Bad Camping Experiences

[brainpause]

This is copied and pasted from my review of Bledsoe Creek SP:

This place was not far from the pits. I suppose the cg was OK. The sites were spacious, with fire rings, although sometimes too far from the camper. However, there was very little, if anything, to do. There was a small playground, and maybe a muddy hiking trail. Not really any scenery to just enjoy. In fact, DW and I went to the local town and window shopped for fun (which isn't terrible, but I don't have to go camping to do that).

We had firewood stolen from our campsite. Holly even had a flashlight stolen while she was in the shower! She had carried it to the bathhouse with her. The bathhouse was decent too, but it doesn't matter. We'll never go back.

The only authority figure we saw was the little lady who collected money for the campsites. No rangers or anything else. Granted, we were there on a Holiday weekend, which brings out the "non-campers", but that's no excuse for poor behavior. I don't think good neighbors would have made our experience much better. The park was just boring.

Summary: We will never go back. We'll just stay at home instead.

Larry

[altozwei]

When we were still in a tent, we planned a trip to South Dakota for a summer vacation. We were living in Denver at the time and planned a two week trip to include our younger child's 1st birthday. We had a brand new tent and our first stop was Devil's Tower. It was late July and temps were in the 90's when we arrived, with a pristine blue sky and not a single cloud. No need for the rain fly. At 2 am, the wind began to gust. There was intense thunder and lightning so my DH and I began a frantic race , in pitch darkness except for the lightning, to find the fly and get it on the tent, while trying to keep it from blowing to Montana. We were exhausted when we finally crawled back into the tent which was sweltering due to having the windows closed. We never got back to sleep, it never rained and the kids slept through the whole thing.

Next night we camped at Deadwood, SD. The temps dropped to the 30's. we had to make an emergency trip to WalMart for extra clothes and blankets. The rain started after midnight and we discovered that, even with the rain fly, the tent leaked like a colander. We put the kids in the dry spot but spent the night cold and wet.

Next day, we spent our sightseeing time at the laundrymat. Went on to Custer State Park. Broke all of our plastic tent stakes trying to set up the tent. Some other campers took pity and gave us some metal ones. The DH and I never managed to get comfortable but the kids had no trouble sleeping on the rocks.

Next day was our daughter's 1st birthday and we had a party at the campsite. We invited other campers, had a cake, ice cream, presents. The camcorder jammed after shooting only 15 seconds of video, then promptly ate the tape. No problem-- I had my trusty Canon 35mm camera and took lots of pictures. It was the following day before I realized there was no film in the camera. I also lost the camera a mount Rushmore when my DH set it down beside the car, then drove off without it (we agreed it was probably the sleep deprivation). We were at Wind Cave before we missed it and had to drive back to Rushmore. Luckily, some nice person had turned it in to the rangers.

Finally, we went to the Badlands and stayed at a KOA nearby. Again it was hot, sunny, no clouds to be seen. We decided to set up camp and wait until the following morning to tour the park. We set up and were preparing to start dinner when the wind began to pick up. The storm came up so fast we had no time to load up. All we could do was sit in the colander, oops I mean tent and wait it out. Once again we had thunder and lightening but this time we had torrential rains with flooding. The wind was so strong, the rain blew vertically through the tent walls. A foot of water filled the campsite. My DH went out in the storm to hold the tent together and got caught in the hail storm. When everything turned green, I thought we were dead. A large branch off a cottonwood tree fell right next to us. Fortunately, the storm passed but the rain fly was ruined and one tent pole was shattered. We spent that night at a hotel with a, you guessed it, laundry room and went home the next day.

Patti

[Tim5055]

This is copied and pasted from my review of Bledsoe Creek SP:

This place was not far from the pits. I suppose the cg was OK. The sites were spacious, with fire rings, although sometimes too far from the camper. However, there was very little, if anything, to do. There was a small playground, and maybe a muddy hiking trail. Not really any scenery to just enjoy. In fact, DW and I went to the local town and window shopped for fun (which isn't terrible, but I don't have to go camping to do that).

Larry

OK Larry,

Time to hijack a thread....

I just noticed we are now just 228 miles apart, which if we met in the middle would be around a 2 hour tow.  When are we going camping?? :confused:

How about Cloudland Canyon State Park  According to Mapquest 2.5 hours for you and 2.25 for me.

[brainpause]

OK Larry,

Time to hijack a thread....

I just noticed we are now just 228 miles apart, which if we met in the middle would be around a 2 hour tow.  When are we going camping?? :confused:

How about Cloudland Canyon State Park  According to Mapquest 2.5 hours for you and 2.25 for me.

