So you want to... GO ON A PICNIC?

ACCORDING TO a junk email from Marks and Spencer, summer 2020 is the summer of the picnic, and what greater fun could there be than to pack our sandwiches, cakes and pop into a basket, find a nice spot in the country and enjoy a feast? It sounds idyllic, but the traditional picnic is not without its risks. Many people have a picnic in the country and return home relatively unharmed, but some are not quite so lucky after falling foul of picnic pitfalls. Recognising the dangers is essential if you are to weigh-up all the factors and decide whether or not to go on a picnic.

So, before you rustle up some sarnies, make a flask of tea and head for the countryside, here are just a few of the things you need to consider.

MANY people think that the rain is the worst weather for ruining a picnic. But in actual fact, it is the sun we should be more scared of. Anyone heading out for a picnic in a place like California’s Death Valley is asking for trouble. Here, temperatures regularly soar above a scorching 50˚C, and picnickers regularly finish off their pop within minutes of laying out their spread. Worse, they then discover that the butter on their sandwiches has turned into liquid, the Penguin biscuits have melted onto their wrappers and the carrot cake, so moist when they set out, has baked to an inedible hardness in the relentless, scorching sun. As their skin blisters and cracks in the dry, furnace-like heat, they decide to pack up their basket and head home, only to get lost in the featureless terrain. What started as a fun day out ends with them wandering off into the parched wilderness, a mass of painful burns and delirious with dehydration, awaiting the blessed relief of death.

IN ADDITION to being arrested for a crime you did not commit, there is every chance your picnic will end in you being arrested for one that you did. Trespassing on someone’s land is not a criminal offence, but it could land you with a fine of up to £1,000, which could easily end up ten times that after court costs. Similarly, taking your radio to a picnic and playing it to more than four people is a breach of the Performing Rights Society regulations, of which the courts take a dim view. And think carefully before you decide to spread jam on your scone. Being in possession of a knife, albeit a butter knife, in a public place is a far more serious offence, one which will land you with a criminal record and up to 10 years in prison.

EVERY year, visitors to the British countryside spot strange animals in the undergrowth and mysterious footprints in the mud, whilst blurred photographs circulating on the internet seem to show sinister shapes lurking in the shadows. Simple tricks of the light? Perhaps, but could it be that fierce carnivores - bears, pumas, lions and wolves have escaped from zoos and circuses, and have taken up residence amongst our native wildlife? It’s certainly a very real possibility, and one that is well worth bearing in mind next time you head out to enjoy a picnic with your family. As your young children wander off to play amongst the daisies while you break out the sandwiches and cakes, it’s a sobering thought that a hungry grizzly bear eats approximately 100lbs of raw meat every day.

EVERYONE wants their picnic to be nice and peaceful, so find a nice, quiet spot in the country. But remember, it is not only picnic goers who want to stay away from the crowds. In seeking seclusion, you may come across people you would rather not meet; drug dealers in the midst of a transaction, the Real IRA hiding a cache of weapons, or a couple of ‘Goodfellas’ burying a ‘whacked’ rival mafia boss in the weeds. Disturb these scoundrels in the midst of their illicit activities, and no amount of sweet talking or offers to share your lemon drizzle cake is going to get you out of your pickle. In shor t, it’s Goodnight, Vienna.

SHOPPING fora picnic is great fun. We all enjoy loading up our trolley with Scotch eggs, bottles of pop, small buns and Mr Kipling cakes. But these items are a clear indication of what you are planning, and would-be burglars lurking in the aisles can spot them a mile off. Any felon watching you fill your trolley in the supermarket has simply to follow you home and stake out your house, confident that at the first hint of sunny weather, you and your family will be off to the countryside. You may enjoy a wonderful, carefree day picnicking, but it will all be spoilt when you return home to find your back door has been kicked in, your house has been ransacked, all your possessions have gone and there’s a pile of human faeces on your living room carpet.

THE BRITISH countryside, with its grassy, open spaces, sun-dappled meadows and shady woodland glades, is a great place to get away from it all. But these secluded spots, well away from prying eyes, are also a draw for a far more sinister group of visitors - Devil worshippers - and woe betide any innocent picknickers who accidentally find themselves mixed up amongst their mysterious, diabolical rites. Nothing is guaranteed to ruin a family picnic more than mum or dad getting dragged away by naked satanists, to be spread across a stone altar and stabbed through the heart with a dagger decorated with runes and inverted crucifixes, whilst a cohort of masked, naked, priapismic diabolists ravish each other to a blood-soaked climax in honour of Beelzebub.

THERE is nothing worse than settling down on the edge of a field for a picnic, only to discover a dead body behind the hedge, the victim of a grisly murder. You might think that calling the police to report your find would be an end to the matter, and you could go on with enjoying your picnic. But think again. As the discoverer of the body, you become the prime suspect…the focus of the police’s investigations. Similarly, if you have your picnic and fail to notice the body, you are still in hot water. When it is eventually discovered, the crime scene will be littered with forensic and DNA evidence pointing to you - your saliva on a pork pie crust, your fingerprints on a Quavers packet. Either way, in the absence of any other suspects ‘in the frame’, you will arrested for a crime you didn’t commit and almost certainly fitted up by the police.

WASPS are a constant source of annoyance at a picnic, but for anyone allergic to their venom, a single sting could prove fatal. Even worse, if one of their paper nests falls from a tree onto your picnic, it will burst into a cloud of 20,000 angry wasps which you and your loved ones will be unable to outrun. Even if to those not allergic, a thousand stings from this angry swarm is more than the human body can tolerate, and a slow, painful death will inevitably ensue. Even if you survive the wasps, your picnic could still be spoilt by screw-flies laying up to 500 eggs under your skin, which develop into maggots, devouring your flesh under a writhing, itching boil, driving you to the edge of madness. These parasitic flies are only found in the semi-tropics of Central America, but as climate change brings warmer summers to the UK, it’s not inconceivable that these foul insects are already here.