Your Most Memorable Camping Trip: Where/Why

IrishEyes

IrishEyes

Member
Location
Midwest
1963 High Sierra Mountains
Mom, Stepdad, 2 sisters, Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Cliff and myself
Always been a mountain lake lover. I could not believe the beauty of it all.
I couldn't take it in fast enough, wanted to see it all.
We were near a lake like the one pictured (could even be it).
The whole family together, no phone, TV, no slot machines :ROFLMAO:
Ran into my first ever rattle snake. I was running bait back and forth to the men
and had to walk on this rock ledge to get from my Uncle to Grandpa. As I passed
these stacked boulders in the crevice I heard that telltale sound and I froze. I peeped
out a soft "Uncle Cliff, I hear rattlers over here" How I did not begin crying or scrambling
I have no idea. I was twelve at the time.
Cliff told me to stay still, he was coming. he crawled up behind me, grabbed me around
the waist and jerked me backwards. Turns out there were several in there. I thought Cliff
was Superman from then on. He assured me we would still explore but he was going to be with me
when I did, and that was fine with me.
Meanwhile back at camp, my two sisters had strayed away from camp and Grandma, Mom and Dad
were walking the road for them, stopping and listening, calling their names. Then Mom heard them calling out
quite calmly "Someone help us please, we are lost and a bear is following us, please find us, we are hungry and thirsty"
Mom saw them walking up the road slowly hitting rocks with sticks as they called out. Mom was not very happy when she
saw how scared they were.... Not! Priceless memories.

highSierra.JPG
 

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Nothing as exciting as your trip @IrishEyes But we used to go up to Maine to Acadia National Park. In the park is Cadillac Mountain where it said that the first rays of the morning sun touch the United States on that mountain. It's a beautiful area.

cadillac-mountain-m1a2566.jpg
 
RadishRose said:
Nothing as exciting as your trip @IrishEyes But we used to go up to Maine to Acadia National Park. In the park is Cadillac Mountain where it said that the first rays of the morning sun touch the United States on that mountain. It's a beautiful area.

cadillac-mountain-m1a2566.jpg
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A sight to die for! Gorgeous!!! Thank You!
 

The most fun place we camped was at Jellystone Park in Sturbridge, Mass. At various times, we took our pop-up trailer, or rented a cabin, or slept in a tent. For some reason it makes me angry to be in a tent when it is raining. I hate it!

With a Yogi Bear theme, kids loved it and were never bored. The place had tons of activities planned for kids. The adults had fun, too. My best friend came with the kids and me. Really, I could have spent weeks there, instead of going for a week just twice a summer. The other visitors were great, the owners were great, it was just great!

At night, everyone got together for dancing, trivia games, and other stuff. I liked the dancing the best. The kids probably liked the ice-cream because they were worn out.

One visit was especially memorable because son #3 came running to our trailer. "Mom, mom, there is a barking cat next door!"
The cat turned out to be a chihuahua. My kids had never seen any dogs except for large (ours) and medium sizes. Who knew dogs came in teeny-tiny? :)

When we got our rough collie, who weighed 100 lbs when he grew up, we started camping at Mohawk State Forest in the Berkshires, in Mass. That was fun too - hiking in the mountains, swimming in the river, making friends we saw every year, bear hunting, some scary encounters with bears at the cabin (over the years we became habituated to the bears -- they were already habituated to people).

We went to a pow-wow. I was so excited about that. The only Native Americans there ran the booths and danced their native dances. I thought that a lot of Native Americans would be there, and hardly anybody else. Very disappointing.
 
WheatenLover said:
The most fun place we camped was at Jellystone Park in Sturbridge, Mass. At various times, we took our pop-up trailer, or rented a cabin, or slept in a tent. For some reason it makes me angry to be in a tent when it is raining. I hate it!

With a Yogi Bear theme, kids loved it and were never bored. The place had tons of activities planned for kids. The adults had fun, too. My best friend came with the kids and me. Really, I could have spent weeks there, instead of going for a week just twice a summer. The other visitors were great, the owners were great, it was just great!

At night, everyone got together for dancing, trivia games, and other stuff. I liked the dancing the best. The kids probably liked the ice-cream because they were worn out.

One visit was especially memorable because son #3 came running to our trailer. "Mom, mom, there is a barking cat next door!"
The cat turned out to be a chihuahua. My kids had never seen any dogs except for large (ours) and medium sizes. Who knew dogs came in teeny-tiny? :)

When we got our rough collie, who weighed 100 lbs when he grew up, we started camping at Mohawk State Forest in the Berkshires, in Mass. That was fun too - hiking in the mountains, swimming in the river, making friends we saw every year, bear hunting, some scary encounters with bears at the cabin (over the years we became habituated to the bears -- they were already habituated to people).

