What's your best tip or hack for camping?
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
Be prepared
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You can dispersed camp for free in most national forests and BLM lands. Its pack-in pack-out for the most part but some spots have pit toilets. Freecampsites.net is my go to site for finding free camping
Seems cool. Vibe feels like mostly people needing a safe place to sleep in their cars without getting ticketed with the other people backpackers who are roughing it
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I couldn't ever manage around groups of people like that or being in public for too long. The most exposed I'd be willing is likely just like floating down a river or something, plenty of people, no real reason to interact outside of a quick hello
I don't do it much any more but one of my favourite pass times used to be taking a load of acid and then going to a very public place or somewhere that you are forced to be around lots of people and have many interactions.
Busy shopping centres, a zoo, busy pubs, an ex girlfriends family wedding where I knew no one. I guess it was kind of masochistic in a way but I just really enjoyed putting myself into challenging situations whilst tripping. The challenge was always to try take the highest dose possible and still be able to actually keep my shit together. I'm sure plenty of people I interacted with at those times thought "this guy is blasted out of his mind, Jesus" but who gives a fuck, I'm never seeing these people again and it actually made me want to speak to people in the first place.
These days I prefer to just lay down, listen to music and drift off into the stratosphere.
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Bring bug spray.
I swear it doesn't work.
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
If you're in bear country, you want to hang your food high from a tree branch. Not right next to the trunk, bears can climb like squirrels. It's really amazing how fast they can climb a tree.
Also hang toiletries; don't keep toothpaste or anything scented in the tent with you.
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Put your shoes in your tent at night so slugs don't crawl in them. Camping in a national Forest is often free. Take nothing but pictures. Leave nothing but footprints.
In the U.S. of A - in Germany do not camp in the wild if you're fond of your money. Although we have a milder variant of the Allemannsretten, ours excludes camping in the wild
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
My friends and I just went camping. Instead of bringing eggs in egg cartons, put them in a Blender Bottle. Shake them up for easy scramble eggs and pour!
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If you go for a tent, first don't forget the tent pegs, and then it's always comfortable having a tiny mallet to plant them, rather than using a rock or your bare hands.
You can also take off your shoe and use that
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Blackout tent so you can sleep late.
There's also birds being loud and the sun making the inside of your tent too hot to contend with
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I swear it doesn't work.
Then bring someone tastier than you. That's a tried and true method
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I swear it doesn't work.
Get the good shit! If its less than 40% DEET it ain't worth a damn.
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
For starting a fire, look for bits of birch bark on the ground, it is extremely flammable and is much better tinder than leaves.
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If you're in bear country, you want to hang your food high from a tree branch. Not right next to the trunk, bears can climb like squirrels. It's really amazing how fast they can climb a tree.
Also hang toiletries; don't keep toothpaste or anything scented in the tent with you.
Also for bear country, don't cook where you sleep
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
When cooking with a skillet, let the fire die down, gather as many hot coals as possible and set your skillet firm on top your coal pile.
When cooking with a pot, hang it above a low fire, in most cases you wanna make sure the flames aren't licking your pot.
This pic is from my last camping trip, if you wanna know how to build the tripod, there are pleanty of youtube videos on the topic.
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My friends and I just went camping. Instead of bringing eggs in egg cartons, put them in a Blender Bottle. Shake them up for easy scramble eggs and pour!
What is a blender bottle? but sounds cool
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
No matter what, don't go in the winter.
As someone who hates the cold with a passion, there's nothing worse than waking up cold in the morning because you either didn't have on enough to keep you warm during a cold winter night in a sleeping bag or had on too much and wake up cold from sweating throughout the night.
Winter campouts are the only camps I absolutely do not miss at all from my time at scouts. The cold mornings are enough for me to not suggest it, despite it not actually being that bad after you've warmed up.
Though, on a more serious note, one of the things I do remember being taught but never followed through with for various reasons is to put your clothes for the next day under your sleeping bag so that way the next day they should be warm or at least warmer so you aren't putting on freezing cold clothes. Especially good for things like jeans because there's nothing worse than putting on jeans with frigid cold metal buttons if your hands are already trembling a little from the cold winter morning in general.
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In the U.S. of A - in Germany do not camp in the wild if you're fond of your money. Although we have a milder variant of the Allemannsretten, ours excludes camping in the wild
This depends on the state.
For instance in Brandenburg and Schleswig-Holstein you can camp "in the wild"*
*there is limits in natural preserves, and what is defined as camping can vary. e.g. tarp vs tent, obv. no RVs...
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No matter what, don't go in the winter.
As someone who hates the cold with a passion, there's nothing worse than waking up cold in the morning because you either didn't have on enough to keep you warm during a cold winter night in a sleeping bag or had on too much and wake up cold from sweating throughout the night.
Winter campouts are the only camps I absolutely do not miss at all from my time at scouts. The cold mornings are enough for me to not suggest it, despite it not actually being that bad after you've warmed up.
Though, on a more serious note, one of the things I do remember being taught but never followed through with for various reasons is to put your clothes for the next day under your sleeping bag so that way the next day they should be warm or at least warmer so you aren't putting on freezing cold clothes. Especially good for things like jeans because there's nothing worse than putting on jeans with frigid cold metal buttons if your hands are already trembling a little from the cold winter morning in general.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]HARD DISAGREE! I fucking love camping in the winter, as there's nothing worse than waking up in the middle of the night hot asf.
The whiney southerners unable to take a simple 40° night was my least favorite part of scouting. Clowns crying whilst I curled up in a snowbank. Losers!
Half-Jokes aside, I grew up cold and have a monstrous tolerance, but winter camping is often great, build the fire high, and find your Sisu!
My slightly littler cousin doesn't appreciate the cold so much, so she also wraps herself in tomorrow's clothes, good call
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
Know where to pitch a tent.
If you are close to a stream, pitch the tent a few meters above the water. If it rains you don't know how quickly it can rise.
In the same wake, if you are pitching on a plain, pitch your tent on a relative rise. If you pitch in a relative depression rain will drench you.
If you pitch on a slope, and there will usually be slight slopes, pitch your tent so, that your head is facing upwards when sleeping.
If a storm is expected you might be inclined to pitch under a tree, but be careful. If a branch breaks off and hits you, that can be very bad.
If you pitch your tent in the open and it is a hot summer, the inside will get very hot very quickly. Make sure to get up and out early, don't get wasted at night and bring reflective covering. People died at festivals when they stayed in their tents when getting wasted and then getting roasted in their tents.
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Any kind–drive-up camping, backpacking, RV camping, in the woods, at the beach, in a shelter, let's hear it all.
I never really see people doing this, but I've had a great time pitching my tent in the back of my pickup instead of on the ground. You get a perfectly flat surface and some foam or an air mattress make it pretty comfy.
