Amercians in lake george

“You girls alright?” the American voice startles us from our frantic activity. An elderly American is standing behind us, clutching rather a lot of wood. It is obvious we are not alright, as the sun has set, the Lake George evening is chilly, and our make shift barbecue lit and died in 10 minutes, leaving our food barely warm.  Lizzy and I are starving and not in the best mood.

“We’re fine” I snap.

“You’re making that fire all wrong” The lady assures us. I am irritated by this, having spent all day on the bus, got here an hour ago with our meager one-man-tent-which-we’re-using-for-two-people, and bought an easy-start BBQ because we were too tired to invest in wood. This lady, our neighbor in the campsite, was staying in a giant camper van with built-in beds, heaters, kitchens, showers and everything else you can imagine, so it didn’t feel like camping at all. The woman, not in the slightest bit put our by my snap, swoops towards us. “You’re meant to make a pyramid of wood, and then put a fire starter in the middle. I make firelighters myself, you put wax and woodchips in cardboard egg cups, and put some string coming out- it works every time.” She drops her massive pile of wood and takes out a cardboard egg holder. “here, take this, you wont ever start a fire without it.”

We thank her, and take the makeshift firelighter and wood, and under her instruction, have a roaring blaze in minutes. We explain that the awful quick-and-easy BBQ we had didn’t work at all, and she realized we hadn’t eaten.

“We can cook on our fire” we assured her, but she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She whisked off out burgers with a “Y’all be hungry, and what if it makes you ill?” and cooked us a whole meal on their fancy gas stove. I was touched by her kindness, especially as she then began to offer us all sorts of food and drink and real seats by her and her elderly husband’s fantastically huge bonfire. We began to talk- she was called May, and her husband was Joe, and they lived retired in New York State, near Albany. They had 4 children and 3 grandchildren, who all called them one after the other so they could “say goodnight.” Whenever one of their family called, Joe and May would put them on loud speaker and introduce as “Two crazy English girls who are travelling around America!” The family member on the end of the phone would squeak in horror and amazement and shout “hi!” at us. They were all amazed we were travelling around America. “Good for you girls, what a brave and exciting thing to do!” May said, “How wonderful!”

“they’re travelling by FOOT” Joe said to his youngest daughter on the phone. (On foot meaning we were travelling by bus, which amazed the family even more) “Isnt that unbelievable? We saw them earlier, didn’t we May, and I said: Wow, they must be so strong to carry all of those bags around, really, I was going to offer them a lift, but we didn’t have any space in the camper. I did just look at them and think, they’re so brave! ”

“How often do you come to Lake George?” I asked them.

“We come here to this campsite, twice a year, every year, for the last 30 years.”

“30? Its 40 years!” May told Joe.

“I don’t think so, we first started when Oscar was born-“

“No, no, it was exactly 40 years this year, I SAID this before Joe!”

“I remember the first year, it was 1981, and it was really cold, remember?”

They squabbled for a while, and I tried to imagine coming to the same campsite, year after year, for 30 or 40 years. I can’t imagine loving a place so much, and wanting to return to its wooded hills and know it as well as home- so much that you return over and over. They even stay in the same camping spot, right in a pleasant green wood, overlooking the dark blue waters of lake George.

“Why do you come here so much?”

“the kids love it here. And we do too. There’s so much to do, you know- swimming and shopping and stuff. Do you want to go shopping? There’s a really nice outlet nearby, we could drive you. It has lots of good stores, not too expensive. We go every year.”

Lizzy and I have oversized bags and too little money already, so we decline, saying that we prefer to go hiking. This draws a big blank. Finally Joe says: “Ah yes, when I was a boy, we used to climb up Mount Prospect. Nice views from there. Good climb.” They both seem confused though. “Are you sure you don’t want to go shopping with us? It’s a beautiful mall!”

“We don’t have any bag space, but thankyou. Maybe we’ll climb Mount Prospect though”

Joe gives us through instructions on getting to the trail, and they both proceed to insist that we take food for the hike tomorrow. Its so sweet and generous, I am astounded. We are strangers to them! Yes, two innocent and unprepared girls, but strangers! But here they are, offering us food, advice, warmth, chairs and blankets for the cold, going out of their way to cook for us and make sure we are prepared. I almost don’t want to accept, feeling like I’m taking advantage of two lovely old people, but they seem genuinely happy to help us.

Over the next 3 days, May and Joe cook for us every night (without us asking) and share a fire and stories and ideas. I have never felt so looked after, as we waved goodbye, the morning we were set to bus to New York, I realized that they had taught me something valuable. It doesn’t matter who you are, or where, or why- human beings should just stop being controlled by the boundaries of society. Talk to other people, help people who need it, offer it even if they don’t appear to. American generosity is one of the things I am most amazed by, in our travels- once I was struggling with lots of food bags from a grocery store. Not one, but three people came over and asked whether I needed help. This would never happen in England. Never. American’s openness, and desire to help is unbelievable- something I was surprised by, as over seas, they are presented as selfish and stupid. Its strange that a country’s perception can be so much dependent on the single few in the medias eye and not the millions who exist and live beneath it. The every-day American is warm and kind, and genuine. Even after my trip, I still think of Joe and May and smile to myself that a couple could on the one hand be so kind, and on the other be so appalled that we would not want to spend the day shopping in a mall. The American oppositions!