Confessions from a Holiday Camp - The Psychedelic Olympics

'Let's do a decathlon' Simon said after we'd each downed a champagne flute of dried magic mushrooms. 'Yeah it'll be funny as fuck' said Bill without hesitation and with that we got up and walked over to the bowling green. Yes we knew that bowls was not an event at the decathlon but we could hardly do the pole vault could we.

Simon and his friend Scott came from New Zealand. They worked in the holiday camp kitchen and I had no idea what they were dong here in Devon so far from home but here they were joining myself, Bill the Indonesian barman and his friend Ben the lifeguard in a psychedelic Olympic experience.

As bowls isn't usually the first event in the decathlon, it was no trouble to add crazy golf into the mix as we walked over to the bowling green. Indeed bowls was only the first event because I had suggested a game just before Simon's decathlon idea. He was like that was Simon. He was one of those people who would always have to add something for an extra edge. You could be about to do a wing walk on an aeroplane and he would probably say something like 'Why don't you do it naked'...you get the gist.

Simon was wearing his mushroom shades as he called them. He would only wear them when he had taken magic mushrooms. The lenses were scratched to hell and he claimed that the scratched shades enhanced his experience by exaggerating his hallucinations. Funnily enough they only seemed to work for him. Everyone just left him to his shades and felt happy in the knowledge that if he wore the shades you would know what to expect should you choose to engage with him.

All five of us were feeling the effects of the mushrooms by the time we started the game of bowls but it was Simon as usual who would be the most affected. While the other four of us chuckled away playing bowls, Simon thought it would be a good idea to run along the edge of the bowling green knocking on people's doors at random. When no one answered any of the doors he decided to drop his shorts and run around us in a circle. Both of these things he managed to accomplish before the end of the first game. We should have been on the floor laughing at him but we were so used to him that it was just second nature to get on with our bit of fun while Simon did his own things.

The game of bowls proved to be uninspiring to us and we quickly decided to head for the crazy golf lawn. To play crazy golf we would have to go into the holiday camp shop to borrow the putters. I decided on the way over that it would probably be best if I went into the shop to retrieve the clubs. I figured I could hold myself together to get the job done without much fuss whereas if the others entered the shop it would be chaos possibly resulting in disciplinaries or worse for some or all of us.

Simon had a better idea though. His magic shades would help him through the process and no one would be any the wiser if he went into the shop to collect the putters. I didn't argue with him, choosing to stay outside the shop out of view while he went about his self appointed role as club collector.

He entered the shop alone while Bill, Ben and Scott waited outside chuckling away to each other. I stood a little away from them just around the corner as we all waited for Simon. After a couple of minutes he emerged from the shop in hysterics carrying a large, round plastic tub. Instead of retrieving five golf putters he had bought a tub of 400 Drumstick lollipops. 'I couldn't remember what I was doing in there so I got us these' he bawled out to us as he emerged, laughing his tail off. We all burst out laughing and I scanned the others before deciding that myself and Ben were probably the only ones who did have any idea why he had gone into the shop in the first place. The boys began to tuck into the lollipops while I went to retrieve the golf clubs.

Behind the counter stood the daughter of the assistant manager of the holiday camp. No one trusted her due to her close relationship with her mother. Her mother was understandably rather protective of her 16 year old daughter whenever she was working on camp. She somewhat mistakenly believed that every hot blooded male on the camp was trying to get down to business with her daughter. Nothing could have been further from the truth. The truth was that both mother and daughter were like a fart in a space suit. A pair of do gooders that would love nothing more than to get a juicy piece of inside information with which to do someone over.

