Earliest camping memories...

[NadMat]

What are your earliest camping memories? For some of the lifetime campers, this may go way back.

My earliest clearly remembered camping memories are from when I was about 4(egads, almost 40 yrs ago!), camping in Smoky Mountains on weekends or holidays with family and friends, mostly other college folk from UT. I can still remember the texture of the weathered rocks, the smell of the forest, laying in the tent listening to soft rain on roof, many hikes, and playing with other campin' kids. No PUP then, but they got around to one eventually:D

Of course, those were just the start of many fond memories of the outdoors that make me thank God for the wonderful parents that I have and the way that they raised me, I didn't always appreciate all of it at time, but still tell them that the  older I get, the smarter I realize they are

[maromeo]

Mine was when I was about 13 years old. My parents bought a 1972 Stuery PU, avocado green striped tenting and we traveled from MN to see Yellowstone where my father fell into the Yellowstone River while he was washing his face and my 4 brothers had to catch him downstream before he hit any rocks. I can still see my father's wallet drying out with all the money and papers clipped on our clothes line outside of the PU. We still laugh about this today. From there we headed down through CO and camped around Colorado Springs where my brother caught the best rainbow trout I have ever tasted. It was great. Then on down to the Grand Canyon it was a great time. Back then it was during the gasoline shortage so we had our issues then too.

I have tried to share many camping experience with my son and daughter also but today things are more commercial. We enjoy our camping family time alot. It seems to be the only time we can really unwind.
Mary Romeo

[dee106]

around 10 yrs old, camping in a tent with family, it started to rain, my mother not knowing used her finger to push the puddle off the top of the tent, a canvas tent! well you know the rest,,,,,,, we had very very wet sleeping bags, and had to pack everything up and head back home 3hour drive in the rain, with wet gear.  took all day to dry out five sleeping bag and all our clothes, then we packed up again, and we to another campground, and met some really nice people, had a great time, and rented a popup the next yr!

[pershingd]

Our family went camping with my grandparents at Quemado Lake in NM when I was about 3 or 4 (over 30 yrs ago). The main things I remember getting goatheads in my feet, being sunburnt, and leaving early because of the weather. Despite this, I still love going out ccamping as often as I can...

David

[mountainrev]

Five or six years old, circa late '60s (yikes), the seven of us were camping in the old Wheel Camper popup, pulled by a new '68 Ford wagon with custom 3rd seat that my dad made.  Yes, it was crowded.  And no, there was no A/C.

We went to Nova Scotia that summer, and I remember going to the bathroom at a provincial park, but getting lost when I came out and not knowing which way the campsite was.  It was very foggy.  I guess I had been taught that when you're lost, just stay put, because that's what I did.  Much later, my family found me.

[mars00XJ]

I remember when we went to Yellowstone when I was 11. It rained like crazy and I had a river that ran thru my tent. I also remember a moose running thru the backside of the site.

That was a fun trip out west. Devils Tower, Mount Rushmore, & Yellowstone in 1983.

[ColemanCampingFamily]

My first memory of camping was at Disney World on Easter Weekend over 30 years ago...I think I was 3. Anyway, we were tent camping and I have a very vivid memory of seeing the Easter Bunny driving through the campground (not sure if it was called Fort Wilderness back then) on a motorcycle!!

The next year my parents bought a Cox Camper that reminded me of a big mushroom. It had green tenting, and was not a "hard top". There were "flip out" (as opposed to slide out) beds on each end, a dinette, "kitchen" area with a sink (no stove), and a space for an ice box. I remember my dad always bought an ice block to put in the ice box to keep the food cool. We went on vacation to Myrtle Beach every year in that camper for 7 years!! I could share more stories, but wouldn't want to bore anyone to death!! (Although, one year we went to the Chesapeake Bay instead of Myrtle Beach).

We have been taking our son camping since he was 12 weeks old, and this is our first year "off the ground" in our camper. He loves camping and always asks to go. I can't wait for the day that he takes his children on their first trip (MANY years from now, lol).

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DW (69)  :usflag:
DH (67)  :!
DS (00)  :J

1985 Coleman Aspen AKA "Patches"

[tahoecampers]

I am guessing the late 60's, Girl Scout camp at Rucker Lake, in the Northern Sierra Nevada. I would go up there for 2 weeks every summer. When I would get back home to Sacramento, I would look at the mountains every evening and wish that I was back up there... (That was before the days of smog, you could see the Sierras very clearly) I have lived up in the Sierras for nearly 30 years now, I guess all that wishing was worth it!!!