We went to a pow-wow. I was so excited about that. The only Native Americans there ran the booths and danced their native dances. I thought that a lot of Native Americans would be there, and hardly anybody else. Very disappointing.
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I used to love on trips to Oklahoma to stop and see the Navajo Dancers when I was a kid. Those sound like really fun vacations, you are so lucky to have those memories! That's cute about the barking cat :LOL:
 
Going waaaay back, to when we were single - a camping trip in Algonquin Park (Ontario), with our very young dog. We had a tent made for us, which we were eager to set up. Pooch was restless, and up all night. We took a canoe (I have a photo somewhere in my album here, I think). Pooch, who was a x-lab, met up with a female lab pup, and they had fun playing together. Another dog, husky, if I recall correctly, met up with a porcupine. We helped with the removal of the quills. The leaves had turned colour, being October - and, it started snowing as we left the park.
 
Two really memorable trips of the many times I’ve camped.

The first was just after my divorce. It was just me and the two kids. There was a new tent, not the light and fancy ones like now. You had to drive a real stake in to anchor it. I took it apart at home to make sure it was all there. Drove for about four hours up into the mountains. Set it up and realized the tent cap was sitting back home and it looked like rain. Fellow campers felt for me and brought over a large tarp. Yes, it rained while we listened to a fellow camper snore.

The second memorable was camping with two friends. We hadn’t heard that there were tornado warnings. They weren’t even that close at the time. Lots of rain and crazy weather. The tent leaked. The next night two of us got the last hotel room in a resort town. TG.
 
Pinky said:
Going waaaay back, to when we were single - a camping trip in Algonquin Park (Ontario), with our very young dog. We had a tent made for us, which we were eager to set up. Pooch was restless, and up all night. We took a canoe (I have a photo somewhere in my album here, I think). Pooch, who was a x-lab, met up with a female lab pup, and they had fun playing together. Another dog, husky, if I recall correctly, met up with a porcupine. We helped with the removal of the quills. The leaves had turned colour, being October - and, it started snowing as we left the park.
Click to expand...
Sounds very romantic for all involved except the porcupine :love: Love it!
 
Jules said:
Two really memorable trips of the many times I’ve camped.

The first was just after my divorce. It was just me and the two kids. There was a new tent, not the light and fancy ones like now. You had to drive a real stake in to anchor it. I took it apart at home to make sure it was all there. Drove for about four hours up into the mountains. Set it up and realized the tent cap was sitting back home and it looked like rain. Fellow campers felt for me and brought over a large tarp. Yes, it rained while we listened to a fellow camper snore.

The second memorable was camping with two friends. We hadn’t heard that there were tornado warnings. They weren’t even that close at the time. Lots of rain and crazy weather. The tent leaked. The next night two of us got the last hotel room in a resort town. TG.
Click to expand...
Had a few sort of like that myself but make good stories to laugh about later. Thank You!
 
SM09989by.jpg

I can't name a most memorable trip because I have so many. Enjoying our planet Earth is a primary activity in this person's life that I greatly regularly enjoy. Regardless of how wealthy a person is in this modern era, they have no advantage over the rest of we average peons when it comes to being able to visit and enjoy inspiring, wonderful natural places. It is true, some regions have much more to offer than others. Our USA American West has an abundance of world class parks and lands with much simply requiring making personal time and minor effort to enjoy.

I have been camping and backpacking here in California all my adult life, though am more a backpacker than car camper. I just returned from a 3 person 6 day group trip 3 weeks ago. As a non-commercial landscape and nature photographer for 4+ decades, I do so in all types of California landscapes, though the Sierra Nevada mountains during summers is where I backpack most. I also enjoy fishing on trips if I have the time and am a student of natural sciences.

If anyone here would like advice, please ask.
 
David777 said:
View attachment 444415

I can't name a most memorable trip because I have so many. Enjoying our planet Earth is a primary activity in this person's life that I greatly regularly enjoy. Regardless of how wealthy a person is in this modern era, they have no advantage over the rest of we average peons when it comes to being able to visit and enjoy inspiring, wonderful natural places. It is true, some regions have much more to offer than others. Our USA American West has an abundance of world class parks and lands with much simply requiring making personal time and minor effort to enjoy.

I have been camping and backpacking here in California all my adult life, though am more a backpacker than car camper. I just returned from a 3 person 6 day group trip 3 weeks ago. As a non-commercial landscape and nature photographer for 4+ decades, I do so in all types of California landscapes, though the Sierra Nevada mountains during summers is where I backpack most. I also enjoy fishing on trips if I have the time and am a student of natural sciences.

