Making Outdoor Memories: Your One Great Summer [Giveaway!]

Cartoon from XKCD (Best cartoon site ever. Don’t argue with me.)

That summer found me a sophomore in college taking classes (compulsive me, remember?), working three jobs (computer lab consultant, Chinese restaurant waitress and catering waitress), living in the crappiest apartment ever (it had a hole the size of a plate in the front exterior wall that we covered with a hubcap we found across the street) and no car. Best summer of my life! Why? Because every free second I had was spent up in the Rocky Mountains rock climbing with my best friends. As long as there was daylight in the canyon we were tethered to a rock face and when the sun set it was tent camping, midnight hikes, bonfires and whatever food I’d managed to scrounge from my waitressing gigs. We rarely slept, we never showered – isn’t that the definition of awesome?

That was the summer I was free rappelling down a 100-foot cliff, got my waist-length braid stuck in the figure 8 and had to hang in space for half an hour waiting for my friends to hike up to the top and lower me a pocket knife in a shoe so I could give myself the worst one-handed haircut ever while trying not to plummet to my death.

That was the summer we wallpapered our ugly apartment with multicolored butcher paper, taped three boxes of tinfoil to the ceiling, covered the whole mess – walls, ceiling, door frames -with multicolored Christmas lights and topped it off with a disco ball. It was every bit as horrendous as you are imagining. Probably worse.

That was the summer I went to a party on an island in the middle of a lake to which the directions included the bizarrely accurate imperative “Turn left at the goat in the road” followed by “Signal with you flashlight and we’ll send the canoe over.”

That was the summer I waited on the same elderly “sunbird” couple, who never tipped, every single day and the last day of their vacation the man told me with tears in his eyes that I was like family to them as he slipped a folded bill into my hand. It was $5.

That was the summer I rode on a bullet bike going 80 miles an hour through a canyon known for its mortality rate. Sans helmet. And I’ve never felt more free before or since. (For the record I would never do it again and it scares the crap out of me to think that one of my kids might attempt something similarly idiotic someday.)

The summer ended when my boyfriend proposed to me – while rock climbing, naturally – and I said no and gave him back the ring and he asked me again and I said no again and then we had a huge fight culminating with him throwing the ring (and some other stuff) at me which sadly broke up our little merry bad of hygiene-challenged mountaineers.

I kept the braid. I kept the ring. I kept every minute of that summer etched into the memory of my body. The sunlight is burnt into my skin, the cool slippery rock face still rough under my fingertips, the slick coating of chili out of a can lines my throat, the lyrics to every Sublime song just behind the tip of my tongue (okay, and a lot of Scorpion songs too – some of my friends had terrible taste in music). Someday, I’m going to be the grandma in the old folks’ home yelling “I said belay on!!” at the orderly before hitting him with a rock.

One great summer. Everyone has one. I’ve shared mine with you, now I want to hear all about yours!

Giveaway

PlanetGear.com – a site dedicated to bringing you the best outdoor and sport brands at the lowest prices as well as discounted travel destinations – is all about helping you have an epic summer (or winter). They are offering one GFE reader a $50 giftcard to help make some outdoor memories. They run like Steepandcheap and Gilt, in that they have one crazy blowout mega sale for a few days and then that stuff is gone and they’re on to the next. Today, for instance, through midnight on May17th you can buy gear from Kelty and winter outerwear from Rossignol for less than half the sticker price. Then starting at midnight on the 17th they’ll have shoes and apparel (both men and women) from K-Swiss. Right now, when you refer a friend they get a $10 credit and you get a $10 credit so it’s a win-win!

To enter leave me a comment telling me something you like from the Planet Gear site. For a second entry, like them on Facebook and leave me a separate comment. For a third entry (and one I hope you’ll do whether or not you are entering the contest!) tell me a story about your One Great Summer! I want to hear it all!! Anyone is eligible to enter this giveaway. Giveaway ends Saturday May 21st at midnight. (FTC: I did not receive any free stuff – seriously, I know! – nor am I being compensated in any way for this post.)

