2024, Family, Kids, Nature

Vicarious Camping

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Today’s post comes to us from Barbara in Winona

Saturday of this Memorial Day weekend, Husband and I went for a walk on a woodland trail at Prairie Island, a few miles from downtown Winona in the Mississippi bottomlands. https://www.prairieislandcampground.com/prairie-island-park 

We brought a picnic lunch to eat afterwards, and Husband suggested we go down by the campground, a mile or so down the road. So at Prairie Island Park, adjacent to the campground, we found a table and were situated in a perfect spot to watch perhaps the last campers arriving and setting up in the remaining grassy spaces.  

We got to see a family of four unload two kids’ bikes, then setting up the screen tent. After biking a bit down the path, the two boys tossed around a football. Another family farther away had put up a net and the teens were playing badminton. Eventually a couple and their toddler returned to their site with fishing poles (though I saw no fish).  

Along the road into the campground, a couple of strollers rolled by powered by older boys, while two dads and another kid on a scooter brought up the rear. I’ll bet the moms were back at the campsite, setting up the “kitchen”. 

It was the best place we could have chosen for our picnic. I’d been sort of lamenting that we had no place to go on this long weekend. But we got to “go camping” in a fashion – vicariously. We watched people do things we’ve done before, just not for a long time. And none of the things I saw are things I want to do at this point – but it was fun to watch other people doing them! 

When was the last time you went camping? 

53 thoughts on “Vicarious Camping”

  1. We towed our travel trailer from Indiana up into Michigan, about a thousand mile round trip, for a few days. It was 2020, I think, our last trip with the RV, although we didn’t know it at the time. Since 2009, we had traveled approximately 12,000 mi, on trips lasting as long as a month. But, we’re getting older, and it got to be too much work.

    Fun while it lasted. I likef the essay and the photos. Good for you.

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  2. Last time I slept in a tent was at the fur trade Rendezvous at Grand Portage and that time I was just sleeping there and driving into Grand Marais every morning for an art class at the Arts Colony. Robin, meanwhile, stayed at the Rendezvous with friends.

    Prior to that, Robin and I had camped at Grand Portage with those same friends for another Rendezvous. For that, because it was an historical reenactment situation, I had made myself some period-approximate clothing, including a pair of moccasins. Our friends provided the canvas wall tent and the cots on which we slept. They do it every year but I could never be persuaded to do it ever again.

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  3. July of 1973 in Winnipeg.

    There were severe thunderstorms all night and the campsite was drowned out. I had the worst earache of my life. I swore never again and have been true to the promise to myself.

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    1. That sounds like most of my camping experiences. At Sylvan Lake in South Dakota, a beautiful spot, the rain was so bad we slept in the car.

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      1. I camped at Sylvan Lake once too. It was raining too. That was the last camping trip I ever took with Morgan. We drove out to Glacier and he insisted on camping. And it rained and rained.

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    2. YA and I encountered a terrible thunderstorm when we were at Mount Rushmore. Even with the tent staked down it felt as if we would blow away and end up in Oz. We did think about getting out and getting into the car, but we would have been soaked to the bone if we had gotten out of the tent.
      The only other really bad weather we ever encountered was an extremely cold night in Hayward. I actually would have preferred thunderstorm because the cold never ended. In fact the next morning instead of having breakfast at the campsite like we normally did, we drove into town and went to Perkins.

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  4. I used to do a lot of camping, but I guess I’ve grown soft. It’s been awhile now. I used to have a Toyota Tacoma pickup. I made curtains and a large shelf inside the topper. I made it all comfy for sleeping and I used it quite a bit. That was up to about 2010. When I sold it, I didn’t camp anymore. I still have a backpacking tent suitable for solo camping but I don’t use it anymore. I also have some camp stoves and other camping gear.

    I think of this little studio condo as a cabin. It’s cabin-y. It’s the smallest unit here. It has its own little walkway back to its own entrance facing the lake. Everyone else enters their units from the other side. Once I’m back here, I can’t see anyone else. The trees are tall so it’s hard to see the lake but I get to watch a lot of wildlife. There are deer, rabbits, squirrels, and some kind of chipmunk or small squirrel that I’ve never seen before. There’s a footpath trail that goes down to another footpath that goes along the lake. It feels like a camping experience with all the comforts of home.

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  5. The Twin Buttes Powwow about 10 years ago. We were in a tent near our friends’ camper. The drumming and singing were hypnotic and went on until after midnight. Our friends made us a wonderful breakfast. The tribe delivered commodity food in a pickup to everyone who had spent the night, and insisted we take some, too, despite our protests that we certainly didn’t need it .

