A Non-Camper Sleeps in the Jungle. With Monkeys.
To say that it's disorienting to be woken up at 4 a.m. in the middle of the jungle by a disembodied, deep-throated howling would be an understatement. It's not just disorienting. It's fucking terrifying. Add to this being sick with the flu, exhausted from staying up later than you should have to star gaze, and sticky from the jungle humidity, and perhaps you'll be able to imagine my experience camping in Tikal National Park. * * * My first memory of “camping” involved a tent in my friend Sarah's backyard when we were about 8 or 9. We stayed up most of the night giggling over the sorts of things that only 8- or 9-year-old girls stay up and giggle over, and eventually snuggled down into our comfortable sleeping bags within a few steps of Sarah's house. Before that, the only time I'd pitched a tent of any sort was in my living room for slumber parties, utilizing my Disney Princess sleeping bags and my mom's kitchen chairs. The kind of tent whe...