Check in tomorrow for another great giveaway!!

82 Comments

  1. Even Canadians can win? This is so unbelievably shocking. Also, Planet Gear looks pretty cool- since I’ve decided to spend more time in the mountains this summer. It’s like a 40m drive, I have absolutely no excuse to not be there at least a few times a month.

    I really like the Rossignol womens snow pants. I need a new pair. My other ones didn’t make it back from Austria (the awesome souvenirs from my adventures won the limited suitcase space war), and because I broke my ankle while I was there, I didn’t get to snowboard the remainder of the winter.

    My best summer was actually my most recent summer. It was my first summer living by myself- and I was in Calgary, so the weather was fantastic (Ontario has oppressive summers that are really hot and muggy). In Calgary, it’s always in the low-mid 20C range, which is ideal. And it’s never ever humid here. And it’s practically always sunny. So amazing.

    I spent the summer it working in an area of law that I love. But the best part was all the cool things I did with my friends. We went to festivals, on a dinosaur hike, on regular hikes, did the Calgary Stampede (lots of pancake breakfasts, chuckwagon races, parades, mini donuts, deep fried pickles…and lots of cowgirl outfits!), got our articling jobs, went to plays and concerts, and generally gallivanted around the city. I also spent most of the summer getting ready for my semester in Europe.

    It’s really the first time I felt like an adult, as opposed to a student. It’s also when I adopted Calgary as my own, instead of referring to Toronto as home, it’s now ‘where my family lives’. It was a very transformative and amazingly positive summer. It’s weird, feeling like an adult. It’s like I’m constantly playing dress-up.

    • I’ve lived in Florida for 30 years. But Calgary will ALWAYS be home. Best city on the planet. (If it weren’t for February…..)

      • You mean if it weren’t for October through April?

        But summer here is perfect. So perfect.

    • I love this: “It’s really the first time I felt like an adult, as opposed to a student.”!! And Calgary sounds wonderful – I’ve only ever been to the western coast of Canada (when I lived in Seattle we went to Vancouver a lot…)

  2. I adored this post! Sounds like a wonderful memorable summer.. Here are some more odd similarities we share. In college, I covered my bed with tin foil. My sophomore summer year of college I maxed out course at the local city college and the big university (Arizona State) so I could graduate a year early but ended up graduating in 3.5 years. I think it was 6 classes that summer. In the free time I had I went to rehearsals for a theatre show I was in and a short film in which I had a small part.

    My most fun summer ever (before I met Brent…meeting B was the BEST) was went to Mexico City to stay a month with a boy I had met on a cruise despite my parents hesitations. It was crazy fun. He was very very wealthy (His dad was president of RCI condominiums) and we went to clubs night after night, rode horses through the mountains, explored the countryside, and I even have a picture of me riding ON TOP a car holding the Mexican flag after they had won one of the World Cup games. It was in 1994 and I was 16. That trip totally changed this small town girls life. 😉

  3. I’m a horrid decision maker, so I’m going to say two.

    The first being the summer after my sophomore years of high school. Working for my dad’s law firm in downtown Indianapolis. Old wartime building at Market and Pennsylvania – overlooking the city market (and the Farmer’s Market once a week)… 13th floor, 3 flights of stairs per floor… my father refusing to give me an elevator key since I wasn’t a full time employee… But I will tell you what, my legs never looked as good as they did the end of that summer… and I had the whole floor (the file floor) to myself… windows floor floor to ceiling looking out into the city.

    Sharing lunch with a homeless guy on the steps of Monument Circle… getting hot chocolate at the chocolate shop on the circle before work.. Something about it was very bohemian (I sometimes would dance as I was scanning copies into the database if I could hear the music from the city market)

    I think the only other summer that I remember being amazing was last summer, which was the summer I went through treatment and got kicked out of the military.. it was a summer of healing.

