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I’ve been camping my whole life, as a kid growing up, with my husband for the past 21 years and now as a family of four for the past five years.
In response to the “why do you love camping?” question, I came up with this list (tailored to car camping in state/DEC campgrounds, although I’ve done my share of backpacking/backcountry camping as well), in no particular order:
10 reasons why I camp
- Hearing owls at night (and loons, frogs and whatever other nocturnal creatures are making noises at night).
- To wake up in the woods (or by a lake or other scenic places)
- For $22 a night, you get a piece of paradise and a chance to explore scenic parts of New York state. (and there are so many campgrounds to choose from, 52 in the Adirondacks and Catskills alone!)
- Night walks with flashlights
- Day walks looking and listening for flora and fauna
- Food tastes better when cooked and eaten outside
- Spending time with friends and family, totally unplugged.
- The ability to do an “Adirondack trifecta” of swimming, kayaking and hiking in the same day.
- Campfires at night (s’mores for the kids and “gl’mores” aka fancy s’mores for mom)
- It’s the only time I have to catch up on reading.
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Staring into a campfire has to be an activity that humans have engaged in for a million years. How can we not be aware of that connection to the very roots of our humanity.
Connect with our farthest ancestors and get out and enjoy the wild places.
One of my favorite things about camping is having the chance to see the night sky away from the light pollution. Watching the moon, the Milky Way, the planets, constellations, meteors, and the occasional comet and aurora, just like the earliest humans did millennia ago, is awe-inspiring and humbling. If everyone did it, I believe our species would make a greater effort to save our planet from ourselves.
I enjoy reading your articles. I have been wilderness camping in the daks for over 40 years. I made a similiar list a few years ago. It included things I liked about camping and the things I didn’t like about working. I subsequently wrote a song about those lists called the Blue Line Blues. Be glad to send you a recording of it as an mp4. Didn’t see a way of attaching it to this note.
Would love to listen, Dave! You can email me at editor@adirondackalmanack.com.
thanks!
All of the above and more. Wilderness camping takes it up another notch to an experience that is a complete and total departure from the life we lead every day. You discover new skills, emotions, and sensory experiences that you really can’t get at a family campground.
The first, and foremost, reason I came up with why I like to camp in the woods is…..to get away from the maddened race!