Ask Lemmy

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.

That most camping gear is horrendously expensive and over engineered.

Get old and used gear, repair things, and make your own if you can.

A good bug net and a tarp are going to be just as effective as a modern tent, and breathe better.

For a backpack, those old aluminum a-frame packs are so easy to repair, and you can clip/tie things to the frame.

Coffee. If you are a coffee drinker, get a way to make half-decent coffee.

Or tea, or hot chocolate if you hate caffeine. Nothing beats the feeling of a hot cup of something after a short, noisy, miserable night.

Minivans and specifically the no longer made grand caravan (the ruined the design a bit with the pacifica). For two people you can do no prep camping. Throw whatever you think you might want in the back. Get to site and backup to the firepit. Throw all the stuff you brought in the driver and passenger seat and open the back. If its raining you can sit on the rear seat facing backwards and the rear door gives you shelter. At night you can just sleep in the back of the van since everything you brought is now in the front seats. Because you can flip seats up and down and such you can sit as you like and easily get the sleeping room. Done some very low prep camping this way. On another note the minivan has about as good a mileage as you get from a non car.

Get some sort of 5 gallon jug that has an on off valve for water. Helps if you want to wash hands or balls

Watch some primitive/bushcraft survival videos on YouTube. There's a lot of good tips and tricks, especially for when you aren't exactly prepared for camping (emergency situations) and need shelter, fire, food, water, etc.

Favorite channels:

• Bertram - Craft and Wilderness (off-trail camping videos)
• Coalcracker Bushcraft (lots of good info)
• Donnie Dust's Paleo Tracks (primitive tools)
• Primitive Technology (fire by friction, primitive crafting)
• Survivorman - Les Stroud (survival, cooking, history, etc)
• Woodsbound Outdoors (good info and demo)

bring extra food for the first timers. they wont bring enough.

About 2-3 cheap string-lights that run off USB battery packs (EDITed out this: ~~run off the 2x AA-battery-packs~~). Mulitple light angles is better than a single light source. Cheery and festive. Get a multicolored string, if camping with kids or you are a fun camper.

Also OSMand mapping software, configured with offline maps of your camp area. Install the hillshades and height maps for extra detail. Enable and add an overlay-layer of Satellite data. Then scan your camp area and surrounds while online, so that it will cache the satellite map tiles needed when you are off-grid.

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.

Psychedelics and people you trust

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.

Ear plugs. Because that rustling of leaves is just a raccoon and most definitely not a serial killer. I like wax earplugs for sleeping versus foam.

Maintain hygiene regimens to greatest degree possible. Don't skimp on washing face or brushing teeth that you would typically do at home.

Food makes or breaks a trip for me. The weather could be awful, plans could go awry, but as long as everyone is well fed, there's potential.

I'm not a no-tech purist while camping but do try to use trips as a time to reset tech habits. Can you go for 24 hours without an Internet connected device? Kinda similar to the occasional dry week or break from coffee/caffeine: check in and see how you're interacting with tech.

Have a first aid kit and know how to use the stuff in it.

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.

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.

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!

Lay a layer of logs on the ground before making your camp fire on top of it. Ideally larger ones. They'll lift the fire off the damp ground, improve air flow and act as fuel once the fire gets going.

Hammock tent. All the advantages of a tent and a hammock.

Don’t have to worry about your tent getting flooded, no need for an air mattress or sleeping pad.

If you're out bike touring, KOA's almost always have spots set aside for cyclists to camp. Both KOAs and state parks are really useful for showers and clothes washing. Was genuinely surprised how many state parks had both when I toured across the U.S.

If you're in Washington state, the state parks are legally required to find room for you to camp if you rolll up on a bike and they're otherwise full.

Bring bug spray.

Put on some John Waters movies and load the karaoke machine with lots of Cher and Elton John.

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