1. How you pack and load your gear into your backpack determines whether you arrive at the campsite crying or smiling :-). The lighter the item, the deeper it should go into your pack. The heaviest should be on the top part. Also a bulky or fat backpack makes a difference compared with a slender one. Don't get cheap on backpack especially if you are over 50.
2. Have you ever climbed the mountain in Indonesia with your friends? Did you remember the many items dangling from their pack? Their water bottle, their kitchen utensils, sometimes even their stoves and fuels. This is a waste of energy. All your items should fit in your backpack or should be loaded on top of it. If you can't, it means you are not camping but moving your home.
3. Cecilia and I bought 2 nice rain pants at MEC for our last camping trip. We didn't encounter pouring rain in Europe and our Gore Tex jacket was already adequate but keeping dry or becoming wet makes a difference between heavenly camping or a 'lousy' one. I shall always remember the three hints my fellow camper told me on winter camping. Number 1 don't get wet, number 2 don't get wet, number 3 don't get wet.
4. On waterproofing, we did that regularly to our tent from time to time. The fabric is OK in general unless you put your tent in a washer :-). What needs reapplication is the seam (jahitan) of the tent zipper. Make sure your hand is steady when doing the waterproofing cause if the glue gets to the zipper, you may have to sleep outside :-).
5. I love leaving for the campsite on a Friday morning. This way, we get to choose from many scenic sites and are not forced to camp in the dark.
6. When you are tired, you will be hungry and thirsty. So if you lead a team, make sure you allow time for rest. If you are a member of the team, munch on your snack from time to time :-), but share.
7. This is a secret actually, not all of my friends know. I keep pee bottle just outside my tent (inside the vestibule). If the weather is lousy or cold, I don't have to wear jacket and get into the boots, just to go pee. I took that bottle inside my tent, ser-ser-ser, finished, I slept again.
8. I told you a hundred times by now, get a good map. The same when you are backpacking, especially to an area you have never set foot before. In this province of Ontario, you can buy any topographical map of any place from MEC or other excellent camping store. Each geographical area in Ontario has a number, you just have to know roughly where you are going.
9. I don't know about your breakfast style but I eat big meal for breakfast. The best type of food is either bean or rice. Sandwich will only last me a couple hours. As said above, bring along snack like nuts and raisins.
10. I have used all kind of fuels for my camping stove. I have to say, gas is the best. There are several varities and if you are a beginner ask advice from the store person which one is suitable for your needs.
11. The temperature dropped to almost 0 when we camped in Zurich. Other than one down-filled sleeping back that Cecilia and I shared (both of us can fit sleeping in a twin-size bed :-)), we had headband that kept us warm. If your head is big, you may want to buy a tuque to cover all of it.
12. Do you know what is a perfect campsite? This is a place close to the water, well drained, above the waterline, lots of space for your friends' tents, the 'john' or biffy is nearby, far from the human noise, in a place you love and you have the company of someone you treasure. :-)
13. Don't bring the following items just by yourself but SHARE the load. Stove, pots and pans, tarp, water filter, water bag, map, first aid kit, GPS, compass, rope.
14. Bring the following and don't borrow: whistle, headlamp, lighter, sunscreen lotion, TP (toilet paper), pocket knife, personal medication.
15. Never save money on tent, your camping enjoyment depends on it. For beginner campers, it's better to borrow or rent first if you intend to camp more than once. This way you get a better idea of the tent you want to buy for the next trip.
16. A tarp could also contribute to a nice camping experience. If the rain is a downpour and the tent is leaking, you can expect a four-letter word swearing followed by 'never-again-in-my-life' oath from your friend.
17. I don't like to wear jeans when camping. It sucks. When it's wet, it is heavy. It is not easy to get dry and when you have a few jeans in your backpack and the climb is a 70 degree slope, I bet you will swear too :-).
18. "You don't want the breast you pay the price," said an unfriendly Popeye Chicken guy to us in Florida at one time. You don't want to get wet ever, you pay the price to wear Gore Tex pant, jacket and shoes :-). They are indeed one of the best inventions of human-being.
19. You don't want to get sick after your camping trip and in Ontario, Canada you could get the 'beaver-fever' from giardia. Invest in a good water filter or if you know how, bring iodine to kill the bacteria from those parasites. (You can use chlorine too if you want.)
20. When you go camping for several days, you can use a 'base camping' method. You stay in one place and only go to explore in different directions. This way, you don't have to pack and unpack every day.
21. Your stove could be your life. At one point in time, at the beginning of a 10-days interior camping, the main stove I brought was broken. We were already a day canoeing from the starting point. My back-up stove was a gas type with only one canister and there were 12 of us. I was lucky that we had engineer among us who was able to fix the stove. Moral of the story, brought either important part or a full back-up if the success of your whole trip depends on just one small item like that.
22. The same thing in clothing. If your pack falls to the water, you want to make sure you don't sleep with wet clothes. So store them inside a plastic (garbage) bag. During a day trip in one fall season, Cecilia fell to the water and was totally wet. Campsite was an hour paddling back. She was lucky that she could borrow dry clothing from the 3 of us because we also brought spare clothing when we went on a day trip.
23. Invest in a good first-aid-kit, especially if you go to the interior (read: several hours or days from civilisation). In Canada it is quite common that people are trained to do first-aid, else make sure that you could have one first-aider participant in your team. More important actually, DO NOT HORSE AROUND in the interior. It means do not do stupid things (becanda keterlaluan) that could cause trouble.
24. Be nice to the environment (exception: peeing a beaver dam, kidding). When you leave your campsite, make sure it is cleaner than before you come. When you walk on the trail, do not litter but put any wrapping in your pocket where you can stuff it in the garbage later on. This way, your grand-grandchildren would have the same enjoyment as you.
25. I don't think most of you will go to bear-country or camp in the interior. Regardless, important stuff like your (bear) pepper-spray, water, first- aid kit, etc. should all be easily accessible, preferably in the outside of your backpack.

