As much as I am really quite terrible and inexperienced when it comes to most things camping, I’ve always been pretty good about choosing my camping buddies. Just like some people are really good at finding Wichita KS Towing Services if their car breaks down in the middle of nowhere. Granted, one time I was totally separated from my camping-mates, but it was at a festival, and there was no cell phone reception because apparently no one thinks about boosting the cell phone tower signal when the population of a town is boosted by 50 000 people. So it didn’t really have anything to do with the camping or the choice of companions, per se, rather the nature of the festival. Anyway, you’ve got to be sure you’ve got the right people with you when you camp, no matter where you are.
Location
This is extremely important. And it’s different than shelter; it’s on a larger scale. I’m not talking about on what part of the forest you decide to pitch your tent. No, I’m talking whether you want to camp in your backyard or in the remote reaches of Norther Ontario.
The way I see it, you’ve got four camping categories, if you will. There are obviously tons of variations and lots of different ways to camp, but I’m talking about tent camping here, and, frankly, it’s my blog, so … I get to pick the categories. So, the way I see it, the four options as far as location go are as follows: in your backyard; at a festival; in a designated area, close to civilization; in the middle of bloody nowhere (where I would demand to have a plumbing company come along and install working toilets wherever I went). Let’s explore some pros and cons of each.
Shelter
This is a big one. As I said, the thing that I hate most about camping is the tent part. The stuff that surrounds the tent part isn’t so bad. I would love to have a whole day of hiking and swimming and end it all off with a campfire if I could sleep in a clean, dry, bug-free bed afterwards.
There’s just something about waking up in a tent, all sticky and sweaty and probably exhausted thanks to not having slept through the night, that I will not abide. Because you go to bed and it’s cold, right, so you’re all bundled up in your sleeping bag, the hood on your sweater up over your head, socks on, and you try your best to drift off to sleep (usually, this takes my hours, because I’m trying not to focus on how damn stuffy it is in the tent, and you just want to hire Kitchener movers to drag your whole dumb tent to the lobby of a hotel, so that you can crawl out and go right up to the desk to book a room).
Food
If you read the About page, you’ll know that I’m not terribly good at packing for camping excursions. I kind of just do granola bars and crackers and call it a day, thinking it’ll be fine. And it never is. Wherever I go, whether it’s hiking or on a short trip or whatever, I never bring enough food. I always end up having to stop somewhere and get more nourishment to feed my apparently insatiable appetite. Maybe I just need to get on board with some foods that I normally would not imagine eating. Then again, maybe I just need to take wedding limo Kitchener wherever I go, which I can only imagine is stocked with all kinds of food.