The closest I came was a cross-country trip with my family when I was a teenager, in an RV that included bunks, a bathroom, a kitchenette, and a TV. My little brother’s pet hamster,and our dwarf Cairn terrier, Vieux-Carre, came along for the ride.
My two fondest memories of “camping”:
Standing in the doorway of the RV in a KOA campground and looking up, awed by the night sky over New Mexico. I’d never seen so many stars.
A dusk in Arizona at another KOA campground when our terrier delighted a 7-year-old French tourist by bringing a tennis ball to her. My mother and I called in English and gestured at her, miming throwing a ball. The little girl tossed it, and Vieux-Carre dashed away and brought it back, dropping it in front of her.
The girl almost hopped up and down in excitement. “Maman, Maman!” she shouted, followed by a flow of liquid syllables as she pointed at our terrier, who was doing its ball-nudging “throw-it-again” soft-shoe at her feet.
Pam Troy 