I approached the counter with my usual lazy smile and asked 'Have you got five putters please Jackie?' She looked at me disapprovingly and said 'What's wrong with him?' as she pointed at Simon through the window. I looked beyond her through the window to see Simon once again dropping his shorts for the entertainment of the boys. 'Oh he's a bit pissed. It's his birthday....don't worry...he's in safe hands' I replied as calmly as I could.' I began a ten second countdown in my head as I decided that I was struggling to hold this together. If the clubs were not here in the next ten seconds I would leave before this situation escalated out of control. Jackie reached under the counter and placed five putters on the desk. I thanked her, grabbed the clubs quickly and began to exit the shop before I realised something was missing. I turned back and said to Jackie 'Have you got any balls?' as I raised a warm smile for her. She went bright red and immediately ducked under the counter to retrieve five golf balls for me. She placed them on the counter and I watched as two of them rolled off and bounced around the shop for a moment before rolling underneath a large chest freezer.

'I'll come back for the balls in a minute' I said and left the shop. Having given each of the boys a club, I returned to the shop and fished around under the freezer with my club. I scooped around for a minute without success before Jackie's voice came from behind the counter saying 'They're under the freezer.' I knelt up and realised I was fishing underneath the shop counter instead. 'Oh yeah, thanks' I said as I turned around to fish the balls out from under the freezer. I collected the balls together, said goodbye to Jackie and we made the short walk over to the crazy golf lawn at the front of the holiday camp.

Simon decided to throw his ball over to the most distant flag in the far corner of the lawn. He managed to overshoot the entire lawn and we watched as his golf ball flew over the wall and bounced on the main road to disappear into the bushes on the other side of the road. Scott, Ben and myself burst out laughing while Bill placed his ball down at the bottom of the steep slope that ran up to the crazy golf lawn. Bill was disappearing into his own world as Simon walked towards the camp gates to retrieve his ball. Bill gave his ball a solid hit and we watched as it flew high into the air before coming down to land just a few feet in front of us on the lawn. A magnificent wedge shot achieved with a putter. Tiger Woods would have been proud.

Scott, Ben and myself started at the first hole as normal while Bill just hit his ball around wherever he pleased at random. He had to shoot off over the car park a couple of times to retrieve his ball while Simon was still out on the road looking for his. The three of us managed to get through the first few holes of the course before Simon returned without his ball. It was lost forever to the thick bushes over the road. Bill carried on his own game all across the lawn and the rest of us decided it was time to undertake the next round of the decathlon.

Ben decided that the next round would be volleyball so we returned our golfing equipment and left the shop quickly before Jackie noticed the missing ball. Bill needed to refine his golfing technique a little more before he would rejoin us over on the volleyball court a little later. We didn't expect to see him again anytime soon.

The volleyball court sat on the other side of the swimming pool. An Australian lifeguard who usually worked on the beach was overseeing the swimming pool on Ben's day off and he knew not to jump to attention when Ben pushed Simon into the deep end as we walked past the pool. I had known better than to walk next to Ben anywhere near the pool. I'd seen this before...a few times. Simon shouted a couple of inappropriate expletives at Ben as we wondered over to the volleyball court leaving him to retrieve his mushroom shades from the bottom of the pool. A few holidaymakers were enjoying themselves in there and a couple of young children were within earshot. We expected one or two complaints to come back to us further on down the line.

A very soggy Simon joined us on the court a couple of minutes later and he stripped down to his underpants, leaving his clothes to dry on the grass by the side of the court. It was England vs New Zealand in the Croyde Bay Volleyball international masters tournament. Or at least that's what Scott said it was. To me it was Simon pissing about in his underpants while I realised we didn't have a volleyball to play with. We all laughed when I reminded them that the volleyball would be kept with the golf balls in the shop for safe keeping.

As going back to the shop didn't appeal to any of us I suggested it may be best to ditch the volleyball idea and play snooker instead. We all knew that the snooker balls and cues were all there in the snooker room waiting to be used. Simon decided that he would take his clothes back to his room and change into some dry clothes for this round and we arranged to meet up in the snooker room a little later. Scott walked over to the staff quarters with Simon leaving Ben and myself to get the next round underway.

There were two tables in the almost always empty snooker room so Ben and I decided that we would play each other leaving Scott and Simon to play each other upon their return. We were probably half way through the incredibly scrappy frame when Ben decided it may be best to find out what had become of Bill. I agreed and we left the snooker room in search of Bill.

