Ah, young love. Makes you do all sort of wild and crazy things.

Such as, say, agreeing with your boyfriend that camping sounds like a wonderful idea for a few days despite the fact that:

• you have really bad hay fever and sleeping in the great outdoors is likely to cause your face to explode with snot
• you have your period, so access to showers is going to be really important and any ideas he has about sexy fun in the great outdoors are going to be nixed quite firmly.
• you don’t leave home early enough to get to the campsite before dark, so you have to put the tent up by torchlight
• he doesn’t let you help put the tent up, because he’s got his arse in his hand about leaving too late (totally all his fault)
• because he’s the one that chooses the campsite and puts the tent up, he doesn’t notice that he chooses to do so in a ditch.

We were fine for the first night, because all I wanted to do was sleep. It started to rain on the second day. That isn’t unusual in Wales, where we actually export water to the rest of the UK because we have so much falling on us, usually during the summer. We drove around for a while, saw some sights, came back to the campsite, ate in a local restaurant and went to bed.

I wake up early the next morning to see my gym bag, containing all of my clean clothes and the copy of the book I was reading, floating across the inside of the tent. It was a large tent, made for six, so there was plenty of space for my bag to lazily drift across.

Boyfriend was woken and is tersely appraised of the situation. He immediately blames himself for the entire situation. I privately agree wholeheartedly, but remain dutifully non-judgmental as I wade to dry land in full view of other campers who remain safe, if not completely dry, in their own tents on slightly higher land. I sit in the car, dressed in some of his spare clothes, as he battles with both the rising water level and the uncooperative tent. We drive home mostly in silence, punctuated by brief cheery outbursts by me, trying hard to Put A Brave Face On.

I’ve never been camping since. Five star hotels have evolved for a reason, you know.