    • They both sound amazing and in two totally different ways! I love that you have the ability to appreciate the beauty in both situations.

  4. hahhaha.. i went rock climbing for the very first time this past weekend so that cartoon absolutely cracked me up! from the planet gear website i’d like that kelty sleeping bag.. i’ve been sharing a sleeping bag with my boyfriend when we camp and it’s not as romantic as it sounds, i assure you.

    i’ve only commented a few times before, but just wanted to say i love your blog charlotte! i look forward to reading it everyday. thank you.

    • Ooh yes, I have shared a sleeping back on quite a few occasions and it is miserable! If the random number generator doesn’t pick you then check local thrift shops – I’ve had good luck finding bags there! And thank you- I’m so glad you enjoy reading the GFE, that really means a lot to me!!

  5. I’d love the pocket picnic bag – would be perfect for enjoying the Fla sunshine!

  6. I liked Planet GEar on FB

  7. id buy just about anything they sell with 50 bucks that i didnt have to cough up of my own 🙂

  8. I’d probably wait a day or two until the K-Swiss sale starts — Need me some yoga pants, yo.

    My best summer memory? From the age of 9 until 22, I spent a week almost every summer at my Grandparent’s cabin in the High Peaks Region of NY. To this day, it is one of the only places on earth I really have a “sense of place.” They sold the place when my little cousin was two, and I always thought about what I would teach her if we’d had the chance to go up there more years: If you turn right out of the dirt road driveway, you can cut across to the old railway line. The best blueberries in the region are across the old railroad trail, up on an embankment. Remember: your main competition for blueberries are little old ladies, and they don’t climb. You can walk all the way around the cove next to the cabin, and never go above knee deep. Doing this risks scaring the crap out of some Great Blue Herons. There are two nesting pairs of loons, and if you get too close and the loon doesn’t dive under, look for the shadow-baby. Watch the rocks by the big island, your cousin Bruce already cracked the dagger-board of the sailboat there. Always sail upwind first.

    My last summer up, I told a good friend that if he brought the beer, I’d bring the island and we’d go camping. He showed up with some damn fine beer, and we canoed out to one of the Forever Wild designated islands, on the other side of the esker from where the grandparents’ lived. He wanted to go skinny dipping, but I knew that channel and vetoed it — while we were swimming (swimsuits on!), no less than three motorboats with kids went by. Heh. After dark, though, we could’ve been 100 miles from anywhere. Woke up in the morning to mist on the lake and loons five feet from shore. It was pretty dang glorious.

    • One of the most beautiful comments I have ever read! I could picture every detail and giggled about beating out the old ladies to the blueberries. Thank you for sharing your memories with me:)

  9. I unfortunately worked my tail off every single summer. Boo to that! My fiance spent an entire summer with friends going out on his boat though….he definitely takes the cake for that one!

  10. My best summer was the summer of 2009. My now-husband, then-boyfriend had just left for Basic Military Training. And yes I was heartbroken and lonely but it was only for 9 weeks, and a the end of that 9 weeks I was moving down to Texas to live with him. So, that summer, I packed every day FULL of family and friends — I spend every weekend at my cousin’s house in Boston, babysat my other cousin’s daughters basically every other day just for some time with them, learned to fish and change the oil in my car from my uncle, went to more cookouts than I could even count, and went to dinner with my now-mother-in-law at least twice a week. Plus — whenever Max got to call home, ithat day became the new best day of my life.

    And finding an apartment to rent in a city 3,000 miles away was really truly a life-changing experience. I went to TX for *one weekend* with $1,000, no cell phone charger, bronchitis, and no sense of direction, and within 4 hours had found an apartment, made a new set of friends, and been taken out for fruit salad with chili powder. (Don’t knock it til you try it it’s AMAZING).

    • Beautiful! I love how you took a situation that a lot of people would have found depressing and turned it into a seize-the-moment opportunity!

