There are many ways to have a memorable and fun wilderness camping experience. The following are some tips and things you can do to make this a great camping experience for families or for couples wishing a romantic getaway.
How Do You Prepare For Wilderness Camping?
It’s an incredible experience! Wilderness camping is one of the greatest outdoor experiences possible. For starters, a person or a group of people get to rely on themselves and the land to survive for days or even weeks. Some people take very limited supplies to survive on while others pack as much as they can. It’s a good idea to plan ahead, bring all the necessary supplies, and prepare for all scenarios. In the end, you can have a great backcountry camping trip with your family, your better half, or a few friends.
Always plan the trip out ahead of time
If you don’t plan the entire trip out beforehand, then you could find yourself in a lot of trouble. For starters, you could find yourself short on supplies and days away from your destination. Failure to plan ahead can easily lead to missing supplies and other necessary items. At all times, a lack of preparation is just begging for something to go wrong during a wilderness camping trip. You won’t be near civilization, so it’s a pretty bad idea to risk anything happening out in the middle of nowhere.
Focus on food, water, shelter, and practical items
You should work on minimizing the weight you have to carry on the trip while maximizing the amount of supplies you can bring. Sure, that might sound pretty impossible, but it’s fairly easy. Food and water take up a lot of space if you are bringing along cans of food or bottles of water. You should go with MREs (meal-ready-to-eat) for food because they are lightweight but pack a lot of food. On top of that, you should bring water packets or a small filter-pitcher combo to get water from natural sources. Bringing a sturdy but somewhat small tent is a smart idea. Plus, you have to pack tools like an axe, shovel, and other items. Decrease weight while increasing the amount of supplies you have in any way possible.
Pack a couple changes of clothes only
Without a doubt, you don’t need tons and tons of clothes to camp out in the middle of nowhere. It’s best to only bring 1 to 3 changes of clothes, depending upon how long you will be out there. You shouldn’t be worried about smelling great because it’s tough work camping in the forest, mountains, desert or wherever. Of course, clothes take up a lot of space and add a lot of weight to your back, so you shouldn’t take too many changes of clothes on a camping trip.
Bring a firearm or bow if possible
More than likely, you won’t have to worry about defending yourself from animals or anything else. It’s still a great idea to take along a gun or some type of bow – if the area you are camping in permits such weapons. These items can be used to hunt for food or in self-defense. So then, a firearm or bow of some sort is just a smart idea because these weapons serve practical purposes out in the middle of nowhere. Just remember to check the firearm rules of the area you are camping in.
Bring a long-range radio for safety purposes
For the most part, you should always be within range of a radio if you aren’t camping hundreds of miles away from civilization. At the very least, you should be able to get a park ranger on the radio if you bring a long-range radio along. Thirty to fifty miles is a good range for campers that run into an emergency. You might not always be in range, but you should be able to get in range of another person within a few hours unless you travel thirty or forty miles per day. During the trip, you will want to keep the radio turned off and only use it if an emergency pops up.
7 Tips For Wilderness Camping
Wilderness camping is by no means easy, so here are some tips for having a fun and enjoyable trip.
1. Brings lots of fun food
A lot of people enjoy fun food at their camping experience. For instance you could bring marshmallows so that you can roast them over the open camp fire. You can also bring the makings of s’mores, which a lot of people find very fun. You can make your own popcorn over the fire. Try all different sorts of items.
2. Brings equipment to play sports
A lot of people enjoy playing sports. You can simply bring a ball to throw around. Alternatively, you can set up an entire game of some sort of sport.
3. Go on beautiful nature hikes
Nature hikes can be a lot of fun in the wilderness. Before you go, make sure you know all about any trails in the area and the safe places to go.
4. Sit around the campfire and tell stories
A lot of people find it very fun to tell stories around the campfire. You can tell every person to prepare a story so that you can all take turns. They can be scary or tame if you have young children. Another fun idea would be to have people taking turns telling funny tales from their past. You can also tell jokes or riddles. You might be able to keep everyone laughing for hours.
5. Have a scavenger hunt
A scavenger hunt can be a very fun activity to do when camping in the wilderness. Make sure that you gear this to whatever age the participants are. You could have some sort of prize at the end for the winners.
6. Leave distractions and real-life stress at home
You might not have a fun time if you bring all of your work from home. Also, it might not be as fun if half of your people are on their cell phones with work, playing their own video games, and so forth. You may want to leave at home these things which may stress you or take time away from fun camping activities.
7. Make sure to be prepared and bring all safety items
You won’t have fun if something happens and you are not prepared. Come armed with everything you need so you can focus on fun and know everything else is taken care of.
A wilderness camping trip can be a lot of fun. Consider the above tips to help you with this.
How To Go Wilderness Camping In The Mountains
One of the most exhilarating types of wilderness camping is when you go up into the mountains. This is because of the breathtaking panoramas, the change in temperature and oxygen levels, and because everything around you is just so absolutely different from where you live. On the other hand, wilderness camping in the mountains is far more dangerous than any other place except for the extreme desert, so you have to be even more cautious than you would have to be otherwise.
