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Rally Tentin'
Blatherings From The Editor Rally Tentin’ Wanda and I don’t camp, although on occasion we do pitch our Bibler tent at a rally site. Eating rally meals and drinking rally coffee kind of makes it not true camping to me. Still, we feel like we’re more a part of the rally when we “camp out” with a bunch of other Beemer heads. At a small rally it’s usually pretty easy to find a secluded spot and have a bit of privacy. Tentin’ at a big rally, like say Paonia at the Top O the Rockies (900 campers), and we’re elbow to elbow with several hundred other tenters. Privacy becomes a bit more difficult to maintain. Got to remember that those tent walls are pretty thin and don’t keep much inside. Years back at around midnight while camping at one of the Death Valley Daze gatherings a female voice broke out in song. The lady sang America the Beautiful at the top of her lungs, never missing a word. It was really kind of kewl. In the morning none of the ladies in the SEAT area would fess up to the singing. We’ll never know who the midnight singer was. Not too many years back I attempted to brew a pot of coffee in the tent. It was a really windy night and I didn’t get much, if any, sleep. That’s my excuse for lighting my tent on fire and burning a hole the size of Kansas in the floor. Was a nice tent, too. Too bad it was ruined. Kind of embarrassed, I didn’t tell anyone about it for six months or more. From my observations most of the tenters at the rallies we frequent are males. There’s usually some beer drinking going on with tall tales being told. As the camp fires burn down and the rally goers sneak off to their tents, a quiet comes over the grounds. When the air is cool and the sky is clear you can hear your heart beat…and some of the best snoring, gasps, chokes and coughs you’ve ever heard. Honestly, it can sound like someone is dying. Then comes the Zipper Orchestra as us beer drinkers climb out of our tents and head to the port-a-potty at oh-dark-thirty. BLAM - the potty door slams shut and another stanza of the zipper waltz is played out. It takes three, sometimes four, pulls on the zippers to get all the flaps and doors closed. Plastic zippers are the piccolos of the Zipper Orchestra; big metal zippers the bassoons. As the sun begins to rise, the birds begin to chirp and announce the new day, a soothing sound to gently wake up to. Crows the size of small pickup trucks screeching at each other are another story. One time I heard a guy yell at the top of his lungs from inside his tent something like SHUT-THE-HELL-UP and damned if the crows didn’t take off. There were a few muffled claps and thanks heard. The awakening of a bunch of campers in the early morning wouldn’t be right without the Flatulence Serenade breaking out across the campground. Guys, and you gals, we can hear you, it wasn’t that quiet; and, yes we can hear you giggling about it, too. Only in America… Tentin’ gets you closer to your fellow rally goers…sometimes too close. And don’t think that there isn’t someone listening, there always is. Deryle & Wanda…what happens in the tent, stays in the tent.
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