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  6. The BWCAW last September. But coincidentally, we’re renting an Airstream trailer for 8 nights and camping and visiting several state parks in SW Minnesota starting today. 🙂

    Chris in Owatonna

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    1. From JacAnon,

      Chris, you are headed to the edge of the Great Plains, home of Jacque and Renee. We both spent time in the area you are going to, but especially Blue Mound State Park. You will also find the home of your fellow writer, Frederick Manfred, who we have discussed on the blog at length. Bon Voyage to you and the Airstream (also a memorable, fictional device of writer Carl Hiaason in an early novel).

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      1. Love Blue Mound State Park. Touch The Sky Prairie is there, too, sponsored by Jim Brandenburg, the nature photographer and another Luverne alum.

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      2. We’ll camp at Blue Mounds for five nights (Ft. Ridgely for three). Looking forward to investigating the history of the area and checking out the Native sacred places. Pipestone National Monument is also on the itinerary.

        Chris

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        1. My Uncle Harvey had a farm just along side the Pipestone National Monument. Luverne has some fun things to do and see. Check out Betty Mann’s nutcrackers at the historical society museum.

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  8. I go camping every year with my sons. Grandsons coming up since their dad won’t take them someone has to show them how cool it is

    ely is the favorite spot but this summer I’m hoping to squeeze in the Canadian Rockies too

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  9. I’ve camped very little in my life. I never invested in a tent or the other gear required. The last time I went camping was probably about thirty years ago with a friend, who supplied the tent & stuff.

    Vicarious camping is probably the only camping I’ll do for the foreseeable future.

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  10. I don’t remember where or when we last camped in a tent, but it has been a long time, probably twenty-five years.

    When we lived in Wyoming, wasband and I camped a lot. On weekends we’d go to Vedauwoo in the Medicine Bow-Routt area, a short drive from Cheyenne. On longer trips we camped in Yellowstone, Bridger National Forest, Shoshone, The Grand Tetons, Hell’s Half Acre, and The Big Horns. We also camped in Rocky Mountain National Park and Estes Park in Colorado.

    For the sheer novelty of it I have winter camped, twice in Afton State Park, and I must say, if you have the proper gear, it’s invigorating.

    The first time we visited the Steger homestead near Ely was in late November and there was lots of snow. We slept on the floor of a tiny unheated cabin with no indoor plumbing. It was so cold that my bottle of water froze solid during the night, and Hans, gentleman that he is, had given me the lightweight summer sleeping bag while he hogged the heavier, warmer bag for himself. I was not a happy camper.

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      1. We were. Back then, 1966 – 67, Yellowstone wasn’t nearly as crowded as it is now, and there were bears everywhere.

        We once camped five days in Bridger Natl. Forest, and didn’t see a single person the entire time. We did see a mountain lion, though, the only one I’ve ever seen.

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  11. We wore out a couple tents and then a small pop-up. Then a hard wall tiny camper. Camped so many nights with kids as they grew up. Up and down North Shore, around Lake Superior, down to St. Louis, across South Dakota three times, to Winnipeg, many MN parks. Last time was 15 years ago. Got too hard for Sandra.

    About to get checked out of hospital, which is where I was yesterday when I asked where I was. Come back next Tuesday.

    Clyde, of course

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  12. Back in college some friends and I had a tradition of sleeping out the night before Easter. As the date of Easter varies widely, so does the temperature. The first time we did it, we slept on the roof of our building on the West Bank. No tents were involved in any of our Easter eve sleep-outs, just sleeping bags.

    That first sleep-out must have been a late Easter. The temperature was mild enough that our bags sufficed. At a later Easter eve sleep-out we convened on a bluff overlooking the Minnesota River. That must have been an early Easter because we just about froze our patooties off. Everyone was so cold, I couldn’t raise any interest in an egg hunt so we packed up and in all our shivery grubbiness we went to Perkins for breakfast.

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  13. I camped in the front yard with an old old canvas pup tent about 45 years ago. I can still smell that. And that’s the extent of my camping.

    Kelly, her brother, and two cousins, went camping with an Aunt and Uncle every summer for many years. They started when the kids were 6 or so. Kelly was working when they went the last few years. They had both good and bad experiences. Aunt and Uncle created a book of the adventures, because they kept good records, so they could recreate it in the book.

    Our son and his wife do some camping.