If anyone here would like advice, please ask.
Click to expand...
You are a great resource for information on places to go and probably the difficulty level of the terrains. Thank you for letting us know David!
 
One I will never forget (for its memorably dreadful moments).....we went over to a Canadian provincial park for what was supposed to be a long weekend camping trip.

We left after work on Friday and when we got there, we realized that we had forgot the lantern, so we had to pitch the tent in the dark. It started raining.

The next morning, it stopped raining long enough to take a bike ride. I fell off the bike and bashed my knee and could hardly walk.

It started raining again. It rained all day and the tent leaked. It was hard to keep a fire going. Everything was damp or wet. And cold. And dark. I was so bummed out that I suggested we pack up and go home. My husband was in agreement, so we just jammed everything in the back of the station wagon haphazardly and took off for home.

About midnight, we hit the Windsor/Detroit border and crossed the bridge. Since everything was jammed into the back of the wagon, my daughter was asleep on top of a heap of stuff. The border agents opened the back doors to look inside, scared her and she started screaming, which scared them.

Then they made us take everything out of the station wagon either because they thought we were smuggling something in or just out of pure pissy-ness.

We hit home about 3 a.m. and just went inside and crawled into bed, wet and muddy.

Luckily, it didn't put us off camping. We did have some wonderful camping trips. This just wasn't one of them.
 
jujube said:
One I will never forget (for its memorably dreadful moments).....we went over to a Canadian provincial park for what was supposed to be a long weekend camping trip.

We left after work on Friday and when we got there, we realized that we had forgot the lantern, so we had to pitch the tent in the dark. It started raining.

The next morning, it stopped raining long enough to take a bike ride. I fell off the bike and bashed my knee and could hardly walk.

It started raining again. It rained all day and the tent leaked. It was hard to keep a fire going. Everything was damp or wet. And cold. And dark. I was so bummed out that I suggested we pack up and go home. My husband was in agreement, so we just jammed everything in the back of the station wagon haphazardly and took off for home.

About midnight, we hit the Windsor/Detroit border and crossed the bridge. Since everything was jammed into the back of the wagon, my daughter was asleep on top of a heap of stuff. The border agents opened the back doors to look inside, scared her and she started screaming, which scared them.

Then they made us take everything out of the station wagon either because they thought we were smuggling something in or just out of pure pissy-ness.

We hit home about 3 a.m. and just went inside and crawled into bed, wet and muddy.

Luckily, it didn't put us off camping. We did have some wonderful camping trips. This just wasn't one of them.
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That just wasn't meant to be fun at all for you. Glad to hear you've had many a lot more fun though. Hope you can laugh about it now ..hugs
 
IrishEyes said:
That just wasn't meant to be fun at all for you. Glad to hear you've had many a lot more fun though. Hope you can laugh about it now ..hugs
Click to expand...
Oh, yeah. We laughed about it....eventually. We always called it The Camping Trip to Hell. Anytime something would go wrong on a camping trip, one of us would say, "Well, it least this isn't The.Camping.Trip.to.Hell!"
 
Well, i remember one from waaay back, I was just a kidling, about 7 or 8
maybe, went on trip down to W. VA. to relatives, all the men got together
to go camping, fishing, ginsengin and such....I was so happy around
that group,,,,,,,in fact when dad was pulling car out to return to Indiana,
I opened the door and got out !!!!!!!!
 
hawkdon said:
Well, i remember one from waaay back, I was just a kidling, about 7 or 8
maybe, went on trip down to W. VA. to relatives, all the men got together
to go camping, fishing, ginsengin and such....I was so happy around
that group,,,,,,,in fact when dad was pulling car out to return to Indiana,
I opened the door and got out !!!!!!!!
Click to expand...
West Va has some pretty good sized mountains too if I remember right. Blue Ridge comes to mind for me
 
WheatenLover said:
The most fun place we camped was at Jellystone Park in Sturbridge, Mass. At various times, we took our pop-up trailer, or rented a cabin, or slept in a tent. For some reason it makes me angry to be in a tent when it is raining. I hate it!

With a Yogi Bear theme, kids loved it and were never bored. The place had tons of activities planned for kids. The adults had fun, too. My best friend came with the kids and me. Really, I could have spent weeks there, instead of going for a week just twice a summer. The other visitors were great, the owners were great, it was just great!

At night, everyone got together for dancing, trivia games, and other stuff. I liked the dancing the best. The kids probably liked the ice-cream because they were worn out.

