Gotta have your comforts!! Haha.. We take heaters, shelves, double-height airbeds etc, though most of this is due to a disability, I do like mi comforts. Queen size bed etc... Can't beat it Tony
Yep tried the basics - went home after the first night and got the duvet I was so damned cold (even with thermals and DPMs)! The secret to summer bare essentials camping....open your sleeping bag out flat, and lie ON it - then grab a couple of £1 fleece throws from tescos and sleep under THOSE Its the warmth you loose through the ground that makes you cold...
You lot don't know what camping is! Extensions, canoeing and multitudes in a tent!!! Good grief, sounds more like a hotel holiday without the brick walls. Now if you want to know about camping, crossing the Pyrenees, Corsica, Alps, Kenya, Kilimanjaro etc. on foot and carrying everything and want some tips on real camping let me know. What a soft lot!!!!!!!!!!!!
I notice a lot of moaning about other halves not liking camping. My Mrs likes it so much we went camping in Norfolk in 2004 when she was 8 months pregnant.
The bit about heat through the ground is spot on... For those of us softies who like to be snug, try using a piece of thin polystyrene type stuff.. The underlay stuff from laminate flooring is what we use, it folds down well so easy to pack and when put under your sleeping bag onto the air bed works great.... Tony (guilty softy)!
I picked up a few of the self inflating camp pads a few years ago and they work great. Highly recommended. Most of our trips are by canoe so these are the best combination I've found for being both comfortable and compact. They roll up really well and are only $30.00 cdn. Everything we need has to carried in a backpack of reasonable weight and stowable in a canoe. That imposes some very ruthless decisions on what is essential. As I get older that 'reasonable weight' keeps getting revised downward. Along the same lines, my 98 lb. fibreglass canoe has now been replaced by a 46 lb. Kevlar model and you have no idea how wonderful that is until you finish a 2 km portage.
Fireman Been there done that in my youth, I lost count of the number of tins of Baled Beans I carried up lakeland and pennine fells. Now its comfort my wife is like Andy's Andrea needs home comforts and good facilities.
The secret to summer bare essentials camping....open your sleeping bag out flat, and lie ON it - then grab a couple of £1 fleece throws from tescos and sleep under THOSE Its the warmth you loose through the ground that makes you cold... Already have the ground mat sorted to keep the cold out - doesn't help when you're in a tiny tent and the cold can be felt from the top parts of the tent But good idea about the fleece throws, will head down to the Warehouse and pick a couple up for about $4 each. (Love Tescos but we don't have one here)
Oldman: I too did it in my youth. The difference is I'm still doing it in my sixties. No more baked beans though. The freeze dried stuff I pinch from my sons T.A. rations are so much lighter to carry.
Discussion in this thread leads me to believe that there are two main forms of camping: 1 Leisure activity, preferably during summer holiday, when summer home is canvas, but otherwise supported by as many of the comforts of daily life as possible. 2 Hiking, with all your needs carried in a back pack. Leading to innovative ideas on how to save weight. On 1) I know nothing. Substitute “canvas” with “GRP” and a mast and I’m with you. On 2) I still find pleasure in this, like Fireman. This despite the fact that some of my professional life is dominated by it. On 2) I have the comments: For a tent, I’m very satisfied with my McKinley which sleeps 2 and weighs in at 2,1 kgs. Only disadvantage; it came without an assembly instruction and I actually performed a couple of modifications until I got the hang of it and now it’s returned to original ! View attachment 35378 For lightweight I too go for vacuum dried food. In this not very densely populated country you can usually take drinking water right out of the streams, at least in the mountains. I also prefer a goose-down filled sleeping bag (what’s fleece for ??!?) and a self-inflating air filled mattress, even if he latter is a little heavier than the foam. (We use foam in the field and my mates trade extra bits of foam for me in exchange for biscuits and chocolate.) It’s about protection from cold from the ground -and sometimes heat - and it's about padding, too! For a cooker; if you consider sub-zero temperatures, a multifuel one is to be preferred. It will always work on kerosene. Otherwise butane will cover all your needs; Clean, quick and simple. Do you want mine they are driving me NUTS! Wtid45: You know I would love to look after your kids at any time. So don’t use that excuse against camping ! For the next summer, I might arrange an exclusive Forum trip in the footsteps of the Telemark sabotuers. Without the snow, the cold, the starvation and the Nazis hunting. Anybody keen ?
LMAO hardly slumming it, are you??? And what's with the tub of British groceries??? The Germans make perfectly edible food ...
We camp for free on the Murray River (2 weeks) where my mate brings the Porta-Loo and all the nice smelly chemicals, Hot Shower which pumps straight from the river through a copper coil embedded in the camp fire, big Camp Ovens to cook the fresh bread, and the Sunday Roast, Community eating tent (no flies or insects) and not forgetting the fridges for the tinnies and the food. His speedboat keeps all the kids amused for water skiing, pulling the kneeboarders, bigtubes etc and ties up at his temporary "pier" which we assemble in about 30 minutes. Still seems like roughing it to me.:tongue:
That was a few miles further South Spidge. We did go in a cemetery in Salzberg, Austria that the Von Trapps hide from Ralph at the end of the film apparently.
First year since 2003 that we didn't go camping for our summer holiday. In a way I missed it but then the thought of our own bathroom with superb shower in the gite soon made me think I don't miss campsite toilet blocks. Especially the French ones with squat-toilets. I camped in the Algonquin Park back in 1992. Lovely place. I got thrown out of Algonquin in 198.... something Have to toss my lot in with the 'wife dont like it' crowd
LOL taking the 'ers-indoors and her daughter to their first bike rally this weekend....two 2-man tents (no standing up), three sleepingbags, a hexamine stove, a tinopener and two mess tins - and a wooden spoon. They want fripperies, they bring their own! Don't forget the loo roll. Rally toilets are notoriuos....
