Ask Lemmy

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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.

About 2-3 cheap string-lights that 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.

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.

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

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.

Headtorch.

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.

Tarps are your friends. Obviously get the footprint sized ones for your tent but bring extras. I like to have one in front of my tent for shoes and things to keep it cleaning going in and out. Or I like to use it to change on if my tent is too small. Great to throw over or wrap things to avoid the dew in the morning. Got to bring a tarp

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.

Hammocks are the best tents, especially for solo camping. Some pack up so small I can fit the hammock, tarp and bug net into the pockets of cargo pants.

Thermo-rest is your best friend, even in a hammock. Having a wind pass under your body will make you real cold.

Scout campsites thoroughly for poison ivy, poison oak, anthills, wasp nests, etc.

Pay attention to sleeping bag ratings and remember that a 0°C rating just means you won't die at that temp, not that you'll be comfortable. Sleeping bags are one of the few things with a strong cost/quality correlation.

Always have rope. Bring lots of rope. Know what makes a good rope.

• Tiny pop-up tent, easier to carry if you can fit inside
• Headlamps
• Sleeping pad or something to separate you from the cold ass ground
• Don't interact with the cute little bear cubs

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.

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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.

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.

Pack a book. Everything from hammock backpacking to week-long glamping festivals, I've never regretted bringing one along.

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!

Bring bug spray.

Never piss on your camp fire if it's upwind of your tent. - source, was in the scouts, we did this to another patrol. Man, their tent stank.

A lb on your feet is the same as 5 lbs on your back. And bring light shoes for when you've set up camp.

And the chair kit for your thermorest is the best investment you will ever make.

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 car camping or RVing, I started bringing my tree limb shears with me camping to cut up kindling from dead branches. So much faster and easier on the shoulder than a hatchet. If they're small enough, breaking them over my knee is fine, but I sometimes find good thick ones and I can't break that sucker down without a sharp tool.

Bring a bucket. Buckets are useful. I have 2 different collapsible kinds, but I also keep a good ol 5 gal paint bucket from the hardware store. It carries wood, water, is a trashcan, can be a seat, used to wash clothes or dishes, can be used as a toilet in an emergency (ideally with a trash bag liner and some kitty litter)...I love buckets.

Use a pill organizer to bring a variety of cooking spices in a tidy lightweight caddy.

Have a good first aid kit always.

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)

Best time of the year to camp is spring and fall. The nights are cool while the days are warm. You are either too early or too late for mosquitos. It can be less busy as well.

Summer camping gets too hot both during the day and at night.

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.

good tents are worth the money. The heavy canvas ones are great if not too far from a car, but too heavy to carry far.

Pool Noodles - Place them like this in your canopy so they add tension to the roof. This will prevent rain water from collecting near the edge and weighing down the roof.

I always place the entrance to my tent under a canopy. This allows me to to stay dry when entering the tent. It also protects me from the sun. And I can put a rug down in front of my tent to wipe my feet.

If you are using multiple canopies, considering some canopy gutters. They are basically 1 foot by 10 feet strips of tent material that you attach between two canopies. This way you don't have to avoid the drip-strip under two canopies.

Outdoor rugs can help to prevent the ground from becoming a muddy mess. They sell large, lightweight plastic rugs that work very well for this. They can be folded down to a portable size and are very light. They allow water to pass through, so they don't soak it up and become heavy.

I've learned to not put a tarp under my tent, that just traps water between the tent and the tarp. Put a tarp down inside your tent and then put a rug (or towels) on top of that. Nice dry comfy rug in your tent.

Apparently it rains every time I go camping...

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.

Blackout tent so you can sleep late.

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

If you are on a budget, camp in whatever vehicle you already own. I lived in a small car with my wife and cat for several months as we were moving. Learned a ton from “Cheap RV Living” on YouTube.

We had a solar generator with some panels, we cooked using electric skillet, had a twin bed, fairy lights use almost no power, and we had a 12v fridge. It wasn’t that bad but we eventually found a super cheap RV and live in that now.

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.

Pee bottle and fairy lights.

• Don't go to bed with the same clothes you wore during the day. The perspiration will make you really cold at night
• Even though it's warm during the day, don't assume it'll be warm at night. The temp differences can be quite drastic
• pack your clothes for the next day in your sleeping bag so they're warm in the morning. I usually either roll them up and use them as a pillow, or put them deep inside my sleeping bag by my feet.