traveled in a big van. We went backpacking through the Gore Mountains for a week. When we weren't backpacking, we stayed at campgrounds and cooked over open fires, etc.
One week we were paired off and sent to live with a Navajo family. It was the most profound experience I have ever....experienced. It was the first, and only time that I truly felt what it was to be a minority. Some of the people in the family were very kind and nice to us. We learned a LOT about their culture and daily lives. But there were also family members who clearly resented us and the whole deal. And I don't blame them. There were times I cried myself to sleep (we slept on the floor of their hogan/hut, as they did). There were times I loved learning how to make fry bread and when the older brother told us about their peyote ceremonies. Seriously, I'm about to turn 63 in a few weeks and I still vividly remember so much about that week when I was a young teenager.
I think we spent the last two weeks or week and a half driving back to New England (base camp) in the van, staying at various campgrounds and also with people along the way.
I remember one stop with a family of farmers in...Iowa? Honestly don't remember. But I remember they took us to their town's public pool to swim and we had so much fun. They also had a couple of teenaged sons/daughters who hung out with us. We had great homemade meals for the day or so we stayed with them. We pitched our tents in the field next to their house. It was like The Field of Dreams movie.
Then another night along the way back East we stayed over at an Indian family's house (Indian as opposed to Native American). We camped out in their basement in our sleeping bags, ate homemade Indian food, for the first time for most of us. And watched The Graduate on TV.
They dropped me off in Ohio on the way back to NE. I remember that when I went to the phone booth to call my mom to tell her our ETA and where she was supposed to meet us to pick me up....we were surprised because a pay phone call had gone up from a dime to a quarter! 😂
When I got home I was sooooo happy to take a real shower and use a real toilet, lol. For the past month we showered about once a week or less. "Using the facilities" was most often done in the woods or in the desert (AKA outdoors). It was a luxury when we checked into an actual KOA campground.
Later in life when people wanted to go on camping trips......I was always like, "Nah, I'm good. Been there, done that."