  11. When I think about my favorite summer, the first that comes to mind is when I was 15. We moved to Kansas from Colorado that year, and I stayed with my aunt and uncle for a couple of weeks in the interim. My brother was 9 at the time, but my cousins were only two and four years older than I was, and we had so much fun playing games and hanging out. I developed a HUGE crush on my cousin’s friend and followed him everywhere. One night, we were on our way home from dropping him off at home…at 2 in the morning…and we got pulled over. My cousins and I were all crammed into the front seat of their old car and the one who was driving wasn’t wearing shoes or a shirt. (Um, and we had all been drinking. It was also the summer I had my first screwdriver. STUPID.) Turns out, we had a busted tail light and we were told to go home and get it fixed in the morning.
    It was also the summer that Gramma died and I made one of the most selfish decisions of my life when I chose to stay in Colorado and not go to Nebraska for her funeral. (Different side of the family.) To this day, I wish my parents had forced me to go, because I will always feel so guilty that I didn’t. It was a difficult lesson to learn.
    Thanks for sharing your favorite summer, Charlotte!

    • This cracks me up! Mostly because I can totally picture you doing this! I’m so sad that you are so sad about missing your gramma’s funeral – I think she probably understands:)

  12. Too many good ones to mention! I can tell you the worst! Summer in medical school 🙁

  13. You definetely had a lot of things going on that summer! Sounds really romantic to get proposed to while rock climbing. Too bad you guys ended up in a fight. Oh well.

    My most memorable summer would probably be when I went to an overnight camp for the first time. I went for a week when I was 7. It was filled with so many fun activities of swimming, singing, games and meeting so many new friends. I have had many great memories of that summer over the years and am still friends with a couple of girls I had met at that camp when I was 7.

  14. I realized that I put both of my entries in one post….so…this is the second one, since I not only posted with an item I like, but also wrote about my most awesome summer in the city.

    I swear, I’m totally capable of reading instructions most of the time.

  15. My favorite shopping indulgence is outdoor gear. I love gear. I love researching gear. I love testing it out on the field. Nothing makes me feel more alive and like a make-believe kid then backpacking with my favorite tent + gear. So I just love the concept of Planet Gear: great gear deals!!

  16. I think my best summer is yet to come. I’m just getting started. I’ve had summers full of sunshine, lakes, hiking and even spent this winter chasing summer hiking in South America. I’ve mountain biked, sang at summer festivals and sunbathed on my roof….

    But I’m getting in shape again. I have this new tent that needs more outings. There’s so much of North America I have yet to see. I need a car, some time and a mammoth road trip across Canada and the US, with a few friends… maybe stop in at Burning Man… I want to learn to kite surf, sail,… see!? My best summer has yet to arrive! There is so much more I want to enjoy!

  17. I have had MANY great summers! (and this is actually going to be a blog post on my own site now! …you’ve inspired me!)

    one of the best though, was when I went to Greece to help run sports camps for the kids in Athens. I lived in an AC-less apartment above a church, I “showered” in a bucket with a washcloth every day…I slept on an air mattress in a room with 10 other girls , and would get so hot at night that I normally woke up top-less due to my new-found habit of “sleep-undressing”. 🙂 BUT, I got to work with amazing kids during the day, sit out on our roof-top deck and drink cold sodas at night, and tour a country so steeped in history that some days I had tears in my eyes from the sheer magnitude of it all. I left with a tan, some very weird greek phrases added to my vocabulary, and a newly formed love of travelling.

    • I can’t wait for your post on this! Let me know when it’s up so I can read it!! And “sleep undressing” sounds hilarious! And embarrassing. I slept naked in Spain for the same reason (SO HOT) but I was the only one in my room:)

  18. Oooooh, I like that camp hauler!
    My husband is an avid rock climber. We’ve been planning to make another trip out to Yosemite this year, which,IMHO, is one of THE most beautiful places on the planet.

