Camping Lessons Learned: Your 2024 Call to Action

By Robert McGarvey

Just what have I learned after four camping trips in 2023, eight nights of sleeping on the ground in Bryce Canyon, Sedona, Lake Roosevelt AZ, and Verde Valley AZ?  

Keep in mind I am a camping newbie.  I never camped as a kid growing up in urban New Jersey and only once had I been persuaded by an editor to write a camping story and I literally packed it in and checked into a motel after one night.  That failed experiment was around 30 years ago.

Why did I decide to give camping a real go in 2023?

The underlying goal has simply been to break out of my comfort zone and to embrace nature.  There are lots of ways to break out of a comfort zone. For me camping was an obvious choice. After a lifetime of urban living I had chosen to shatter my beliefs about what I needed in my daily life.

The big plus: getting out into nature just is good for us.  There is testimony from so many, from Thoreau (“we can never have enough of nature”) to Frank Lloyd Wright (“Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you”).

Understand this: tent camping is not comfortable.  The ground one sleeps on is hard and in my case that is with a sleeping pad, an inflatable sleeping pad, and a sleeping bag good to 20 degrees.  My goal isn’t to create a comfortable night’s sleep, it’s to create a night’s sleep and this gear – plus a camp blanket – has given me enough comfort to get a restful sleep even when the night time temperature fell to around 26F as it recently did in Clear Creek campground in Verde Valley (and the forecast had called for temps in the mid thirties).  

After every trip I add something new.  Not to achieve comfort, just to get a little better at camping.

The last trip prompted me to accept that the inexpensive tent I had wasn’t what I needed and so I splurged on an Aurora Highrise Tent that is tall enough so that I can stand up in it – and unless you’ve done it you have no idea how awkward it is to change clothes sitting on a sleeping bag.

After a few miserable efforts to cook on a camp fire I bought a Coleman propane stove which makes it easier and quicker to make coffee in the morning, cook soup in the afternoon, and even crisp Spam for an evening meal.  No, I haven’t (yet) partaken of the freeze dried foods favored by dispersed campers but even that stuff needs a jolt of hot water to make it edible.  But neither have I taken up ambitious camp cookery, although I did buy a copy of a camping cookbook authored by long ago neighbors of mine.

Camp fires, by the way, are great – for ambience and morning warmth.  I’ve built one at every campsite but after it took me a half hour to get water boiling for coffee on my first camping trip, I opted for the faster propane route for food and coffee.

But there’s still more to buy – indeed I now have a bag packed with miscellaneous smalls that have proven to be necessities. Such as an axe (for firewood), a butane lighter (for lighting the fire), a mallet (for pounding tent stakes into the ground), aluminum cookware and aluminum plates and cups, a tent footprint (essentially an under floor that prolongs the life of a tent’s floor in the desert where sharp rocks and cactus needles are enemies), a tent lantern and also headlamps for finding the lavatory in the night.

I’ve also expanded my camping wardrobe to include a base layer which is gear to keep warm at night.  Mine now includes thermal underwear, heavy sweatpants, a thick Helly Hansen hooded sweatshirt, and a knit cap (heat escapes the body through the scalp, they say at campsites). There also are sandals to quickly put on.

Approximate cost of this gear: all in it’s around $2000.

But my 2024 camping plan already includes reserved stays in Organ Pipe National Monument, Joshua Tree, Sedona, and Chiricahua National Monument (which could soon become a national park).  I figure around 20 days in 2024. I’ll get my money’s worth…and I’ll do it in nature.

All the while attacking my comfort zone limitations. I do not urge you to camp. I do urge you to set a 2024 resolution to attack one of your cherished comfort zones. It may not feel good but it is good for you.