 Tim...check your email.

LC

[Tgraham]

As usual the first time of anything is always memorable. Our first trip out in our PU was to Myrtle Beach, SC. This was in 2000, or 2001 around Sept-Oct. There had been a small hurricane lingering off the coast for seemed like a month or more. It just kept making small circles, just far enough away to not affect the camping at the beach.[/IMG]

Since we had made reservations well in advance we were bound and determined to keep them. Upon arrival at the CG we get word the hurricane in coming inland. This did not worry us at this point because for the last 1-2 months this storm had headed inland and turned back.

Well we were "lucky" enough to get a BEACH FRONT site.[IMG]
Well our first night at the CG, our first night in our PU, turned into a first we will not soon forget.  The storm stayed its course!!!  Started out with heavy rains, then the wind picked up. Fortunately the storm did lose alot of its strength, downgraded to a tropical storm, before it hit the campground.

I managed to keep all my ladies, wife and 2 daughters, calm until first light. At that point I manged to secure a site well off the beach in a wooded site with much less wind. As soon as the PU was relocated, my ladies decided we would spend the rest of the storm and most of the weekend touring the inside of the mall.

The last day of the 3 day trip the sun popped out and was beautiful for the drive home.[IMG]

[OC Campers]

Our worst trip was to a small regional park in Southern  California.  O'neill Regional Park is a neat place with lots of hiking and biking trails.  Unfortunately, at the time we were there it was also $12 a night to camp.  This included hot showers so basically every homeless person had a site here.  One particular camper (er..homeless person) was across from us.  He had a tarp slung over a rope in the back of his 1985 Ford Ranger pickup.  He and his wife were staying (living) in the back of the truck.  After dark the woman left (in her VW).  A few hours later she returns and round 1 happens.  he starts yelling at her about going out and that she was sleeping with some guy.  So of course every other word was F***.  This fight went on for about 1 hour.  It was so bad we thought for sure he was going to start abusing her.  Finally she leaves.  Around 2 am she comes back again.  He starts in on her again.  Holy cow these 2 can fight.  The F*** words are flowing freely again.  By this time I am so tired of the yelling I told dh that he should go get the ranger.  Of course no ranger to be found.  Finally about 3 am they go to bed.  We decided to stick around for another night thinking that Saturday night couldn't be as bad as Friday.  Wrong!!!  Finally the ranger came over and talked with them.  What a horrible weekend.  After that we never went back.
 
Jacqui

[Camping Coxes]

Oddly enough, the only truly miserable trip I can think of happened at one of our favorite places, Sequoia NP.  We went when I was about 5 mos. pregnant with my now 11YO and my son was about 3YO.  We decided we'd go right after school started so we'd avoid the crowds.  I called the CG three days before to find out the weather forecast and was told it was low 50s at night and low 70s during the day.  So off we went, sweat suits and long pants packed, ready for adventure.

We got there and set up our big tent we had just bought.  We brought toys for my son and had all these dreams of hiking with him and climbing on rocks.  The weather was much colder than the ranger told us.  In the morning it was so cold it was painful to go outside the tent, so DH would start our car to get the heater running and put my son in there to thaw out while we made breakfast (mostly he made breakfast -- I hid in the warm car!).  Then my son, who was recently potty trained, decided those CG restrooms, which were clean and well-stocked, were not like home and refused to go to the bathroom in them, resulting in many "accidents."  (He'll appreciate me telling you this now that he's almost 15YO!)  So I've got a kid running out of underwear fast, ziploc bags full of soiled Barney underwear, and we're freezing.  We also had these killer buzzing insects that kept landing on our faces and ears and making my son hysterical.  After the second night, when the temp. guage in the car read 23 degrees at night, we decided it was time to head home early.
 
There's a reason most of these mountain campgrounds close after Labor Day!Oh, and the stuff we wanted to go look at was closed, because only idiots like us were around trying to camp in late September!
 
There are other comical trips, like the huge man with the beach umbrella on his shoulder and holding a giant bottle of beer, dancing nearly naked in the next site, and me yelling to my husband, "Ooooh, baby, hold me back!!!"

[tlhdoc]

P.S. Assateauge was a beautiful place to visit, but not to camp!!!

I would have to disagree with you. We camp there several times a year and love it, bugs or not.
 

We pulled into our favorite CG on Thursday evening, and the best campsite has a little a** tent setup in it. So we proceed to setup our Motorhome on the site....
 
 
 
 
 
Just kidding.
 

ROTFLMAO!:D