I’m within spitting distance of NYC and its immediate suburbs, and since COVID the state parks and all of the campgrounds have been packed to the gills. Good luck getting sites anything less than 6 months out, and even then it’s a challenge. It’s great that everyone gets to share in the great outdoors, but thoughtless Citidiots ruin it for everyone else. Multiple drownings by people who had no business trying to swim across a major river have resulted in no on being able to so much as dip a toe in the water. Ditto people playing loud music until 4 am, with enough wattage to light a stadium illuminating your campsite. You’re supposed to be experiencing nature and the great outdoors. If all you’re going to do is bring the trappings of urban life with you then stay the fuck home.
Yeah, I’m guilty of that, and will continue to do so. I’m old, and my days of sleeping on the ground are way past me. I will still enjoy the wilderness with my dog as I work remotely well away from my home office. I just want to do it well away from other people. This is one of my favourite places on the Northern shore of Lake Superior, at the end of September. No ragrets.
Yeah, I saw a random Tuesday available but not even many of those. I just want to tent camp with my kid for a couple days that my husband won't have to burn up any vacation for. I liked the vibe of my neighbor's camping experience. Just chilling, eating snacks and good food, dogs nearby, playing cards, playing in the lake when it got hot. My family stopped camping when I was young and most memories around it were stressful. Everybody pissy for one reason or another. Life's for the living, let's go! I got a nice pop-up 8 person tent on clearance and I'm going to find some blow-up mattresses to go with it. I'm not trying to prove how tough I am or anything, but I definitely want to get out there and make some memories with lil B.
There's probably more than a thousand campsites on this lake. It is definitely different since covid. We like to call the weekend visitors terrorists. It's so calm and quiet during the week. We've had several bad incidents this year. A drunk guy jumped off the dam, because his equally drunk friends dared him to, and drowned. Two people hit by boats, same weekend but separate incidents. A few drownings. You see how people act and wonder why it doesn't happen more. And, I get it, I used to be that guy. Drink my face off all day because camping is a little vacation. We went out on the pontoon Saturday evening and there was four dudes in their late twenties. They were absolutely hammered, blaring and singing along to a 90's country playlist. My wife said, "That used to be you and your friends." You could call the parks and check for cancelations. It's hit or miss, but since people book so far in advance, there's always quite a few that don't show up because something came up, in my experience. Also, our area has a Facebook group, where people will post sites they've booked, but aren't able to use because something came up. We've also gone camping, started on one site and then moved to another mid trip because that's the only availability for the entire time we wanted to camp.
The wilderness is, unfortunately, getting loved to death. It's really problematic and I don't know what the solution is. If you charge more to keep the numbers down, you exclude lower income families. The current system of "he who books furthest in advance, wins" is obnoxious. Lotteries have been implemented for some areas - which is at least somewhat equitable, but is, of course, very frustrating. One somewhat ironic aspect to this is that the true backcountry of most of these parks - that is, >3 miles off the campgrounds and roads - is basically empty. In Yellowstone, you can go from a bumper-to-bumper throng of traffic to seeing literally zero other humans by just walking a mile or two off the main roads. But it's really hard to get there, because you have to fight the masses to just get to the trailheads. Definitely recommend checking a couple times a day starting at around a week out and looking for last minute cancellations. If the campsites cost money and the site has online booking you probably don't even have to call anyone. We booked a campsite at a small wilderness campground that has <20 tent pads. We had to book it 4 months in advance, and all pads were gone within 5 minutes. But 5 days before we left we checked and there were 3-4 spots available. Lake camping is particularly competitive. You might be able to find some state parks or state forests that simply operate on first come, first served, and show up early.
We are lucky with the amount of lakes we have around here, Nett can certainly concur. But if you want to be nearly a lake, don’t buy “Lake Side”. Hell, as much as a 100 yard walk further towing your gear will save you so much. Less demand, less cash, the lake is still close. Our weekend trailer is near Lake Huron, as in a literal one-minute drive. But because our campground is not lake side— with direct water access, it costs almost four times as less with more lot space for us. I’ll take that.
More and more I'm hitting very remote and unserviced campgrounds, which is why I've updated my battery system... so I can be selfcontained with all my power needs while I glamp.
I've been trying to do the same hike for years. I've won the lottery twice, but the first time I had to cancel because of an imminent government shutdown (which ended up getting averted at the last minute, but not until after I canceled all my flight/lodging/etc reservations), and one I had to cancel because the date I won ended up coinciding with a cross-country move.
We applied for the lottery for The Wave a few times and didn't get it. We were driving through Utah two years ago and applied for a next-day permit on a whim even though it was like 6 hours out of the way. Boom, permit granted. We napped in the hotel for a few hours and then left in the middle of the night to drive up for the ticket pickup. Great hike, though.
On the spot permits often have good luck, because all the cancellations go into the on the spot pool. But if you have bad luck, then you've just wasted your trip, so a lot of people understandably don't want to rely on them.
T-30 mins for Starship Flight 10. One of the best streams to watch it on is: Everyday Astronaut https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04-mfJavLT0
It's not the most beautiful but I had to be quick... Here's my first peach cobbler from my peach tree!
It's half eaten because I'm a fat ass but I chose salted caramel ice cream as the accomplice to this bad boy.