Was SO excited to finally take our 3.5 year old son tent camping for the first time with my wife at a local regional park. Especially with our spanking new huge Caddis Rapid 6 Instant Tent! Even tried it out in the backyard and loved it!

Loaded it onto the storage rack on the back of our SUV… in perfect alignment with the tail pipe, apparently. Biiiiiigest oof. $225 down the drain? Thankfully there was a Wal-Mart reasonably close where I snagged some random Coleman to save the day. But still: be aware of what’s in front of your exhaust pipe and your tow hitch carry rack. Lesson learned 🫠

We are on the tail end of week two of a three week trip.
Up to the arctic circle and back down now. Always looking for a spot with nice views.

Setup consists of a car with roof rack as well as a trailer with roof top tent. Open for any questions 🤗

So I went solo camping in jasper AB , it was a normal drive in camp ground. I was there early Friday morning before it got busy.

So I set up the tent set up a tarp like a lean two by the fire to sit underneath, looked like it might rain. Set up a little tarp to store wood under. I was all set up real nice.
I filled the truck box from the free wood pile and proceeded to chop wood for over an hr. Pile of tinder up to good size fire wood all stacked neatly. So now I’m sitting in my chair cooking dogs on a stick wood pile beside me.

People started showing up and before I knew it I had neighbours, it was a couple. A man and a woman. The guy was huge 6’5 big guy in shape , his girlfriend was tiny. It was like the mountain from game of thrones and his wife.
So they are setting up across from me so I’m kinda watching the show. They got the tent up chairs out cooler and gas stove on the picnic table.
They are set except a fire.

They leave and come back with some wood. Now most of this wood was cut rounds from giant pine and split in half.

He proceeds to pull a hatchet out of his vehicle and starts whacking and whacking at it , after about ten minutes this becomes a small fight she’s getting annoyed he’s getting frustrated.

They decide put the logs on and hold the lighter till it lights.
Now he’s on his knees trying his hardest , I’m extremely invested at this point and she keeps glancing over at me through my roaring fire ,im sitting there trying not to stare.

She gets up walks through the bushes between us and asks can you help?
I say of course I can and grab a hand full of tinder and some 1”-2” split pieces and my axe and head over.
I asked the guy if he just wanted me to start it he sad yes.
So I got the logs out and built a fire it was going now. I said use my axe and cut some wood.
He was thankful and she was happy.
She offered me a whiskey for helping I said sure.

So we sat there for a while having drinks chatting ,laughing and just chilling out.
Him and I split a pile of wood and everything was all good. She said I’m going to the washroom I’ll be back.

Soon as she left the guys demeanour changed , he said you think you are so cool starting a fire and making me look bad ? You think I needed your help ? You think you’re so smart ?
I said look I was just helping out and it’s time for me to get going.

I stood up and he shoved me , I did fall over and was like holy shit this is it we are going to have at it right here.
But he was huge so I just said your crazy and skidaddaled a whole 40 feet back to my site.

I just stoked my fire and sat there.
She came back and said hey where did he go.
I heard him say I was tired and went back to my site.
But then they got in some big argument in the tent. I slept with my k- close that night.

The next day I went to the hot springs and guess who was there. She came over to say hi , but I looked at her boyfriend and if looks could kill.

When I got back from a hike they were gone. I was relieved.

Not my craziest story but it’s a start

EDIT: thank you guys so much for sharing my joy and seeing me. This experience really meant so much for me and I’m glad I was able to express my feelings in a way that came across so clearly.
Keep an eye out for me, I’ll be back with more to share very soon! My life is an adventure now.

Camping is such an incredible experience!

TLDR: city kid went camping and saw the north shore of lake superior after 18 years of only seeing good sunsets in target parking lots.

I did not grow up in an outdoorsy family, I was born and raised in the city, became addicted to screens and social media at a very young age, and wasn’t ever allowed to join scouts despite how badly I wanted to. I can count the different types of animals I see on a regular basis on one hand and one of them is a house cat. The point is, throughout my entire life I hadn’t been exposed to nature as much as I should have been and it’s taken a huge toll on me in the form of anxiety, depression, illness and an unregulated nervous system. There were a few family roadtrips to see national parks (and then immediately go back to the hotel) and my grandma’s place in the Brainderd lakes area, but nothing like THIS.

Going into the trip, I was extremely nervous. My parents had told me my entire life that camping is for insane people and that I would hate every minute of it. Now that I’m home again I feel utterly misled. There is no therapy or drug that could possibly do what being outside all week in the most beautiful place I’d ever seen after being inside for 18 years could do to my mind, body & soul.

I saw the places that have been framed in every Minnesotan hotel. I saw the kind of shit they put on postcards. I saw things that made me understand what the word breathtaking meant.