    XDFBen

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  14. I’m wondering whether the baboons who enjoy(ed) camping as adults went camping with their parents when young? My sister and I did, despite the fact that we didn’t have a car and had to haul everything on our bicycles. Not sure mom liked it, but dad sure did. During the summer Randi and I also often camped out on our lawn. We had to move the tent every few days so as not to ruin the lawn. As a teen I also went camping with the girl scouts a couple of times, and I loved every minute of it.

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    1. I didn’t camp with both my parents but I camped with the Boy Scouts and my father was sometimes a scout leader. Camping with the Scouts was a mixed experience at best. All our equipment in those days was army surplus—heavy canvas tents and clunky wooden cots. For most of the scout leader fathers, it seemed, their sole experience with camping had been in the military and they reenacted it on camping trips. The scouts didn’t just hike—we were expected to march in formation. Recreation included an obstacle course the fathers had devised. The older scouts tended to terrorize the younger ones with no intervention from the leaders. It was not an experience I savored.

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    2. My parents camped a lot when I was quite young. It ended, however, after a camping trip to Glacier Park when bears were circling our tent. Mom and I slept in the car. Dad refused to let bears disrupt his evening. We didn’t camp after that.

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    3. No camping for me as a child. My mother is not a rough-it kind of gal. And come to think of it, my dad wasn’t a roughing-it kind of guy. When I was in eighth grade we borrowed my grandparents pop-up camper that pulled behind our station wagon and did a long trip out to California and back. It was pretty dreadful from beginning to end. I remember waking up in the back of the car at one point and it was two in the morning and my dad was driving. We drove straight through from Arizona to St Louis. That was the only thing even approaching camping we ever did

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  15. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    I have not camped for about 15 years, but before that we camped regularly. We took our kids camping so they had that experience, as well as the experience of simply running free for a weekend.

    My uncle first took me camping in 1964 in the station wagon. We all (Aunt, cousins, me) slept in the back. Uncle Jim slept on the roof of the car. In the middle of the night he moved his sleeping bag to a picnic table. My camping career went on from there. I was hooked.

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  17. Some of you remind me of this:

    My mom never camped as a kid, but she and her sisters got to sleep out in the yard on blankets on the hottest nights of the summer – she remembers looking up at a lot of stars… there would have been very few streetlights, as they were on the edge of town at the time.

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  18. I have been on five 6 day river rafting trips (Grand Canyon once; Green River, Utah 4 times). The Green River trips were high school graduation gifts for my nephew and three nieces. The outfitters provided all the equipment and prepared all the meals. Twice we slept in a tent but it was too hot and stuffy so we usually slept out under the stars (on cots). The most work we had to do was help unload/load the rafts at each camping site, set up our cots, and wash our own dishes. Those trips were a lot of fun.

    In 1980 a friend and I took a trip through Canada from Winnipeg to Vancouver Island, returning via Washington, Idaho, Montana, and North Dakota. We camped for most of the nights – no cooking, though. We loved the truck stops for brunch in Canada – great food at a reasonable price. On that trip we experienced an overnight thunderstorm in Banff and a huge overnight windstorm in eastern Washington. It was quite the adventure but I wouldn’t want to repeat it now.

    My younger sister and I have camped a few times over the years. She loved it – me, not so much. I never could sleep well, whether on the ground with an inflatable pad or on a cot. On a trip to the Tetons and Yellowstone about 10 years ago we spent one night in a camper cabin. It had bunk beds with a thin mattress, a desk, and one chair. Outside the cabin was a bear proof cabinet for any food and personal items such as toothpaste, deodorant, etc. There was a nice building with toilets, sinks, and showers. That’s my kind of camping!

    These days I have no desire to camp anymore.

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  20. My favorite kind of “camping” was in the pop-top VW camper – comfy enough bed, tho’ kinda narrow for two adults… There was an upper “bunk” for an older kid (cousin who came with us) and a cot that stretched across the front seats for Joel. Did all the cooking outside, but if it was raining, we could eat in.

    It was great for trips to visit out-of-state friends or relatives – when you show up with your own bedroom, you’re welcome for a longer stay.

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  21. I’ve been hearing an underwriting credit on public radio lately for some company that sells campers and RV’s. One of their ads talks about a camper with a “gallery kitchen”.

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  22. When YA was younger, we did a fair amount of camping. Every summer we would go up to the Hayward area for a week or so and camp. We tried a few different campgrounds there over the years. We also camped when we went to the Great Cheese Festival and a few trips to the Dells. Also camped when we did college visits out to Colorado. A couple of years later YA asked if we could do that trip again and just enjoy it without the college visits hanging over her head. So we did!

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