Camping

Zardnaar

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Joined
Nov 16, 2003
Messages
19,952
Location
Dunedin, New Zealand
Family is out scouting a new campsite for January camping trip.

Inlaws are getting older and need easier access to the river and basic facilities eg shower and toilets starting to appeal.

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The site.
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River.

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3 minute walk it's around $7-8 usd a night. F all tourists I used to swim in that river as a kid. Same river school camp 1989 and various cub camps.

20 minute drive to home town, 5 minutes to a small village with great fish and chip shop.

Reasonably tourist free as well costs money they ten to go for free sites.

Weather's been good 21-27 Celsius this week January is usually better. Rain has been abundant but no flooding river is clean with reasonable water levels.
 
If you are staying in anything more complicated than a tent, you are not really camping. If your home away from home has wheels and is made of metal, you are not really camping.
 
If you are staying in anything more complicated than a tent, you are not really camping. If your home away from home has wheels and is made of metal, you are not really camping.

We'll be using tents. FIL has been getting chemo so was thinking tents are good for him.
There's a shower block and actual toilets vs what we usually use.
 
River beside old campsite.

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Zards old swimming holes in 80's and 90's.
 
Just for the heck of it, I Googled Elk Creek Campground (the place where I woke up to frozen hot chocolate 50 years ago). These photos aren't enough to tell if much has changed, but the water and Ram River Falls are still there. I think they improved the path to the lookout point at the falls to include steps and proper handrails now; before it was a handrail and slippery gravel path that you couldn't pay me to try to go on.

It's nice out there, but for me the biggest attraction would be the night sky.
 
Just for the heck of it, I Googled Elk Creek Campground (the place where I woke up to frozen hot chocolate 50 years ago). These photos aren't enough to tell if much has changed, but the water and Ram River Falls are still there. I think they improved the path to the lookout point at the falls to include steps and proper handrails now; before it was a handrail and slippery gravel path that you couldn't pay me to try to go on.

It's nice out there, but for me the biggest attraction would be the night sky.

Reading link now.

We're not allowed open fires now due to fire risk and nearby pine forest.

20 minutes to penguins.

 
Last time I went camping the organiser forgot the tent. We went to Millets to try and hire a tent, something they don't do preferring to sell them, and were out of luck until he phoned his wife and handed the salesman over to her. That got us a pity tent for rent soon enough.
 
I have never gone camping, have gone caravaning, which apparently is not the same. Anyway, i found it uncomfy, dirty feet all the time, emptying the septic tank all the mornings, nights full of mosquitoes, and like living in a parking for a week (mostly without the 'like'). So i bought a roadster instead of a caravan and go to hotels.
 
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If you are staying in anything more complicated than a tent, you are not really camping. If your home away from home has wheels and is made of metal, you are not really camping.
"Not really camping" > camping :D

Sleeping on hard ground & roughing it is fun when you're <35. RV trip someday sounds fun
 
I spent 3 weeks living in a Winnebago in the summer of 1985, the year my dad, great-uncle, and I took a trip to Vancouver Island and Wenatchee, Washington.

That was the summer I became bilingual in miles/kilometres, as I was the navigator with the map (in metric), the reader of road signs (metric in Canada, imperial in the U.S.), but my dad only spoke imperial.
 
If you are staying in anything more complicated than a tent, you are not really camping. If your home away from home has wheels and is made of metal, you are not really camping.

Caravaning isn't quite as evocative though.
 
In the UK at least its quite good at evoking negative stereotypes.

Is glamping still camping?
:lol: Not at all. The tents don't fit in your car.
 
In the UK at least its quite good at evoking negative stereotypes.

Is glamping still camping?

Define glamping? We take an inflatable mattress, some of the others have stuffed the trailer full of furniture, golf clubs etc.
 
maybe I would've enjoyed camping more if my boy scout troop weren't complete putzes but I never liked teenagers anyway, even when I was one.
Hotels or bust.
 
Define glamping? We take an inflatable mattress, some of the others have stuffed the trailer full of furniture, golf clubs etc.
Glamping is when your campsite has a 5 star restaurant and a cocktail bar.
 
The most important thing about camping is a fire, and an area where one can collect fallen wood like a caveman.

The second most important thing about camping is a good bed. If one is alone, I rate a camp bed with a self inflating mattress on top.

Spoiler A bed like this :


Spoiler A mattress like this :
 
Camping is a lot of fun! I love packing for longer trips out where I can just chill in nature and kinda meditate on life. Always pack a comfortable sleeping arrangement. I like to go lightweight so I have more room for dried food and the sort, but I am not UL. Base weight is always aimed to be under 15 lbs or so.
 
Camping when you can bring a car to the campsite is a whole different thing to hiking in. I have not done the hiking in thing for years, since being an adult really. It is much more hardcore.
 
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