I took extra care to be a few steps behind Ben as we walked around the pool area headed once again for the crazy golf lawn. As we rounded the pool Ben stopped and turned before saying 'Maybe he's in the cupboard.' Readers of the 'Mushroom Madness' episode of this series will already be familiar with 'The Cupboard.' 'The cupboard' was a tiny hole in the wall with a door on it. Standing about three feet high and two feet wide, it contained the apparatus for controlling the swimming pool. Bill and Ben used the cupboard as a retreat to smoke bongs. They would simply squeeze themselves in there either side of the gasket and use the bong that was always kept hidden behind the gasket.

Ben opened the door and Bill was not to be seen. 'Fancy a quick one' he said to me as we observed the empty cupboard. 'Be rude not to' I said in response and we squeezed ourselves into the tiny space, one either side of the gasket that occupied the centre. Ben retrieved the bong and I retrieved the ready made mix in the bowl that also lay hidden behind the gasket. We left the tiny door open a touch to allow enough light into the cupboard to allow us to see what we were doing and as Ben was ready to pull the bong, I closed the door and held up a burning lighter to add a little light on the proceedings.

We both chuckled and smoked a bong in the darkness. We waited for a few moments to let the smoke dissipate before opening the door to once again continue on with our mission to find Bill. As I pushed open the door I realised that I was a little stuck in this situation and rather than try to get up to leave the cupboard, I decided it best to just fall to my left as I crouched down. Ben laughed hard as I toppled to the side and I laughed as I lay there on my side watching Ben do the same.

We both lay there chuckling away and I looked up to see a man standing over us. It was a holidaymaker with his wife and two children stood behind him. 'Are you two okay?' he asked me as I looked up. 'Oh were fine thanks' I laughed at him. 'It's always giving us trouble this pool' I added to excuse our presence in the cupboard. As I squinted at the man I noticed that his nose appeared to be moving around his face in a circular motion and the sky was incredibly bright behind him. 'Okay' he said and they made off around the pool and carried on with their holiday.

The crazy golf lawn was empty when we arrived except for a large tub of drumstick lollipops. We grabbed the lollipops and walked around the whole camp looking for Bill. He was nowhere to be found. We also knocked on both Scott and Simon's rooms and they too were nowhere to be found. Ben suggested that we abandon the decathlon and go to his room to listen to some music, smoke and eat drumstick lollipops for a while. I agreed and he introduced me to a band called 'Massive Attack' and their new album called 'Blue Lines.' I loved it and still listen to it regularly to this day. In fact whenever I listen to it I am taken back to that day. It always makes me smile.

Bill did eventually turn up a couple of hours later. He had been playing golf in the sand dunes next to the beach. Amazingly he had also managed to return both his club and ball back to the shop. Or at least that's what he told us.

I bumped into Scott and Simon the next day. It turned out they had both been out for a walk through the village and to the pub. Simon was convinced that he'd been dancing in the road in the rain but no one else could remember it raining at all. Scott spoke of the sky being an unusual shade of pink that day and watching the clouds dance around.

A couple of days later I found myself in the shop and Jackie asked me to pay for the lost golf ball. She told me that Simon had blamed me for the loss of his ball when he returned his golf club. 'It's still under the freezer' I told her as I left.

I hope you enjoyed reading this story.

Back with more soon.

Until then, may you never get your balls stuck under the freezer.

STEEMONKEY🐒

Previous confessions

https://steemit.com/funny/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp-the-potty-piss-up

https://steemit.com/comedyopenmic/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp-tango-unchained-comedy-open-mic-round-18-entry-2

https://steemit.com/comedy/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp

https://steemit.com/comedy/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp-the-uv-light-show

https://steemit.com/comedyopenmic/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp-mushroom-madness

https://steemit.com/funny/@steemonkey/confessions-from-a-holiday-camp-an-introduction