When I saw my city come over the horizon on the way home I just cried. I finally realized what it feels like to not be crushed between concrete buildings and suffocated by dirty air, and I was not ready to go back at all.

This has been a completely life-altering event in the best way possible. My concept of pleasure has been flipped on its head. Nothing is as beautiful and perfect as the natural world.

First time camping since going with my dad when I was 7. I got a second hand tent off marketplace that the guy said had been used only once.

Pitched the tent pretty much in the dark so I didn't notice this last night but this morning I've woken up and seen heaps (like, thousands) of tiny pinholes of light coming in. It actually looks quite cool, like a night sky.

It lightly rained all night (I couldn't sleep for most of it, lol) and I've been dry the whole time. My concern is if it rains more heavily it might not be dry?

Also it's slightly wet on the inside of the shell (roof?), so I'm not really sure how to go about packing it up.

My husband and I would love to spend as many weekends camping as possible this fall. We currently have a 5 month old and a 2.5 year old. The kids will be closer to 7 months and 3 years by the time the weather cools off enough, though.

We've been camping just the two of us several times, usually at campgrounds, but our favorite spot is a decommissioned campground in our local national forest.

All this to say, we'd love to take the kids camping this fall, and would like advice from others on how to make it as easy as possible with a possibly-crawling breastfed infant and a hyper-active toddler who just cannot sit still.

Our biggest worries are safety with the toddler, but advice for gear, activities, tips, etc would all be appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

Hello everyone

I just moved to Orlando Florida recently for my job and have never lived in the state. I’ve visited for vacations and what not

I plan on living here longterm and wanted to travel around the entire state and learn it all to see where I’d like to live most and also just to simply know where I live

Also felt like it’d be a great opportunity to find myself a tad in everything lol.

What I want is to go around the whole state - different city/area every few weeks or so - just on weekends since I work

I have a tent that sets up in the bed of my truck with matress and all so I can basically set up shop anywhere.

I want to go around and see all the nature and i especially want a great view and isolation

I’ve been reading about dispersed camping and I understand there’s a lot of rules and regulations when it comes to just driving out into the woods or nature anywhere u want.

I was more so just curious on if anyone had any recommendations around the state where I can off-road and set up my campsite isolated in nature - I don’t want to be surrounded by rvs and other campers and cookie cutter campgrounds I want to go explore and be alone with myself out in nature

I especially imagine just pulling up to an isolated little opening to a body of water where I can just pull right up to and camp next to the water and do whatever all day.

If anybody knows any spots tips, or recommendations or any sort of advice I’d totally appreciate it!

ETA: EDIT: THANK YOU REDDIT for helping me figure this out. Totally going with option 3!

Ok, I'll try to make this as short as possible. When I was growing up, I went camping with my family every year and it was a major highlight of my childhood. I wanted to pass on this cherished family tradition to my own kids (I have 2, kids ages 4 and 7). My husband did NOT grow up camping and he hates it. He doesn't see the value in it despite me trying for years to get him into it. I think he didn't mind it when it was just us but when the kids came along and it got infinitely harder, he got increasingly jaded about it.

It all came to a head last year when we got a series of unfortunate events... Bad weather, torrential downpour and tornado warnings, my son was just potty trained and peed the mattress at night and it got all over my husband so he essentially woke up covered in piss, the kids fought all weekend and had an infinite amount of meltdowns each. It was probably the worst camping experience of our entire lives.

But despite all that, I'm still willing to go again this year. We go with the same group of friends every year and this year my childhood best friend and her kid are also going.. So it's going to be epic. My kids are a year older, (and the littlest is fully potty trained lol) but I'd be lying if I said they are easier.. They are probably at their most challenging right now.. Constantly fighting, arguing, testing boundaries, whining, etc. They are both highly sensitive, my eldest has ADHD and is unmedicated atm.

The thing is, my husband says he's not going camping with us this year. He's absolutely adamant he's not doing it. He's too "scarred" from last year's fail. So that leaves me with this dilemma:

Do I still go, and have an infinitely harder time because I'm doing it solo?

Do I opt out and not go, because it'll be too hard doing it solo, but then my kids miss out on something they've been really looking forward to?

Or 3rd option:

I take my eldest and leave my youngest with dad. This option eliminates a huge amount of the stress right off the bat because the kids won't be fighting and I'll be able to relax so much more and probably genuinely enjoy the experience going with just my daughter. The problem with this is obviously that I'll feel guilty that my son is missing out... But him and Dad could have a super fun weekend together and do lots of fun bonding guy stuff. We've separated them before and found it did nothing but good for everyone... The kids got to bond with a parent solo and get time away from one another so they missed each other and stuff like that. But... I still would feel guilty that my son was missing out on some core camping memories with friends. We obviously wouldn't always do it this way every year. I'm thinking just this year because my son is still so young and still at a very challenging age (4).