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There is a time to start and a time to end. This story has to be finished and for those of you who were reading it during the company hour, you've got to get back to work :-). Those who took a break from their study, you better get back to your thesis work :-). Well my friends, I told you earlier that we loved Milan. Actually, after we had the time to digest all our experiences in the 5 European cities we visited this time, we loved them all. Each city was unique and brought good memories, including the 'free tour' to Murano :-). It was compounded by our 'luck' that we met C and H in Zurich who offered us to stay at their apartment on our last night in Europe after we arrived back from Salzburg. Imagine if we had to go to Camping Seebuch and endured the hassle of just one night camping. I might not be able to smile back to all the Singapore Airlines stewardesses on our Zurich-Singapore flight :-).
Our train from Salzburg, after passing many beautiful and scenic places around the border of Austria and Switzerland, arrived around noon on May 21. Knowing Zurich well then, we stored our backpacks at the train station and we took advantage of our Eurailpass. Its holder was entitled to a free Lake Zurich tour. However, because of the time, we took the shorter (one hour) version of the tour. It turned out that we were on the public boat (not an exclusive tour boat) that stopped at many places. Eventually getting bored as that lake was nothing special, we got out at a place called Kirchberg. The idea was to visit Lindt chocolate factory near there. Bad luck this time because the tour was only in the morning. Lonely Planet misguided us again when it said that visitors would get ample sample of free Lindt chocolate. It was a lie, cause we were offered only ONE small piece of Lindt chocolate. It was even smaller in size and less in quantity than those we gave to our neighbours' kids at Halloween time :-). No wonder Switzerland is a rich country :-).
I was kidding of course because C who was so generous with her time and everything else for us, picked us up at the station after we returned from our do-it-yourself tour. We had dinner together and continued chatting till the evening with her and her husband. I enjoyed talking to H because he has a hobby to visit hot countries like Indonesia and Kenya (safari). When I asked what is his favourite place in Indonesia, he said Bangka (island). I was alarmed and of course demanded a justification :-). He had been there several times and he said, the beaches were perfect. I didn't want to argue with my host, of course. But later on, without H knowing I verified his statement with my Bangka island relative who swore without the bible that H was right :-). Since my wife doesn't like hot places too much, I doubt that I will ever visit Bangka island. C showed us an exemplary generosity of an Indonesian, not only by driving us to the airport, but walked together to the departure gate on our last day in Europe, May 22. She could do so because she worked for Garuda Indonesia (airline) office in Zurich and thus has special privileges.
I have many friends and some of you guys do not believe in God which is fine with me. After all, in my birth country called Indonesia, it seems that the more people believe in God, the more determined they are to kill one another. So, whatever you believe in, the canoe "god", the cycling "deity", they all must have worked together with the God that I believe in making our European trip such a wonderful experience. Whether you gave us your blessings and prayed for us or you just said farewell, I thank you again for your prayers and your best wishes. It is Cecilia's belief and I had to agree with her if I still want to win in Scrabble :-) that it was more than just luck, we had Divine Providence. To our "sponsors" of this trip, our family and friends, danke schoen noch einmal, grazie mille, terima kasih berat. Please pray again for our next Australia and New Zealand trips, to start on June the 14th. :-) Greetings from Jakarta, bye for now.
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Many years ago, when I was much younger I read a book entitled "Europe in 50 $ a day". It was not a Canadian book, therefore the currency was in US dollars. The author did not mention camping ground at all but highlight places where one could eat decent meals and stayed at budget hotels. I knew before I went backpacking to Europe that it would be impossible these days to budget 50 dollars per day in Europe unless you are still young and healthy, thus can carry your "food and lodge" in your backpack. That was what we, Cecilia and I did, starting our journey of a lifetime, May 5, 2002 from Toronto to Zurich, Switzerland.

