Written for Ilvermorny, New Beginnings event.
Prompt: Scotland tradition. (Write about a Muggleborn wizard/witch taking their Pureblood friend on a camping trip.)
Harry stepped over a tree trunk. He and Hermione were taking Ron on a camping trip for his birthday (their run during the war hadn't counted). He were almost positive that Ron would hate it — not nearly as much food as he usually ate, wilderness, large animals, no magic...
Plus, Ron knew absolutely nothing about camping.
That would make it rather difficult.
"So, how do I make a fire?" An eager Ron asked. He was rooting around in his knapsack for...something. Harry couldn't tell.
He decided to bite. "What are you looking for?"
Ron looked up. "Food." Hermione stifled a laugh.
"You don't get food until noon," Harry patiently told his friend. Ron looked horrified.
"But it's hours till noon!" He protested.
Harry shook his head. Hermione had her hand clamped over her mouth, and her shoulders were shaking with her muffled laughter. "That doesn't matter, Ron. You aren't allowed to eat on camping trips unless it's eight A.M., twelve noon, or five P.M." Ron's jaw dropped.
"How am I supposed to survive?" He moaned piteously. "You know that I eat a snack between breakfast and lunch, and lunch and dinner!"
Hermione snorted. "Yeah, if three sandwiches counts as a 'snack'," she said sarcastically, making bunny-ears with her fingers. "Come on, Ronald. We still have at least another mile before the campsite."
"Are we there yet?" Ron whined. Hermione giggled.
"Almost," Harry said in a tired voice. Half an hour later, which was interspersed with complaints from Ron, they reached the campsite — a circular clearing with a small brook a little ways away. "Let's put up the tent, Ron."
"I can do it by myself," Ron insisted. "You help Hermione." Hermione scowled at him — after all, she'd been camping for years. Harry shrugged, and went over to his other friend. They soon got the tent up and turned to see how Ron was doing.
"A little help?" A voice came from beneath the heap of cloth and poles. Hermione and Harry rushed forward and hauled the collapsed tent off of Ron. The redhead was lying on his back, a scowl on his face. Harry dared not look at Hermione, lest he burst out laughing. He didn't think Ron would take kindly to that.
"Are you alright?" Hermione asked, biting her lip. It wasn't her usual nervous tick; it was to keep her laughter from burbling out.
Ron glared up at her. "Of course I'm not fine! I just had a huge pile of sticks and cloth collapse on top of me! You couldn't have given me any help at all?"
"We're terribly sorry," said Harry solemnly. They still had another four days out here. It wouldn't do to offend the ginger; he could hold a serious grudge.
They all helped put the tent up (Ron was amazed when they actually were the size that they appeared on the outside instead of being like an apartment), set out their sleeping bags (Ron couldn't believe that they would keep him warm without magic), and build a campfire (Ron was disappointed when he realized he would actually have to cook his own food).
They went fishing — Harry and Hermione catching everything — while Ron sat on the bank and watched with a squeamish look on his face as they stuck a live worm on the hook. They ended up with several small silver fish, which Harry cleaned and cut up.
They made a small fire, wrapped the fish in some sort of leaves that Hermione had brought, and set it in the fire to cook. Ron complained bitterly about being 'a growing boy' — even though he'd stopped growing years ago — and how he always ate between meals at home.
They ate the fish, which was really rather bland, and decided to make s'mores. Hermione rooted around in her seemingly endless bag to find the necessary ingredients and handed them out. Harry preferred his marshmallow burnt, while Hermione liked them evenly golden on all sides. Ron stuck his marshmallow into the flames and promptly forgot about it, resulting in him handing over most of his to Harry and Hermione making double, for both her and Ron.
The remainder of the trip was spent in a similar manner, although Ron finally managed to catch a fish — on a line that Harry had to stick the worm onto. He unfortunately did a victory dance, resulting in it getting away. He also learned how to not turn his marshmallows into a black gooey mess.
By the time their short camping trip was over, Ron was lethargic "from starvation", as he said, Harry had a constant headache, and all it took for Hermione to crack up was to take one glance at the redhead.
All three were thankful when the five days was up. Ron went around the Burrow kissing and then eating everything in sight. Molly completely spoiled him by cooking all of his favorite foods — at once. It took the entire extended family four days of eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner to finish it all.
Hermione couldn't even look at Ron for the next three weeks without bursting into laughter.
And Harry was just glad that she'd managed to convince Hermione to come along. He didn't even want to think about what horror the trip would have been had he been trying to deal with Ron by himself.