Camping Out

Photo by Museums Victoria on Unsplash

Since the age of ten or twelve I’ve done a fair amount of camping. It’s one of those things that, only in hindsight I realize has added some dimension to my life. A bit like reading books, or raising children, or travel in general, it has made me more competent than I would have been, and that’s worth something. 

I remember a canvas pup tent pitched in the backyard. And listening to a transistor radio with my friend David, piping in rock and roll from some AM station in Chicago. After we had reached what we judged to be the goal of staying up all night, we were back inside the house in bed a little after midnight. The ground was hard and it had begun to rain.

A book called The Complete Walker, written by Colin Fletcher (Alfred A. Knoph, 1968) gave me new focus around the age of twelve. Credited with birthing the backpacking industry, it was a fascinatingly detailed book on how to camp, specifically how to backpack off the grid. All my spare time was spent reading and re-reading this book. All my money spent on backpacking gear.

At the time, we only lived about 90 minutes from the beginning of the Appalachian Trail in north Georgia, the near mythological footpath that began there and terminated 2198 miles later on Mount Katahdin, Maine. That one could shoulder a pack and walk, completely self contained, from Georgia to Maine, was a dream of independence and adventure to my adolescent mind. 

And so our long suffering parents, bless their souls, would drive David and I up into the mountains and drop us off at the trailhead, and then pick us up thirty or forty miles north a few days later. Exhausted. Ravenous. Giddy with accomplishment. 

Having little money in our early years together, my wife and I camped all over the beaches of the Florida panhandle and the southern Atlantic low country. A brightly colored tent, peel and eat shrimp, snapper filets on the grill. Hammocks stretched between two palm trees, cheap white wine and sun. It felt luxurious.

With the understanding that learning to camp was part of the curriculum, we started the kids camping in an orange VW pop top camper. In that iconic ride it always felt like an adventure. Timeless. Like James Michener’s The Drifters, or Kesey setting out on the bus, pranking, they learned to ride bicycles, set up a tent, build a fire, put a worm on a hook. Life skills, in case of societal failure. Or maybe in spite of it.

Photo by Kevin Schmid on Unsplash

I’ve never really stopped camping, though a blow up mattress has become the most important item I bring. And I’m not backpacking much these days. Humping a forty pound pack over a mountain just doesn’t have the appeal it once did. 

But a few months ago Johnna and I bought an eighteen foot Jayco Swift camper. And on its maiden run recently pulled it to Lake Lanier, north of Atlanta. We parked it in a secluded and shady spot out on a peninsula, lake views in almost every direction. The campsite had running water, a picnic table, firepit, and grill. A sweet spot.

And, philosophically at least, the camper has a lot of that same self contained character I first found in a backpack many years ago. 

Friends of ours brought their boat, the kids who were available came, and we spent time out on the water exploring the lake and relaxing in the sun.

We grilled pork chops and fresh vegetable kabobs one evening, hamburgers and hot dogs another. And of course had a campfire every night. All with that good conversation and camaraderie that seems to flow sitting around a fire.

There’s something special about still sharing this camping life with adult children and significant others. Some of the means may have changed but the essence is still the same. Being outdoors in scenic places. Cooking dinners over an open fire. Waves lapping on the shoreline. 

Johnna and I were there alone the third night when a thunderstorm swept in, over the water. Lightning lit the sky and rain pounded away on the camper roof. Inside it was as cozy as one could wish, and afterwards when the rain stopped we opened up the doors and windows and let the summer wind blow through fresh and clean. 

William Least Heat-Moon, in his book Blue Highways, A Journey into America (Little, Brown, and Company, 1982) writes about the “internal journey, and the external journey.” That can be read and applied on a lot of different levels, but camping epitomizes it well. We travel to these places and set up our campsites, outdoors, close to nature. And being out in that nature brings us closer to our roots, to the natural world, to our true selves, and maybe something greater than ourselves. Hopefully we grow a little.

And there’s still a lot of satisfaction in that.