Confessions from a Holiday Camp - Mushroom Madness

The month of September brings about an annual event like no other. Across the country people can be seen wandering around fields with their eyes fixed on the ground as they hold their plastic carrier bags in the hope of a little treat from mother nature.

This is similar to the situation I found myself in. It's the early 90's and the location is a field somewhere in east Devon.

'Fancy coming picking?' Ben said to me. 'What do you mean?' I asked in return. 'Me n Bill know a great spot near our place in Somerset. It's our day off tomorrow so we're going in the morning.' I was lost. 'What do you mean...picking what?' I asked sheepishly. Ben gave me a smile like he felt sorry for me. 'You've never had mushrooms?' he asked me in a rather surprised manner. I now knew what he meant. I'd heard of magic mushrooms but knew nothing about them. 'No mate...are they any good?' I enquired. 'The best. Fancy it?' he quickly replied. 'Sure I'll have a bash' I said without much hesitation. The following day was also my day off work. I'd switched my day off to match that of Bill and Ben some weeks previous so we could hang out together.

And so the following morning we found ourselves pulling over at a stile next to a field. I had spent much of the drive with Bill and Ben quizzing them about these mushrooms. Usual stuff like what they look like, what they do, how many you need and so on. I have to say their answers were most intriguing and I was very much looking forward to engaging with these mushrooms. They sounded like something to experience and something to remember.

I trusted Bill and Ben. I'd gotten to know them well over the course of the summer season. Bill was from Aceh in Indonesia and no-one could pronounce his real name so as he was best mates with Ben, everyone called him Bill. He didn't seem to mind. He worked behind the bar on the holiday camp. Ben was the lifeguard. They were both characters and were both very much up for a good time.

Ben opened the car boot and pulled out three large boxes, each about the size of a microwave oven. We took the boxes and climbed over the stile into the field. Immediately both Bill and Ben found their targets. They didn't have to look far. In fact they had both trodden on magic mushrooms as soon as they put their feet into the field. They laughed as they showed me their prize. I must say the mushrooms didn't look very impressive. They were tiny little things.

Tiny they may have been but they were everywhere. We didn't have to move. It was simply a case of bending over and picking them up. We spent the next eight hours doing exactly that by which time we had filled our boxes with these mushrooms. We assessed our catch and the lads were mightily impressed. They both said they had never seen anything like it. I was still a little perplexed with it all and didn't appreciate just what a find this had been.

By the time we had finished picking, our backs were aching off and we were still only about ten metres from the stile. There was a whole field of these mushrooms just sitting there in front of us. Enough to fill a truck with. It was amazing...even if I didn't know it at the time.

We loaded up our catch and headed back to the camp to prepare these little natural wonders. Bill and Ben knew what to do. They emptied the contents of the boxes into a bath tub and gave them a thorough wash before laying them out in Bills room to dry. I looked in the room and every surface was covered with mushrooms. They were laid over the bed, over the wardrobe, over the ledges, over the cabinets and all across the floor. The electric heater was left switched on for a day and the door was closed.

I met Bill and Ben the next day. They had slept together in a single bed as Bill's room had been out of commission. They found me in the dining room preparing my tables for the evening service. They were both extremely excited 'You've gotta come see this Ian' they giggled. I dropped the cutlery and made my way over with them to Bill's room for a peek.

The room looked much the same except for a few gaps that had appeared as the mushrooms had dried and shrunk. Three champagne flutes sat on the cabinet. Each of them contained dried mushrooms. They looked like little pieces of wire scrunched up. Ben grabbed a flute and passed it to me. He then passed one to Bill and proceeded to tip the contents of his flute into his mouth. Bill did the same. 

They pulled faces as though they were eating grass. Ben filled his flute with water from the sink and washed his mushrooms down. Bill did the same. 'I can't take these now. I haven't finished work yet and I'm back on shift at five o' clock' I explained to the pair of them. 'I'm at work now' Ben said as he picked a couple of bits from his teeth. 'I'm on at five too...till nine' said Bill. It was 11am and I still had half an hour of finishing up to do before I would have the afternoon off and be ready on shift again at 5pm. 'You guys are fucking crazy...I'm gonna wait until I've finished my shift tonight. I've never done these before' I said to them. They seemed a little disappointed with me but understood my predicament. I took the flute of mushrooms and left it in my room for later.

At the end of my morning shift I needed to find Bill and Ben to see what had become of them. Finding Ben was easy, he was at work. The swimming pool was located near the restaurant and as I made my way down I could see Ben sat on his chair wearing his sunglasses. It wasn't particularly sunny so I assumed he was hiding behind them. I shouted across the pool to him 'How ya doin?' A few holidaymakers were sitting around the pool enjoying a few drinks. 'Fish mate' he shouted back across the pool.

