Sleeping (NOT) Through a Stormy Night...

The Canadian Met Office predicted a break in the weather on Thursday, with unseasonably cold and wet weather forecast. That was OK with us. We’d be in the car for much of the morning, driving to our next destination in the Rockies. Chances were, when we got there, we might even avoid a soggy tent altogether and sleep in a cabin.

Today was Wednesday, so we still reckoned on the weather keeping its pact and waiting until tomorrow to turn wet and cold. Oh, how silly of us! On the humorous side, it was reassuring to know that it’s not just the Zimbabwean Met Office that gets its weather predictions wrong.

We had struggled to find an official campsite that wasn’t already full, so we happily settled for the challenge of finding a wild place in the bush. It was after 6pm when we finally drove into a delightful wooded spot that could accommodate the car and our tent away from the main road. However, even as we set down the tarp, the grey skies loomed fast and ominously. Anxious to get the tent up “in case it started raining”, Gus and Max completed the job in record time. But before the task was even completed, the encroaching rumbling overhead confirmed our dread. It was no longer a case of “in case”, but the certainty of some Big Rain. Any moment.

As we wrestled with erecting the second tarp as a shelter from the rain, the rain began and the wind picked up. It came in furious bursts of hostile energy, trying by all means to terminate our efforts of self-preservation. At one point, it almost succeeded, as it whipped our entire tent clean out of its pegs and upended it. A second’s worth of gratitude registered amidst the chaos, that we had been lent such sturdy, all-weather camping equipment!

In time, with determination and good humour, we eventually had our mini-camp rain-proofed and secured. A supper of minimal effort and resources was prepared and gratefully scoffed, before retreating into the comfort of our dry tent. The storm had by now abated, having bared its angry elements through several rounds of heavy rain, thunder and lightening in the course of the evening. It felt good ‘knowing’ we’d got through a pretty tricky three hours of stormy weather. For now, the softer rainfall was a comforting lullaby to which to fall asleep…

1am. I am startled unceremoniously awake by what sounded like a bomb explosion. Heart poundings accelerate my foggy mind into consciousness, as I realize The Storm has returned to avenge our earlier smugness! Rain batters our tent in a frenzy; lightening blinds my eyes as only direct sunlight might; the thunder right above us sounds as though the sky were being ripped open by dynamite. It is a terrifying, yet strangely exhilarating sensation. So long as the trusted tent holds out…

There is way too much noise and light to be able to sleep. The ear plugs and airline eye patch offer pathetic relief. I toss and turn trying to find a good position. If I could simply lie and listen to the supernatural elements without, and enjoy them for the extraordinary powers that they are, that would be OK; that would make the middle-of-the-night-wakefulness bearable. But alas, no. For the conscious mind has now stirred and betrays me by taunting me with a string terrible ‘What Ifs’: what if the tent gets struck by lightening? What if the rain starts pouring through into the tent? Worst of all, what if there’s a flash flood and we get swept away? At that point, my memory drags up the details of a past Tsunami movie. I inwardly groan and toss some more, in the hope that physical movement will calm the mental activity.

2am. I have not slept. Nor even dozed. So I am already awake for the second battle in the unrelenting skies above an hour later. Max is awakened by the battery assault this time and we exchange hoarse whispers. Gus has earphones in, so is mercifully unaware.

3am. A third almighty battering explodes. Events happen in Threes, right? I beg for this to be the last blast. By now, I am so tired, I manage to doze off. The night ticks slowly and noisily by, the rain never ceasing, though the storm finally takes its fury elsewhere. Seems the three theory was right. ZZZzzzzz.