# Funny Story: Why My Wife Wants A Camper



## Bharvey (Mar 24, 2013)

So a few years ago I bought a brand new 8 person Magellan tent from Academy. It's the first tent I ever purchased and was to be used on our first family camping trip. At the time there were three of us; my wife, my 2 year old daughter, and myself. 

We were extremely excited and couldn't wait to take my daughter on her first trip. My wife was a little apprehensive at first because she had never really enjoyed camping as a kid. She decided to go anyway with the thought that her tastes may have changed now that she had a kid of her own. 

So we headed to Lake Texana and camped on the park side (north of Highway 111). It's a beautiful area full of oak trees situated within 40 yards of the water. We had a great day swimming, riding waverunners, and BBQing. Some of my wife's family showed up and camped along-side of us. Her parents showed up later in the evening to camp as well. 

By the evening we'd already discovered an ample population of racoons in the area. They were extremely couragous as they'd come sit under your feet as you ate. The first night we thought we had taken care of all of our ice chests and storage bins, only to discover in the morning that the racoons had raided our camp and taken food from the ice chests and things from my storage bins. 

The following evening we fixed the problem by jamming our ice chests and storage containers under our trucks so they couldn't lift the lids; it didn't stop them from trying though. This is where the story gets good...

So it's about 1:00 A.M. Myself, my wife, and my daughter are all sound asleep on our air matress. I had already heard the raccoons, earlier, attempting to access our ice chests and storage bins. Feeling victorious, I drifted off to sleep. About 30 minutes later, half-asleep, I can hear the crinkling of plastic wrappers & bags outside of our tent. I drift back off to sleep for a moment until I heard it again; but this time it seemed louder. As I dozed in-and-out of conciousness for a few moments it finally hit me that the crinkling of wrappers seemed extra loud for some reason. So, still half-asleep, I start reaching for my mag-lite next to the air mattress. After feeling around for a moment, I was strangely unable to locate it. I rolled over to look for it and found myself staring into the eyes and snout of what I thought to be a vicious mountain lion! I let out a hollar that woke my wife up. The animal FREAKED and dashed across the tent. As he darted across to the other side of the tent, he stirred up his buddy. (By this time you've firgured out they're racoons). The other racoon dove out of one of our suit-cases and followed his partner-in-crime in their attempt to escape by climbing the walls of tent. Once I saw the first one climb the tent wall, I could see his silohuette and realized it was a racoon. I was able to chase one of them out through the small hole that he entered from. The other I had to open the tent door and flush him out. 

Now, how did they get in you ask? Apparently all of Magellan tents have door zippers that zip down to the floor. These little rascals unzipped the door to my tent and let themselves in. They ate all of the baby snacks we had for my little-one, jacked-around with my mag light, and must have been literally wearing my underwear at one point.

Once we realized they were racoons, and calmed my little one down, my wife and I spent the next 20 minutes laughing about it; as well as the other campers within a 200 yard radius...

Ever since this "episode," my wife has ferociously suggested that we will not be doing any camping until we get a camper. As far as the tent goes, I took it back to Academy and told them the story. They exchanged it for a Coleman no questions asked...lol 

(True Story)


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## SwampRat (Jul 30, 2004)

That's funny, but be happy it wasn't squirrels looking for nuts.


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## Bharvey (Mar 24, 2013)

SwampRat said:


> That's funny, but be happy it wasn't squirrels looking for nuts.


 LMAO!!:rotfl:


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## wisslbritches (May 27, 2004)

Too funny. I remember the raccoons out there being bad. Amazing creatures. I dread the day they learn how to open Yeti's!


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## fishingtwo (Feb 23, 2009)

Amazing you slept thru as much as you did, guess they were sneekey and had some previous experience with this. Anyway that is a very funny story and glad no one got any injuries.


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## Bharvey (Mar 24, 2013)

fishingtwo said:


> Amazing you slept thru as much as you did, guess they were sneekey and had some previous experience with this. Anyway that is a very funny story and glad no one got any injuries.


I know. There's no telling how long they were in there. Our clothes were thrown out of our bags. Heck, for all I know they found my "protection" and were pointing at me in my sleep...


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## BadBob (Dec 16, 2010)

Had a similar situation with squirrels at lake somerville. Dont leave food in your tent while boating or you'll come back to hot dog buns all over the place. The next morning gram crackers, marshmallows and choclate bars covered our campsite. From then on everything went into coolers or plastic storage containers.


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## devil1824 (Sep 4, 2010)

We looked at campers 2 weeks ago. My wife really enjoyed this story!!!!!


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## NanoSkiff (Jul 26, 2012)

Lolol


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## SlowRollin' (Oct 25, 2010)

Awesome camping trip, glad it worked out.


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