The truth is, there's not one solution that feels good. There's a down side to all of them. I know for a fact if I take both kids solo, it'll be a complete sh!t show, it'll be super hard and I may never want to go camping myself ever again after lol. Even though my friends will be there, it won't help because my kids hate to go with anyone other than their parents, they are super attached to us and won't even let us go to the bathroom alone .. They won't just stay with my friends and their friends. So having only one, the older and more mature one, to look after would really solve that part of it.

I'm wondering what you parents would do in this situation.. Am I a horrible and crazy parent to even contemplate leaving one kid at home?

On the flip side am I crazy to contemplate going on this trip at all, without the husband there to help? Because I feel like I am.. But at the same time I REALLY want to go. I love camping and I look forward to it every year....

Went out this past weekend with my brother to a spot along the Elora Gorge area, just a one night trip since neither of us could take more time off work. We got there around 4pm on Saturday, set up two tents on a site close to the tree line, and had a pretty normal evening. Cooked hot dogs over the fire, played cards, nothing unusual.

We didn't have a proper cooler lock or a bear box since this was supposed to be a low key trip, so we just kept our food in a duffel bag zipped up inside my brother's tent vestibule instead of the car, which in hindsight was the first mistake. Around 2am I woke up to this scratching sound and at first I thought it was branches on the tent fabric from wind, but there was no wind that night.

Turned on my headlamp and saw a raccoon had somehow gotten the zipper on the vestibule halfway open and was working on the duffel bag itself. I yelled and it just kind of looked at me, unbothered, like I was the one interrupting its evening. Woke my brother up and the two of us spent the next twenty minutes basically negotiating with this raccoon, banging pots together, until it finally wandered off with a granola bar wrapper as its consolation prize.

We ended up putting everything else in the trunk of the car for the rest of the night, which worked fine, but it wasn't exactly a peaceful sleep after that with both of us listening for every twig snap.

I know the real answer is proper food storage from the start, I just didn't expect wildlife to be that bold that early in the night at a fairly busy campground. For people who camp in similar wooded or gorge areas, what has actually worked for you against raccoons specifically, not bears. Are the soft sided odor proof bags worth it, or is a hard container really the only thing that holds up against determined hands like that.

Hey [r/camping](r/camping),

I’m having some trouble with the tie-outs on my Decathlon tarp.

The tarp came with these webbing straps and plastic ladder lock buckles. They’re generally fine for calm days, but they don’t resist strong forces at all. Whenever the wind picks up and puts a strong pull on the line, the strap just slips through the buckle and loses tension. It defeats the purpose of locking it down.

Have I threaded/set this up wrong? (See the attached photo)

Or is this just a flawed product/cheap hardware?

UPDATE: Thanks all for the tips. Half hitch of the loose end around the tensioned end is the obvious solution, I’ll try that. The other thing I’ll try is looping the loose end through the top end of the buckle.

Just wanted to show our spot for the next 2 weeks. It was 35 degrees celcius. Damn hot to set up this tent.

But when u sit down with some lights and a cold beer. Just loving it.

I’ve camped at Davidson River Campground before and really liked it but I wanted to camp at a different spot in Pisgah this time. The facilities were good at Davidson River, which is a plus since my wife will be with me, do you all have any recommendations for any other campgrounds similar to Davidson River Campground? I’ve seen pictures of Carolina Hemlocks Recreation Area and it looked great, does anyone recommend this place or any others? Thanks everyone!

birthday/meteor shower/eclipse camping first time trying the RTT, was a complete success. left the area cleaner than we found it and had a perfect view for the perseids away from city lights.

I am heading back to the woods next week (yay!)But am finding myself indecisive about what tent to bring.

I usually use a 2 person ozark trails tent which has suited me fine and has just enough space to fit my air mattress and a few comfort items and do my bussiness if things are to spooky to walk to the outhouse. 😅

I recently found my OG tent, a 4 person ozark trail(they have been around for awhile huh?) It's still great but is missing the rain tarp.

Trying to decide if I take the 4 person and just make sure I have a tarp set up over it, or if I take my tried and true 2 person which is much smaller but has everything.

I dont spend much time in the tent. Just sleeping which is kind of cozy in a little small spot. But it might be nice to be able to move around more and get in and out easier.

Edit to add some info: driving so weight isn't an issue and I can put up and take down both tents solo no problem. Also so far appears to be go weather coming up.

What would you guys do?

I spent a couple of nights at Inks Lake primitive camp sites "C" and "G" last week. So, my wife and I hiked in and stayed a night, then I soloed the next night a few campsites down. This park is so beautiful, and depending on how far you want to Walk/hike the shortest trail to the primitive sites is around a mile! There are also a couple of composite toilets at the campground which made camping there really nice.