[CajunCamper]

Our family went camping with my grandparents at Quemado Lake in NM when I was about 3 or 4 (over 30 yrs ago). The main things I remember getting goatheads in my feet, being sunburnt, and leaving early because of the weather. Despite this, I still love going out ccamping as often as I can...

David

Okay, I'll be the one to ask the question. What does it mean to get goatheads in your feet. Sounds like something you want to stay away from for sure.

CajunCamper

[Cheryl]

The first vivid camping memory I have is of a family campout, in a tent, up on Big Bear Mountain in California for a Thanksgiving Weekend way back in '62 or '63. My Dad was Air Force and all our family was out East. We camped to enjoy nature and spend time together as a family. The first morning we woke up and all our water had frozen and our tent, table and car were covered with a thick layer of ice. Eventually, everything thawed and we had a blast.
Started DD camping at 12 weeks old way back in 1983. We had a six year hiatus from camping from 1984 to 1990 so DS didn't camp for the first time until he was over a year old. We've been a camping family since. Now DD and DS are involved with Jobs and College but they still join us periodically.
Cheryl

[mountainrev]

Okay, I'll be the one to ask the question. What does it mean to get goatheads in your feet. Sounds like something you want to stay away from for sure.

CajunCamper

I'll answer (don't mean to horn in on your post, pershingd).  Goatheads are little burs that come from the "fruit" of a weed.  If you look at them closely, they look remarkably like a tiny head of a goat.  The "horns" are what gets you!  They will puncture your mountain bike tires as well as stick into your bare feet.  Nasty critters.

[fdtd]

I was 10 years old and in the weblow program of scouting.  It was a father/son campout at camp conestoga/buck run in somorset, pa.  We stayed 2 to a tent in wall type canvas tents...my first campout and i was hooked, but I think my dad wished I wasn't (he eventually got "drafted" to be scoutmaster).  Any way from 1986 to 2005 I only camped with a tarp except for my time on camp staff.  Now I am in a pu with the family, but could go back to "roughing it" if need be...

[ScoobyDoo]

I remember holding the rope on 1 side of the canvas wall tent while dad was staking down the other side. I still have Coleman lantern and stove that dad packed in the trunk of the '58 Ford. In '63 the family got an Econoline van so we didn't have to fight with the tent for overnite stops. The last time the tent was used was in the early '70s. Dad had 2 weeks of training somplace in up-state NY. They set the tent up, put a old treadle sewing machine in it. Dad would take the van to class, mom would sew cloths for charity while she was stranded. She said that every day she could find a new tear or split seam, they didn't haul it home.

[DoubleD]

Gavins Point Dam, SD and Fremont Lakes, NE back in the 60's with a big old 150 lb canvas tent that was a bear to set up.  So darn heavy it broke the poles.
Driving dad's '55 Chevy down the dirt roads of Nebraska at age 7.
The drawbridge over the Missouri River near Yankton SD.
Skipping rocks on Lewis and Clark Lake.
The Walleye that pulled dad's rod right off the dock when it took the bait, snagging the line and pulling the fish and the rod back out of the lake.
Catching gar and catfish out of the Missouri River.
Getting away with cussing when we would say "turn off those dam lights!"

[flyfisherman]

As far back as I can remember our family vacations were state parks and the old family canvas wall tent. Dad always made them great adventures with plenty of things to do and sights to see, plus he was an avid fisherman.

Somewhere in those early days he tried a small TT which proved to be too much for his '39 Chevy (that should pretty well date me!) and was sold by the end of that season; and Dad went back to the old wall tent and took to towing a small utility trailer for all the family gear (but there never was enough room for my bike).

The next thing Dad tried was building a little cabin, back in the woods on the shore of this lake ... there was'nt even a road around the lake in those days. That proved to be a source of addiltional maintenance chores where he ended up spending his vacation time working on the cabin. Needles to say, he sold that property and it was back to the tent! Dad said afterward that the best idea would be to have some property on a river or lake that offered a lot of privacy, with maybe just a utility building to store a boat and such, and then have a popup camper. I've went back to that lake a few times and, of course, Dad's cabin had long been torn down, replaced by a Taj Mahal, the lake laced with canals and many roads around and leading to it, plus the population of a large town.

Ah, yes ... progress.


Fly