    The summer I turned 17 I went with my family to Europe. We spent a week with another family at their home in England, then we all packed up the van and headed south. Took the ferry across the channel, then kept driving to a small town in southern France where they had a second home. We spent 2 weeks swimming, hiking, and eating, and it was the best time! Somehow we all managed to get along the entire time. At night we walked down the road to the local pub, which closed at 11. Then we’d turn on out flashlights and head home (there were no street lights). Meals went on for hours, and we sat at these huge tables with dozens of people. My French is very rudimentary, but I got the gist of what was being said.

    Best summer, ever!

    • I loved my summer in Europe too! Shoot – maybe I should have written about that one instead! I loved those hours-long meals!

  19. Ooh…I love the pocket picnic and Jaunt. Perfect for day hikes 🙂
    I’ve gotten my husband to be as nutty about the outdoror as I am now – One of the reasons we started getting in shap e is so we could go on long day hikes together.
    My husband and I try and get out for hiking trips at least once a summer now. This fall we’re planning a few hikes around Quebec in the fall…to see the leaves turn 🙂 I can’t wait!

  20. Oh yeah – almost forgot. My one great summer.
    I spent a summer in Ireland working with street kids and the weekend were ours. I would hike out to ruins or cliffs or pack a pack and seplore castles, out to islands awhere they spoke gaelic and have an incredible time eating in pubs and meeting the locals. A lto of locals invited me into their homes for lunches and I had an incredible summer there …I hated to come home.

    • seplore = explore. sorry. There’s a delay on this site when I type and I confess I’ve stopped spellchecking…

      • No worries! I’m so sorry my site is still hanging on you… not sure what else to try:( And your summer sounds awesome! I love castles…

  21. ahhhh….I love all the summer memories! (and why is it that all of them seem to be about our life before kids?!)

    Mine was the summer before my senior year in college and I went to study abroad in Valencia Spain. I went to clubs until 6am, drank beer out of the beer (instead of soda) machine that was on my way to school in the morning, and had a crazy summer fling with a guy in my group. We drank sangria like it was water and made fools of ourselves. It was awesome. I think I might have also learned spanish too, although I don’t much remember that part! 🙂

    (sigh) those were the good old days! 🙂

  22. One of my best summers was a 7-week car camping trip through British Columbia with my Slovak boyfriend (then husband, now ex-husband). His first time to Canada, we borrowed a car and hit the road. We camped in fields and bathed in (icy cold) mountain streams and lakes. One night in southern BC, we tried to pitch a tent in the dark, only to find that we’d chosen a patch of prickly pear cactus. We spent the next hour drinking beer and picking needles out of our legs and butts. On Vancouver Island, we camped on a beach and had to build moats and dams to keep the water out of our tent when the tide came in. The park warden tried to convince us to move, but we were having too much fun drinking wine and wondering if we were going to get wet (we never did, but it was close). Our campsite was raided by ravens (who actually opened boxes to get at the cheese and muffins) and we had to completely dismantle and clean our bikes when the gears seized from all the sand and salt. Much time was spent biking and doing playground “bootcamp” workouts. Visiting family in Vancouver, we had Chinese food feasts on the beach and went sea kayaking and jumped off rocks into the surf. It was the first time since I was a kid that the summer seemed endless and time ceased to matter.

    • That sounds amazing!! I don’t know which part I enjoyed more: the beach camping or the prickly pear (who knew they had those so far north??)

  23. Entry 1 Post:

    Ooo, I really like the purple haze back pack that is on there, too bad it is sold out! I really need to get a good backpack, as I plan on doing some backpacking and camping this summer! They have a lot of good things on here, honestly. I’m intrigued to see what their future sales are.

  24. Entry 2 Post:

    Your favorite summer story was great and it sounds like it was such a blast, honestly. Any memorable summer stories involve just getting to be outside a lot for me. I have to be cheesy and say that so far this summer, despite barely having begun, is shaping up to be ‘that’ summer for me. This year has been a lot of shaping of my character and doing things that I really have longed to do for a long time. In essence, I am getting to be me and discover ‘me’ finally. The right people are in my life to have people to go out and do things with. Top top it off, I am mentally in a place where I can go out and do things on my own. So what has been on the list of things done so far?

