Ever since the weather has been getting warmer, I have been craving a fun outdoor picnic. I am in the process of searching for a great place so I can go with some friends on the long weekend.

Here are some picnic stories

1) Once I planned a picnic in the end of April for a friend’s birthday. The weather was above seasonal so i thought a great hike on an unpaved trail would be fun. Of course I forgot to realize that NONE of the trees had leaves yet. And all of the snow hadn’t melted. Definitely the most interesting hike I had been on.

2) When I go to picnics with friends, we play extreme frisbee, soccer, dodge ball, badminton, and any other picnic-type games. The best part of picnic games is that you don’t have to be good! You just need to run around and have a great time! When we used to go with our family friends, all of the south Indian maami’s find these purple colour track pants from who-knows-where, and these baseball caps from the dollar store. We play the most unusual picnic games ever; like dodge-ball antakshari. Good times

3) My general picnic food includes sandwiches, fruits, energy bars & water. It’s easy to carry, clean, easy to eat on-the-go, and pretty delicious. Especially if the sandwiches have chutney! When I was younger and I went on ‘family-friend-picnics’, with my prayer group, we used to bring thairu shaadam (yogurt rice), and a variety of kari’s (veggies). The “easy” food was the large pathram (container) of coconut rice. By the time we got to the picnic grounds, the cars, and our clothes smelled of south indian goodness. It was pretty hilarious. On the plus side, people used to keep distance from our picnic area, so we always got a little extra space

4) When I was a lot younger, we went down South to USA to this park with family & family friends. Nobody remember’s what the park was called, because we all started calling it mosquito park. EVERYONE swallowed atleast ONE mosquito. A few people got them in their eyes/nose. We were SO outnumbered.

5) We once went to this park a few hours up North, again with family friends. All the ‘big kids’ & ‘uncles’ wanted to try canoeing, so they left all of us little kids at this park with one of the uncles. We were all playing ball when this HUGEE dog ran up. Everyone was trying to stay still, but my sister was SO scared she started to run. She was almost in tears when the park security pulled the dog away. After we found its owner, the security guard told her to keep her dog on the leash, or within sight, as per park regulations. She rolled her eyes, pushed her sunglasses down on her nose and said “thanks for the tip”. 10 minutes later, she unleashed her dog and went back to sleep.

6) Just last year, our family decided to go upto Algonquin for a weekend. We stayed at this really cute rental cottage, off of a lake. We decided to go on a hike before lunch. We asked the person at the entrance of the park which would be the best 1 hour hike. She recommended a trail to us. Remember, my dad is 50+. Apparently this girl hikes a LOT, because it ended up being an 11 km FULLY uphill trail. It was gorgeous, no doubt, with beautiful lakes, amazing scenery, cute streams, cliffs… you name it, we saw it. 1/2 way through we saw an old couple sitting on the ground. We asked them if everything was okay, and they said that they couldnt go further because they were too tired. They were just planning on waiting for a few hours and then restarting when they felt better. They had some food with them. The trails had no cell phone reception. By the time we got out, THREE hours later, we were all hungry and tired. We drove to the closest food place (25 minute drive; within the park), and pigged out. My sister and I were fine, but my dad’s back got so bad he was unable to move for a week! We decided to take it REALLY easy that afternoon, just relax at the cottage. Three hours later, we were all bored and fidgeting, and decided to go for a small 800 meter hike closer to the cottage. Our family clearly does not know how to relax

I am excited about upcoming picnic adventures!!! I loveee summer.