I thought it best not to continue this conversation within earshot of the guests so ventured over to Ben. 'What you on about...fish?' I said to him quietly. 'Fish mate...look' he said as he pointed to the pool. 'Can you see them?' he added. I looked at the pool to appease him, 'No mate...there's no fish' I whispered. Just then my mind wandered over to Bill, 'Where's Bill?' I asked. 'He might be in the cupboard' came the response.

Strangely enough this made sense to me because Bill and Ben had a cupboard. 'The cupboard' was a tiny little hole in the wall with a door on it. It was about 3 feet high and 2 feet wide. Inside were the controls for the swimming pool. A large gasket of some sort had a couple of pipes coming off it that ran through the wall to the pool. A panel with a few dials was mounted on the wall inside the cupboard. Bill and Ben kept a bong in there for use whenever the opportunity presented itself. They would simply open the door and squeeze themselves in there one at each side of the gasket. They would remove the bong from behind the gasket and smoke in there. Occasionally you would see smoke appear through the crack of the door when you walked past. Everyone knew about it and everyone just left them to it.

I checked the cupboard and Bill was not there. What with Ben seeing fish in the pool, heaven knows what Bill would be up to. Having washed and changed into my day clothes, I took a stroll to Bill's room. He wasn't there either. I asked around and no one had seen him. It took me about ten minutes to find him. I couldn't miss him. He was playing crazy golf on the front lawn in his speedos, holding the club upside down. I wondered about these mushrooms and what on earth was going to happen to me when I tried them that evening after work.

I ventured over to the overweight, scantily clad, Indonesian gentleman on the lawn and enquired as to where he learned how to play golf holding a putter like that. He didn't say anything in response, preferring to hold his club close to his face as he stared at the putting end laughing hard. He continued to stare at it for a few seconds before dropping it back down and continuing on as he had done with the putter upside down. I watched on as he stood by a flag, knocking the ball in the hole from time to time and then getting the ball out and putting it back down in the same place a few inches from the flag. I tried to talk to him but he had no words. He would simply laugh at me whenever I tried to speak. I left him to his round of golf and went for lunch.

By the time I had finished my evening shift, word had gotten round about our little day trip to east Devon and I noticed more people than usual hanging around the staff quarters. I also noticed that some of them were holding empty champagne flutes. This was going to be a very interesting evening I thought to myself as I headed for my room to change.

As usual, when I entered my room there were about 5 or 6 people in there smoking bongs. As I was in my third year on the camp I'd managed to get myself a nice big double room. Of course it became a hang out for everyone as most other people had rooms half the size. My champagne flute had gone which was no surprise but I wasn't concerned as you can probably imagine. There was enough to go around that's for sure.

I left the people to their bongs and ventured over to Ben's room. Bill and Ben were in there and surprisingly they were both compos mentis. They cheered as I walked in and Ben passed me a pre arranged champagne flute. They both grabbed one each and we said cheers as we touched flutes before downing the contents.

The next few hours were interesting to say the least. Ben had chosen the music as usual. This time he had selected a 'rare treat' for me as he described it. For some reason he had chosen Hawkwind. I'd never heard Hawkwind before. I sat settled on the bed with Bill and Ben as the mushrooms took effect. They stared at me in anticipation, waiting for some feedback. It took about five or ten minutes before I could feel the effects and after twenty minutes I was well away. 

I remember sitting on the bed listening to this awful music. The particular song that was playing was so intense that I had to escape it. The window was above my head. I stood up, pushed the window open and dived out head first. Fortunately for me, Chadwell (who was supposed to pick me up in 'The Mad Monk' episode of Hitchhikers Adventures) was walking past the window and he caught me before I could land on the concrete head first. I got up and walked back round to Ben's room. When he opened the door I asked him to turn off the awful music that had done my head in. He obliged and we spent the next couple of hours watching the boxing on TV.

The fight was between Chris Eubank and Nigel Benn if I remember correctly. At the end of the fight we simultaneously turned to each other and burst out laughing at the same time. 'What happened?' I said as we stopped chuckling. 'I've no idea' said Ben. 'Me too' said Bill and we all burst out laughing again. 'How long have we been watching that?' I then said to them. Again they both burst out laughing as they said 'I've no idea' at the same time.

Things were beginning to become normal again and we spoke about the previous few hours. We had all sat speechless, transfixed on the boxing for the entire program yet none of us knew what had happened or how long we had been sat there.

The experience was something I will never forget. There is nothing like it. I was changed by it. Something had switched on inside me that hadn't been there before. I felt deeper. I felt like new avenues had been opened up in my mind. Avenues that I would ultimately find lead to the most wonderful answers about the point of existence and the nature of spirituality.

There would me more mushroom madness over the coming period of time as many people made their way through our little fungal friends. Maybe there'll be one or two more mushy stories in this series. We'll have to wait and see.

I do hope you have enjoyed reading my mushy tale.

Stay tuned for more confessions coming soon.

Until then, may your being be at one with the rest of nature.

STEEMONKEY🐒