    – Running – love this and really have discovered that my body can do a lot more than I realized previously.
    – Geocaching and lots of it. I finally went out and did this, thanks to a guy I am seeing. Since that time I have gone on my own, introduced others to it, gotten stuck in a very muddy thunderstorm while refusing to leave until we had found the darn cache, and gotten in some wonderful hikes
    – Camping and I can’t wait to do more of it, which is on the list for this summer
    – Drive in movie theater
    – Lots of beer tasting!
    – Gardening and cooking out
    – Lots of time out with friends

    Up and coming on the plans for the summer?
    More camping, more drive ins, ice cream, geocaching, swimming out at state parks, obstacle courses, playing in mud, etc etc etc. Doing whatever the heck I can to be outside the whole summer. I can’t wait. This year is going to be great!

  25. I think my favorite summer was the one after I graduated from high school. I worked at a summer camp for (we figured out afterwards) about 30cents an hour when we added up all the days and nights. But the money didn’t matter. We played with our campers, had counselor parties in the bathrooms between our cabins after they were asleep, slept on bookstore floors on our rare half-days off. Because my parents lived not far from the camp hordes of us descended on them on session breaks to do laundry and dye our hair and eat all their food before going back up the mountain roads. It was silly and full of drama but altogether awesome.

    • ” It was silly and full of drama but altogether awesome.” Best kind of awesome there is!!

  26. The camp hauler on Planet Gear looks awesome! But I’ll probably keep my eyes open for a tent. We’ve been borrowing one from my parents and one half of the front zipper is broken. Trying to climb out of a tent without ripping apart the duct-tapped zipper is such a pain!

  27. The summer between my freshman and sophomore year of college, I rode my bike into a freshly paved street coated with hot tar. Second and third degree burns over 20% of my body. Wheelchair with no use of my hands or legs for two months. That was a fun summer.

  28. Oh man…
    Lets go back to my sophomore year of high school (summer before Junior year). I had just quit gymnastics, so I had a LIFE and somehow became good friends with all the popular boys (not like all the other girls who would fawn over them and wanted to date them – I would smash mailboxes and play video games with them – and that was SO much more fun). So I spent a lot of time up at the lake, driving around in cool cars, learning what fun it was to kiss a boy and not want to call them the next day, developing a crazy sense of style because I worked at Hot Topic and got an amazing discount and first pick at the clearance clothes, and had my first exposure to parties (and getting drunk, and learning how to give my parents a fake name and number of where I was staying…heh).

    Basically, that summer I went from a girlie girl who was frankly afraid of boys to someone who was much more comfortable hangin’ with the dudes.

    I’ve had better times since then, but in the classic sense of memorable summers, I’ll always remember the sights and sounds and places vividly of that one. Nowadays, the experiences are too segmented by work/responsibilities to count as a memorable SUMMER. Now memorable weeks… that’s a different story…

    • “developing a crazy sense of style because I worked at Hot Topic and got an amazing discount and first pick at the clearance clothes” I knew we were friends for a reason!

  29. My favorite summer was exactly a year before I had my first child. My husband and I were living in Amsterdam in a cute little apartment with our dog. There was a picturesque bridge right out our window, and we rode our bikes everywhere. Every Monday we went to Quiz night, and drank too much beer, on the weekends we went on little road trips in our little MG convertible (the dog had to sit on my lap, he is a lab). Our Dutch neighbors owned a boat, so we would go to the market and get meat, cheese, fruit, and bread and pack a picnic to go on a boat trip around the canals. We went to France, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, and Belgium. It was the best summer that I could have possible imagined to have before starting a family.

  30. I liked the Kelty Large Shadehouse because I go on an annual camping trip with a big group of friends (with a lot of kids!), but we use a crappy tarp to cover ourselves from rain or sun. We need an upgrade!

