Craving for boiled meat
It was one of the coldest nights of my life. Ever. And yet one of the happiest.
As a child, I was never fond of hiking and going out in the mountains. I hated it. Roaming the city streets with my bike was my favorite thing to do. I didn’t need mountains to make me happy. The people that were going there were ‘lame’. I did not consider myself lame and that is why I didn’t want to be associated with the mountain ranges. I didn’t hate nature. I just didn’t want to go there.
Paradoxically, I love sleeping in a tent. Every summer, I used to set up a tent in the backyard of our house near the seaside and sleep there every night. My favorite part of the day was the bedtime. Don’t get me wrong, I love tents. I just didn’t like being in nature. Until three years ago.
It was a summer day — dry and hot. The sheet metal under my feet was reflecting the already unbearable heat. My thoughts were focused on how to escape from this hell. My phone rang. It was my best friend with an unusual request. “Do you want to go backpacking for two nights in Belmeken during the weekend?” said Andrey. ‘Sure, why not!’ said I.
The next thing I knew, I was shopping for backpacking equipment in Decathlon. The trip would require a tent, a sleeping bag, a sleeping mat, a gas stove, and lots of food. At that time, the knowledge I had about backpacking was insufficient, but I was willing to expand it.
One of the most important things that one needs when going trekking is to bring enough food. I was aware of that, of course. That was the only thing that I knew, practically. I bought a pack of nuts, a can of boiled meat, beans, and tuna, a pack of noodles, and that was pretty much all the food that I got. For a two-day trekking trip.
A week later, we set off. We traveled to our starting point by car at sunset. It was a warm summer afternoon, and the windows were slid all the way down. Kendrick Lamar was blasting at full volume and people were turning their heads towards us. We were so excited to experience the coziness of sitting in front of the fireplace and the beauty of sleeping under the night sky.
After two and a half hours of a bumpy car ride, we finally reached our camping site. It was already dark, so we had to set up our camp using flashlights and headlamps. The whole operation took us not more than 30 minutes, which was a great achievement since it was our first time setting a camp in the dark. A bonfire was lit, and we gathered around it.
Since I didn’t have a proper dinner, it was the perfect time to cook some. I cooked the boiled meat and the beans in the pot on the fire. I’ve never had boiled meat before in my life, so I didn’t know what to expect. After 10 minutes of preparation, our dinner was ready. I took a spoonful of the unknown substance and that was the tastiest dinner I have ever had. I realized that because of this tasty yet simple and cheap dish, I would become addicted to backpacking. Food just tastes different in nature. However, there was one thing that I didn’t comprehend at first. I ate all the food that I had. I was left with a pack of nuts, noodles, and a can of tuna. Considering that we had to undertake a 10km hike that was the worst mistake I made.
Once the dinner was finished, we went to sleep in the tent. Our camp was situated on the bank of a lake. Usually, any place near a lake tends to get cooler during the night and there is much more humidity, which makes the temperature even colder. Of course, I had no idea about it, and the clothing that I brought was not suitable for cold nights. For the ease of one’s understanding, I was clothed for temperatures around 15–20 degrees Celsius, while the outside temperature was 5–10 degrees. Long story short, I froze to my bones and couldn’t get an hour of sleep.
After 8 hours of restless fighting not to get hypothermia, we shared a light breakfast and set off for the hike. The trail was around 5–6km and the total elevation gained was 500m. In other words, it is a long and steep ascent that requires a substantial amount of energy. As I was rationing my food, I didn’t have lots of energy. I was hungry most of the way despite the pack of nuts that I ate in 20 minutes or so.
The last kilometer was the hardest. At this point, I was already starving and had a hard time carrying my 15kg backpack up the hill. Finally, we reached our destination. We set up our camp and shared a light lunch. We rested and played card games until the evening. Needless to say, I was already starving by dinner time. Dinner was the only meal we didn’t share that day as I cooked the tuna and the noodles. It was the most nutritious and filling meal I’ve had the whole day and it was amazing.
We ate our dinner and went to sleep. That night was way warmer than the previous one and I wasn’t struggling to keep myself alive. I had the best sleep. Eight hours later, we woke up and made our way back to the car. Our amazing trip came to an end.
Despite all the hardships I had on the first night, this was the best experience of my life and helped me enjoy and start loving the mountains. I started backpacking even more and my heart aches for even bigger and longer backpacking trips. Contrary to all expectations, without being cold and having to ration my food the next 2 days I don’t know if I would ever start loving backpacking as much as I do now. There was one more thing, which solidified my decision to go backpacking even more — boiled meat mixed with beans.
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Vasil Stoyanov is a Senior at AUBG. He now loves nature and wants to do long trekking trips.