Mountain Weather
To go wilderness camping in the mountains, you should first familiarize yourself with mountain weather by going camping in a campground in the mountains first; in fact, you may want to do so for an entire season. This is because it’s difficult to describe to someone just how differently your body feels when moving into higher altitudes.
Where Should I Camp In The Mountains?
Next, when you do head into the wilderness, don’t start out with the mountain top, instead, choose a place that is more like foothills than mountains, and that is within walking distance of a campground or ranger station. Or in other words, start out with training wheels.
Granted, it’s a difficult thing to do once you decide you want to go wilderness camping; to hold yourself back. But, if you feel that tug, just remind yourself of how many others have given in to that temptation and have found themselves in deep trouble because they were caught by surprise and didn’t know what to do, or didn’t have the proper gear.
How Bad Can The Weather Be In The Mountains?
And that’s the next thing. Before you ever set foot on some bit of mountain wilderness, convince yourself of this one fact. The weather can get far worse, far faster than you can ever imagine, when in the mountains. Anyone that’s done any camping in the mountains can tell you all about this. A nice warm spring day can end up in a snow or ice storm.
Or vice versa. It’s just that unpredictable. This means that you have to assume the worst when camping in the mountains, which means brining gear for the worst possible scenario. This doesn’t mean lugging up snow equipment in the milled of July of course, but it does mean knowing that the temperature can get a lot lower than you might expect, so having warm clothes would only make sense.
Bring A GPS
The next thing is, because of advances in technology, there is no reason for anyone to go wilderness camping in the mountains without a GPS device that both sends and receives signals. Having one of these little gadgets makes it almost impossible to get lost, and if you do get lost anyway or get hurt and can’t walk, it will show others exactly where you are.
Do Your Homework
And finally, as with any other wilderness camping, do your homework. Learn everything you can about the area where you will be; where the ranger stations are, where towns and roads are; average temperatures, types of wildlife you may encounter, etc. And then, only go wilderness camping in the mountains or anywhere else, after you’ve learned how either through safe camping experiences or from someone else who really knows what they are doing.
How To Make Wilderness Camping A Romantic Getaway
Though it might not be for everyone, wilderness camping can be for some couples, one of the most romantic getaways imaginable. Imagine sitting side by side, arms around one another, sipping wine or beer while gazing into the warmth of a campfire. This is what wilderness camping can be for couples who are looking for time alone away from all the other distractions in life, so long as you plan it well.
Planning A Wilderness Camping Romantic Getaway
One of the key ingredients in almost any good romantic getaway, is good planning, and wilderness camping is no exception. This is because with good planning, you can have those peaceful moments together, but without it, you could find you and your loved one lost, cold, wet or just plain miserable.
Wilderness camping requires careful planning, there’s just no two ways about it; at least if you want to have a good time. Also, it should be done with common sense. For example, a wilderness camping trip as a romantic escape should never happen in a place where neither person has camped before. That’s just asking for disaster.
Also, it should generally not be done unless either or both people have some experience with wilderness camping; this should go without saying, because learning to camp in the wilderness is something that happens over many outdoor excursions. To have a romantic camping trip, someone has to know what they are doing or things won’t go smoothly, to say the least.
Weather
Also, to have a good getaway, you need to have good weather. If romance is what you’re after, check the weather reports very carefully. Nothing dampens a wilderness camping experience more than rain. Also, be cognizant of the time of year and average and expected temperatures.
Camping when it’s ninety degrees or higher is no more fun than is camping in the rain. Neither is camping with a forest full of gnats or biting flies. Know your camping site and when it’s best to go there. What you’re after is pleasant temperatures, sunny skies, little to no bugs and lots of dry wood for your campfire. Oh, and a beautiful vista wouldn’t hurt.
Comfort
Also, comfort is a pretty big deal when you’re talking romance, both in the tent and when out and around it, so bring something comfortable to sit on, and make sure you will both be very comfortable when in the tent. Also make sure the tent is big enough so you won’t get tangled up when you’re not sleeping.
Premade Meals
Plus, have all of your meals planned and either premade or simple, such as a steak on a stick cooked over the fire.
The idea is to set things up in such a way as to not have to make any decisions, to do as little work as possible, and to know how things will go so that you won’t have to be figuring things out as you go. And then, get yourselves out there and let it happen, easily and naturally as nature intended.
Thousands of people trek out into the wilderness each year to camp out for a few days or even a couple weeks. It’s a thrill to get out into the middle of nowhere and survive on somewhat limited supplies. Without a doubt, it takes a very skilled and resourceful person, couple, or group of people to make a successful wilderness trip. Still, anyone can enjoy wilderness camping if they like being outdoors!
Great ideas and tips, I love camping but have never been wilderness camping–this might just change.
We are just starting to venture out again! I love the scavenger hunt idea….especially for the kids! TU. 😊