With a young family and one income, we learned early to find inexpensive vacations. Pop-up camping was my husbands idea. He camped as a youngster, loved the outdoors and quite honestly never thought a tent would work for me. For many years we took our young sons to state parks in Tennessee. Bike rides, bubbles, wading the creek, chopping wood, campfires… they played hard, ate well, and slept like champs. We created the “Guessing Game” and played for hours by a campfire. Someone would think of a person.. and we would each ask only yes and no questions to determine the answer. One year, a birthday cake for our five year old was cooked in a cardboard box.. another camper taught my husband the famous campfire trick that turned our fire green and pink.. the stories of raccoons eating our chips and the one weekend it rained a solid 26 hours. Camping was our get away — and then those young sons grew up and left us empty nesting.
When our youngest was in college we started tent camping. Our popup camper was long gone. With years of high school sports ruling our weekends, camping was a distant memory. Blazing a new trail with a tent, air mattress, and the basic necessities we chose different parks. The memory of little boys with us was too fresh.. this needed to be a new adventure, places we would discover on our own and make new memories.
Something happens when you ‘leave the world’ behind and set up a tent. The birds sing louder, the night is darker, the moon shines brighter. Staring into a campfire is mesmerizing, snuggling into a sleeping bag on a cold night just feels right.
Occasionally, we have the camping desire but not the time or energy to make it happen. I suppose camping is an attitude.. of being away from it all. And that adventure can be created from home! With a fire pit in our backyard, a full moon and a nice dinner — we did just that last weekend. My husband is a master fire builder. We ate our dinner by his creation and stayed up late watching the moon rise. The next morning we chose to visit Henry Horton State park, a less than 20 mile drive for a hike along the Duck River. Returning home we had a short family visit, dinner with friends and the next afternoon spent some more ‘backyard time’ in our hammocks. It truly felt like camping from home without the effort of the tent or packing.
Adventure is an attitude, step away and breathe deep. Watch the moon rise or relax along a trail. You’ll be glad you did. Oh — and don’t forget the fishing pole.
Happy Camping,
Beverly Alice
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