One visit was especially memorable because son #3 came running to our trailer. "Mom, mom, there is a barking cat next door!"
The cat turned out to be a chihuahua. My kids had never seen any dogs except for large (ours) and medium sizes. Who knew dogs came in teeny-tiny? :)

When we got our rough collie, who weighed 100 lbs when he grew up, we started camping at Mohawk State Forest in the Berkshires, in Mass. That was fun too - hiking in the mountains, swimming in the river, making friends we saw every year, bear hunting, some scary encounters with bears at the cabin (over the years we became habituated to the bears -- they were already habituated to people).

We went to a pow-wow. I was so excited about that. The only Native Americans there ran the booths and danced their native dances. I thought that a lot of Native Americans would be there, and hardly anybody else. Very disappointing.
Click to expand...
I remember Jelly Stone!
We didn't camp over night but when the kids were small we visited Bear Lake in Utah. I would say day camping.Bear_Lake.jpg
 
In California, the closest one can get to a genuine High Sierra alpine experience by hiking minor distances with lakes is rather limited because few paved roads lead up to such elevations. All 3 of the below are along the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada because those landscapes rise up steeply from areas to the east, while the west side is gradual for dozens of miles.

In the Eastern Sierra above the Owens Valley are the following that don't require much hiking beyond road ends. There are other trailheads with nearly as high elevation road ends. However, one would still need to hike up significant climbs to reach lakes. All the below have nearby campgrounds listed within Inyo National Forest web pages. There is little public transportation between the modest communities in these areas and road trailheads. So using a vehicle, as is common throughout the American West, is usually one's only choice.

Onion Valley
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

Mosquito Flat
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

Saddlebag Lake
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

-------------------

Some links to car camping.

- Camping & Cabins

Visitor Maps and Guides

Inyo National Forest - Visitor Maps and Guides

The below link is to the Rock Creek area the above Mosquito Flat link is within:

https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/nfs/files/legacy-media/inyo/WM ROG Rock Creek Camping.pdf

This is a short 4 minute Youtube video of a family visit and their modest 7.2 miles roundtrip hike. One could just go one mile up just 200 feet to reach several small lakes.

 
David777 said:
In California, the closest one can get to a genuine High Sierra alpine experience by hiking minor distances with lakes is rather limited because few paved roads lead up to such elevations. All 3 of the below are along the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada because those landscapes rise up steeply from areas to the east, while the west side is gradual for dozens of miles.

In the Eastern Sierra above the Owens Valley are the following that don't require much hiking beyond road ends. There are other trailheads with nearly as high elevation road ends. However, one would still need to hike up significant climbs to reach lakes. All the below have nearby campgrounds listed within Inyo National Forest web pages. There is little public transportation between the modest communities in these areas and road trailheads. So using a vehicle, as is common throughout the American West, is usually one's only choice.

Onion Valley
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

Mosquito Flat
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

Saddlebag Lake
CalTopo - Backcountry Mapping Evolved

-------------------

Some links to car camping.

- Camping & Cabins

Visitor Maps and Guides

Inyo National Forest - Visitor Maps and Guides

The below link is to the Rock Creek area the above Mosquito Flat link is within:

https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/nfs/files/legacy-media/inyo/WM ROG Rock Creek Camping.pdf

This is a short 4 minute Youtube video of a family visit and their modest 7.2 miles roundtrip hike. One could just go one mile up just 200 feet to reach several small lakes.

Click to expand...
Being 12 at the time we went and in the back of a station wagon I can't say or remember where the lake was they fished at. I really wasn't watching roads the scenery was too gorgeous to watch a road. I do remember Grandpa using an ocean rod since he was up a steep incline and the lake a distance below to reach the water to fish.
 
Wasn't actually a camping trip. (we had plenty of those later on).
A year and a half after we married, I moved to Vermont with no place to live. There was me and the pregnant wife, and 5 dogs. We were living in my 55 chevy wagon, parked on a burned out school house lot. (still had a nice well for water). Stayed there for 3 months before I landed a job and was able to find a small house to buy.



55chevywagon.jpg
 
squatting dog said:
Wasn't actually a camping trip. (we had plenty of those later on).
A year and a half after we married, I moved to Vermont with no place to live. There was me and the pregnant wife, and 5 dogs. We were living in my 55 chevy wagon, parked on a burned out school house lot. (still had a nice well for water). Stayed there for 3 months before I landed a job and was able to find a small house to buy.



View attachment 444577
Click to expand...
I bet you became a better man because of that experience too! Hats off to you for sticking it through and getting past it.
 

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