Knowing I could still portage a canoe (don't tell people that it is a Kevlar one :-)), I know I can put our three-season tent, sleeping bag, Therm-a-rest (for non-camper readers: it is a sleeping pad), cooking set, stove, eating utensils, and most important, FOOD in my backpack. At the end of our European trip on May 22, when I did the final calculation of our expenses, we spent an average of US$ 80 per day. We didn't really 'live miserably', we were only cautious in our expenses. If we had to spend, like celebrating our 27th wedding anniversary in Milan (Father Kusmaryanto can testify) we didn't hesitate to eat in a fancy restaurant :-). When it was our belief that it was worth it to buy a package deal like the Salzburg 3 days card for visiting all the museums and other major tourist attractions, we bought the 32 Euro ticket. Yes, we didn't spend $ 500 on a La Scala opera ticket in Milan but we had free musical symphony concert in the famous and beautiful cathedral (called Duomo).

We didn't enter Europe through the front door nor did we go through the back door or the cheapest way but rather we came through the side door. Hence, it will be my story's title of our journey of the spring time of Anno Domini 2002 in Europe. Sit tight my friends, this story will be as exciting as Mr. Lantern Coleman's one if not more :-). Because of my love for my Canadian and native English speaker friends that I am writing this story in my second language despite the fact that I am a better writer in Indonesian :-). Let me begin with sharing our trip planning a bit with you.

As you all know, because I am a retiree now and Cecilia is her own boss at home, we have a lot of flexibility in our trip length. However, being a devout Catholic my wife wanted to come back to Toronto before the World Youth Day 2002 event so that she can meet the Pope again. We met or rather saw him last on May 10, 2000 when we were in Rome celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary. We also knew we wanted to stay for about a month in Indonesia so that we would have enough time to meet our families and friends. Thus, we planned to be around (but not more than) 3 weeks in Europe and later on around 2 weeks in Australia and New Zealand. This would leave about a month in Indonesia, our birthplaces.

After reading about 10 Lonely Planet books on Europe, also having been to some other countries, we picked Switzerland, Italy and Austria as the 3 countries and chose Zurich, Milan, Venice, Vienna and Salzburg as the 5 cities we would be staying. Yes, this way we (started to) saved on the Eurailpass ticket because there was a special fare of visiting 3 countries in 5 days train travel. It was also a good deal because the ticket was first class fare. If your age is beyond 50 like ours :-), we recommend first class fare Eurorail ticket rather than a second class. It was much worth it, especially when we took the night train from Venice to Vienna (I will tell you more about this). So, our schedule in Europe was quite set. We intentionally left it open as to how many days we would spend in each of the 5 cities. The Canadians say, let's play by the ear or rather as it turned out by the cost of the enjoyment :-).

That's for now. In the next episode I will share with you our Zurich camping experiences. If you recall or are aware of, Cecilia and I fought before we went. In my opinion she was sissy, not willing to walk 4 km from Zurich train station to the campsite. In her opinion, of course I was wrong :-). Wait how this battle turned out to be :-).

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