It seems like everyone has an opinion on camping. You might love it (REI certainly does and wants everyone else to do so also), hate it (those folks will remain nameless), never tried it and never want to! I recently started camping again thanks to the inspiration of VanLife videos and reactions range from a perplexed “do you enjoy that?” to “why do you want to sleep outdoors?” to that “sounds fun!” I reflected on why I like camping on a recent excursion near the beautiful Washington coast. I was surprised to realize that that I actually have a long history with “camping” including car camping, backpacking and of course hiking tourism with glamping that ranges from cabin to cabin hiking to lodges with luxury bedding and hot showers. And why do it? Sometimes it is to get away from modern life to embrace nature and other times it is the only way to get to a remote and beautiful location and of course, for me, take pictures!
As a child growing up in the Pacific Northwest, I was loaded up in a camper pulling a fishing boat and traveled east to the warmer, drier part of the state with lots of lakes and great trout fishing. Now it seems very crowded to think of a family of four plus a dog piled into a pickup truck with a camper but it did not feel like it then. We had a great time camping and fishing. This was the “noisy and active” camping experience of Good Sam campgrounds with kids running around the campsites just having fun. Backpacking purists would call this one of those “crowded campgrounds” they would not be caught dead in. But we fished, played and generally were kids! The only longstanding negative takeaway is a fixation on small trout bones from a meal gone a bit astray. . . . I recently visited a public campground with these same traits and had a blast despite the occasional noise of generators and early morning clam diggers. I mean really, look at that bacon? I also recently replaced my trout memory with pan frying Alaska salmon – yummy! I have also enjoyed replicating some of these memories as an adult with my nieces and nephews, “roughing it” in tents instead of being in a warm and dry camper! I cannot wait to see if camping has left an imprint on their choice of outdoor activities as they start families of their own.
From the pickup camper experience we graduated as a family to a boat when we relocated to Alaska which had a lot to do with the lack of roads and inability to drive very far! Some of my best childhood memories involved overnighting on the boat. Especially when we were able to raft up with other boats and could bottom fish all night, listen to some pretty tall tales that were likely not appropriate for kids and row the dingy to shore to walk the dog. Sometimes we caught a crab and popped it in the pot right then with freshly melted butter – wonderful! In hindsight, this may be the root of my love of kayaking and the silence on the water when no one is around.
And then the various forms of “glamping” during multi-day hikes although I would not put the two person tent along the Chilkoot Trail in the glamping category but other trips to Peru, Bhutan, Italy, Chile and Argentina may qualify given there were no tents involved!
So now the question, are you a camper and if yes, why?
InspireDragonflies 