  31. My favorite summer was last year. I had a miserable spring that involved finishing my first year of medical school, a bad breakup, and some family issues. The day I took my last final I got on a plane to Germany with one of my best childhood friends. We spent our days exploring a couple of different cities, eating gelato, drinking coffee with baileys and lots of German beer, and buying scarves. We stayed in a castle, drank in a biergarten on the top of a 15th century fortress, got charged by a baby donkey at a zoo, took a tour in German (which we don’t speak), and got crazy on the Reeperbahn, among many other random adventures. It was by far the best trip I have ever taken in my life and when I have a bad day I think of those memories & I always cheer up.

    The next month I spent some time in Hawaii with a different friend. Maui is the most beautiful place I have ever been, & Oahu was gorgeous as well. I spent that trip laying in the sun, swimming in the ocean, driving the road to Hana, snorkeling, going to a black sand beach, and swimming in a waterfall pool. It was another awesome trip that I will never forget.

    My summer was completely carefree, which I had never before experienced and will probably never experience again. I am so thankful for my travel buddies and all of the awesome memories we made 🙂

  32. The picnic backpack or shade tent.

    The summer after I met my hubby, a group of us went white water rafting every weekend. We were lucky enough to know someone who had been a professional guide and our university rented out rafts dirt cheap to students. The rapids were an adrenaline rush and then there would be a stretch of calm water where the beer, snacks and fishing poles came out. Once it rained and hailed on us and my hubby said he was impressed because I didn’t “wimp or diva out” like some other girls had. Loved that summer, sigh.

  33. Best Summer Ever: I was 17 and a summer foreign exchange student in Tokyo, Japan. My totally awesome host family had me sleep in their traditional tatami room. I spoke to my host mom in bits of Japanese and French. She teased me and called me a baby (aka-chan) because it creeped me out to eat fish with the heads still attached, and all I could say in Japanese was “it’s looking at me!” She always gave me a fork even though I could use chopsticks. My older host sister liked to sneak out with her friends and go salsa dancing, but felt bad about it because she appreciated her parents supporting her while she went to college. My younger host sister would watch a video tapes of Tokyo Disneyland parades at night and practice their dance choreography. She ended up drinking most of the Coca Cola my host parents kept in the house to keep me from getting too homesick. I liked the big jugs of iced green tea and milk coffee better. There was a small Shinto shrine that must have been hundreds of years old just down the street. They also had a community farm. My host mom always packed mushrooms in our lunches because she was afraid that living near these big power lines would cause cancer. I studied Japanese with some Americans, Italians, and girls from Hong Kong, one of whom had the same birthday as me. I had my first ever huge-ass crush on one of the Americans (unfortunately, even though he did seem to like me, he was dead set on making out with Japanese girls that summer). I remember as I was going through the moodswings of adjusting to a different culture, I was morbidly thrilled that if I got hit by a giant bus plastered with Doraemon cartoons — at least I would die in Japan. I learned how to use public transportation, how to ask Japanese shopkeepers, between two CDs, which one was better? (they didn’t like making such a judgement, lol), got a super awesome portable CD player that was shiny purple and tinier than anything I’d seen in the U.S. I got my wallet stolen on the train and a random stranger translated for me at the police box and gave me enough money to cover my lost train pass and the money I said was in there — then he refused to let me pay him back when I got home and emailed him for his mailing address. At a week-long foreign exchange student camp, one of the year-long-stay Australians taught me how to say “Australia” and I taught him how to say “Nevada.” We made curried rice on the bank of a beautiful river and saw the Daibutsu in Kamakura and lit fireworks at my host family’s traditional country house and went to summer festivals wearing yukata. Before I left for Japan, my coworkers at the video game store in the mall had nicknamed me “Da Mouse” because I was so timid. When I came back, they had to change my nickname. I brought back a high tolerance for making a fool out of myself, and learned that there are far more people in the world who want to help you than hurt you. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg.