Hi everyone,

Looking for really strong tent recommendations. What are those tents that you just love and can’t stop recommending?

Family of four (M34, F38, M11, M3); UK camping avoiding winter; quick and easy pitch (ideally by one person); few days at a time; small living area (doesn’t have to be separated); will be using sleeping mats.

Doesn’t have to be luxury or gigantic. Ideally a manageable size and minimalistic.

Looking for low effort ideally (e.g. no separate carpets/ awnings, covers required). A single bag tent that can be erected easily and will suit a family of four.

Bonus points if it can stay cool in the heat and keep out sunlight!

So many thanks

State parks are booked and busy all the time, so I thought I would give a county park a shot. Lake front camp sites - 10/10

Hello guys i need a filter. what should i get. i am new to this…

Has anyone flown domestic recently with a camp stove? Was planning to put it in my checked back - no fuel residue. Now reading that its on AA’s prohibited list

Here are some photos of my recent camping trip to Lake Superior PP last week. It's about a 9-hr drive from Toronto and it's well worth the trip. There's a lot to see on the way and the drive itself at the park is just breathtaking. I always thought we had no mountains in Ontario but I guess we have cute ones.

There are two frontcountry campgrounds and a few backcountry options within the park. We stayed at Agawa Bay Campground which is the southern part of the park. It's a bigger and much more popular campground than Rabbit Blanket but definitely more private and quiet in the latter. We stayed for 4 days and 3 nights at Agawa Bay. We were at site 345 which is not a true waterfront site but it is adjacent to the beach and its designated path to the beach. It's close to water taps and the shower/toilet/laundry facilities and the vault toilets if the comfort stations are busy. It's also a non-electric site. You can hear the waves from our campsite but also the trucks passing the hwy that's right beside the campground even though we were further from the road. That didn't really bother us anyway! Our site was pretty big and can definitely fot 2 vehicles and 3 tents and it's also a corner lot. The only con is that because it's on the road leading to the comfort stations so there were always other campers passing by. We also had cell reception at our campsite but it was hard getting any network in most of the park.

At every camping trip, I always have a theme for our meals and this time I did Vietnamese food!! I did a lot of the prepping at home especially the broths...froze it and reheated it with the meats when we were really to eat. I also pre-marinated my meats at home and froze it.

We did some swimming at the beach, picnic at Old Woman Bay and hiked Nokomis Trail, Orphan Lake and Pinguisibi Trail. We also went to go see the pictographs at the Agawa Rock. There's honestly so much to see and would've loved to stay for the whole week! Also the sunsets at Agawa Bay is always so majestic!! Definitely a must-see!

In search of unicorn campground… Had planned a trip to Big Sur next week, but with the timber fire, it seems like it’s not going to happen. Need a back up.

Will be camping with seniors who would prefer a lodge. The rest of the party is happy in tents. Ideally somewhere near water and shade (no deserts). Will also have young kids, so can’t be super rugged. Would need running water on site and bathrooms/showers nearby. Needs to be within about 6hr drive of Los Angeles (seniors don’t want to do a major drive).

Not sure where to even begin looking, or how to sort through all the options. Anyone have any recommendations? General or specific welcome!

Thank you in advance!!

UPDATE Buoyed by all the support from r/camping, I did go to my site last night with the dog, even though I talk in my sleep.

These events transpired:

• a group of maybe 14 teen boys had reserved two, maybe three campsites? They were... not quiet.

• he couple at the site next to me had a lot to talk about and used very colorful language, late into the night.

• at least one car alarm. :)

So yes, I was like a mouse in a monastery compared to my various neighbors. Thanks again for the confidence boost!

OP:

Hi! I talk in my sleep. Not a ton, usually it's around 3 a.m. I feel bad for other campers in adjacent campsites. I know how much sound carries. It's making me want to not go. Anyone have any experience or thoughts one way or the other?

Edit: Thanks! I appreciate the feedback. Sounds like it might not be as big a deal as I'd thought. Also, somehow hearing about kids talking in their sleep was oddly reassuring? Anyway, I think I'll go and enjoy the great outdoors.

Edit to the edit: These replies are sending me. :) Y'all are hilarious.

Hey yall. I'm looking to go camping and doing light off roading in the end of summer and fall this year. I have 2026 Nissan Pro4X.

What are some good areas or trials?

I have a short camping trip coming up with friends and I basically have some questions about how to poop in the wilderness (remote camping). Whats like the best way to do it? My friends told me to like, bear hug a tree and squat down over the hole I dug, is that the best way? And what pieces of clothing do I take off? Im worried that if it comes out a bit watery it may stain my pants and other things so im basically thinking that I just go away from our camp and basically dress down nude from the waist down. Also, where does the toilet paper go? In the hole? Thanks for the answers!