    I love your story of living poor but grand… and getting an engagement ring thrown at you, lol. (I’m sure it sucked at the time, but still, that’s pretty hilarious.) And yes, XKCD is the best webcomic evvvaaaar <3

    • This is one of my favorite comments on this post! You described it all so well and it sounds like a life-changing experience! I loved this: “My host mom always packed mushrooms in our lunches because she was afraid that living near these big power lines would cause cancer.”

  34. I like the ROSSIGNOL W’S CLIM JKT in white!

    one great summer I had was the summer of 2009 when I decided to lose weight and get into shape. After months of attempting to exercise and diet, this summer was when I actually got serious and developed a love for fitness.

  35. I like the green KSwiss skirt. very cute

  36. My most awesome summer ever (so far) was when I was a camp counselor at an overnight camp. I got paid to play in the forest with very fun kids and very fun coworkers 🙂

  37. I would love the K-swiss Running Skirt. It’s not available yet, but all the same. Also any of the camping gear. Right now we have hand-me-downed hand-me-downs but it’s not as urgent since camping with an infant isn’t real high on my priority list.

  38. My best summer was spent in St. Croix, USVI. I was working at a little sandwich shop in Christiansted, and I opened it and ran it every day. The people who ate there were generally very nice and tipped well, and when business was slow I would sit in front of the shop and watch people walk around the town. It was during college and I was staying with my dad and three siblings, and one of my friends from college had come with me. I am 9 years older than my next oldest sibling, and it was great getting to be around them again and be a big sister. It was also a blast dragging the beach chairs into the surf and drinking Fuzzy Navels out of the bottle with my friend. It was just an all-round perfect summer with great weather, beaches, friends, and family.

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  40. I like the purple backpack, but its sold out!

  41. Ack. This is going back almost 20 years…Hard to believe. My family always went camping every summer at a favorite National Park in Nova Scotia. This one particular summer, my sister, best friend and I arrived at the park to find out that they were full. They put us on a waiting list and told us to come back in the morning. My best friend’s grandmother lived nearby so we went there for the night, then went back in the morning. Doesn’t sound like a great start to the trip, does it?

    When we got there the next morning, the guy at the registration desk told us he was giving us the best site in the park. We had to hike from the car to get there, it was at the very end of the path on a little point. We were surrounded by lake & trees, couldn’t even see another campsite. It was the best camping spot ever and we had perfect weather for the whole trip. I don’t know if there is any summer that stands out as the best summer, but that does stand out as the best camping trip.

  42. I like the k-swiss section. My husband will ONLY wear k-swiss shoes, and for some reason they have become harder to find in stores over the years. I’m totally going to save this site for the next time he needs shoes!

  43. Also, for my best summer, it would have to be the one I spent interning at a theater in Florida. There was a lot of crazy fun going on, but my favorite memory is going skinny dipping in the Gulf in the middle of the night, floating on the warm water and watching the heat lightning overheard. Looking back I can’t believe I was lying in the ocean during LIGHTNING, but alas, I was invincible then I suppose.

    • ” Looking back I can’t believe I was lying in the ocean during LIGHTNING, but alas, I was invincible then I suppose.” I think a lot of people’s best summer memories have that same ending line!

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  47. I like the KSwiss Spliced Crew in Pink.

  48. hmmmmmmmm i’ve had some pretty good summers but the best one was last summer on my trip to tx. it was just awesome and changed my life plans. i’m moving there!

  49. the kswiss running skirt is really cute.

  50. Ah, I wish I had checked out the kelty gear, I’m not really a fan of K Swiss, but I’m sure the site will have some cool stuff I like in the future!

  51. I simply love the outdoors. I want to win your giveaway. $50 to spend on just what I want is just what I need.

  52. I like some of those tennis dresses, but they would definitely not work for me! I did like them on facebook. Love getting workout clothes cheap!

  53. Hey there! I’ve been reading your website for a long time now and finally got the courage to go ahead and give you a shout out from Vegas. Just wanted to tell you keep up the excellent work!