The car camper's alternative
This article offers suggestions on how to camp in bad weather. But why would you want to? Hiking in the rain stinks. So do hunting, fishing, and birding. So if you're on a trip and it rains, stay at a motel. If the weather's bad the motels will have enough cancellations they'll be glad to see you. With what you're saving by not buying a RV you can stay at a luxury resort. But if you're cheap like me there are still towns where you can find motels for less than $40: look for older motels on the main business routes into town.
What we're aiming for is camping comfortably and conveniently. Tent camping can be as comfortable and convenient as camping in a pop-up camper or a tent trailer. That means putting some hard-earned money into camping gear. Still, it's a lot less than you'd put into any kind of RV and you don't have to buy everything at once. Start with the basics for fine-weather camping and add gear as you need it. But we're dealing here with foul-weather camping.
The Upside
Things being equal, the big advantage of car camping is versatility. You can go anywhere your car can. There are some public campgrounds even van conversions can't get to. For that matter, there are some you need four-wheel-drive to access, but that's getting away from the concept of car camping.But things aren't equal. Car camping frees you from putting up capital that can be used more beneficially elsewhere. You also avoid steady outflows for storage, insurance, maintenance, and licensing. And your fuel mileage will certainly be better.
Tent
Let's start with the tent. If you're determined to camp in winter storms you'll
be looking at 4-season tents that can hold up in gale winds and keep you dry
Here's a cool trick to make setting up easier. First assemble the poles and get them positioned on the stubs at the corners of the tent. Pull them up together and tie them at the intersection with string or, if you have it, a rubber strip. Then the poles will be self-supporting and you can hook the tent hooks on painlessly.Manufacturers size tents unrealistically. A three-person tent allows three small persons to fit shoulder-to-shoulder if they don't put anything else inside. Go by the dimensions instead. You'll want the length to be two feet bigger than your tallest person. The width should be 2-1/2 feet per person plus three feet or more.
You'll want to put a ground cloth under the tent to protect the floor. Since you may have to put up the tent on wet ground, something impermeable like a shower curtain is a good choice. The ground cloth should be considerably smaller than the tent, leaving a foot or so around each side; otherwise rain will dribble down the tent and find its way to the ground cloth, leaving you with a puddle inside your tent. It doesn't hurt to leave some of the tent floor exposed to the ground because you won't be putting much weight on the perimeter of the tent anyway. Consider punching some holes in the ground cloth: it'll still keep the tent floor dry and will also keep puddles from forming.
Cooking
Cooking in the rain is a bigger problem. We have to assume here that restaurants aren't an option. As you'd expect, different situations call for different approaches.
At one end of the spectrum is the single camper with a hatch-back car who can rig up a tarp and cook and eat at the back of the car. Some people depend on finding picnic tables and inventively rig plastic tarps over them with poles, ropes, and stakes. Other campers prefer to get folding tables and chairs and canopies. Going further, you can buy walls for your canopy for wind protection (bear in mind that most of the time rain will blow in from the side) and even insect screening. All of this means more stuff to carry in your car but it's still better than cooking and eating in the rain and less trouble than towing a trailer.With tents and canopies comes this important precaution: don't put them away wet. It's okay to travel with them wet for a day, but dry them out as soon as you can. When you get home let them air completely because there likely will be some residual moisture on them. The same holds for your sleeping bags.
A quick web search will locate any number of people who have focused on camp cooking and they have posted many suggestions so I won't offer a lot of them here. But I'm a big believer in pressure cookers. Using canned food and instant brown rice, I can make a hot, delicious meal without watching and stirring in under a half-hour. Load the pot and bring it up to temperature and hold it at the steaming level for maybe six minutes at sea level to eight minutes at 5000 or so feet of elevation. Turn off the heat and let the pot cool naturally until it de-pressurizes. Don't like canned food? Think about using the cooker to can your own food at home. About breakfast: even if you don't like oatmeal, it's easy and quick to prepare and with enough granola and trail mix it provides a healthy, good-tasting, hot breakfast.Don't forget about washing dishes. Think about bringing a couple of plastic dishpans and a dishrack that fits inside them, plus detergent and a sponge.
Stoves
What kind of stove? There are people who would never give up their Coleman gasoline stoves. Other people recoil at the thought: gasoline stoves are heavy, smelly, and dangerous. Propane is their clear preference. You'll have to decide for yourself: gasoline (heavy, smelly, and dangerous) or propane (lightweight, only smells when there's a leak, and safer). Either way, make sure you have a good windscreen.Lanterns
With gasoline or propane lanterns you can just annoy your campground neighbors to no end. Light up the campground like a night baseball game. And open up your car's doors and turn up the radio as loud as it will go. Alternatively, you can use LED lanterns and headlamps to provide the lighting you need and save yourself the trouble of dealing with lantern fuel. While you're at it, listen to your radio/mp3 player through ear plugs.Sleeping bags
Since you don't have to carry them on your back, consider having two sleeping bags. A mummy bag is a good choice for one of them because there will be nights when you'll be glad to have that extra warmth. The other one can be an inexpensive regular sleeping bag for nights that aren't especially cold and for very cold nights when you'll want to put the mummy bag inside the regular one. Sleeping bags have to be cleaned professionally from time to time. You can extend the time between cleanings almost indefinitely by bathing (more on that below) before turning in and putting on clean socks and cotton sweat clothes. The cotton sweats also allow for modesty if your evening repose is interrupted.Sleeping Mattress
There are several options, one of which is distinctly better. Air mattresses are wonderfully comfortable. Sadly, every air mattress ever made eventually developed a pinhole leak so it lost its usefulness during the night. Repairing it just buys time until the next leak. The self-inflating mattresses aren't any better, plus they aren't nearly as comfortable. Foam-rubber pads are too thin to be comfortable, although for backpackers they're generally the best choice.
Heater
Unless you only camp when the nights are warm, a tent heater makes tent camping a luxury instead of a penance. You'll use it when you bathe (more on that below) and you'll use it when you get up in the morning so you don't have to dress in the freezing cold. Some people run theirs all night when they're sleeping in freezing temperatures but using an extra sleeping bag is just as good. Even though it's much more expensive and bulky, consider getting a heater with a fan so you're heating the air in the tent and not just radiating heat at one side of yourself. The instructions that come with them aren't very good. To light it, turn the gas on to full and hold the knob against the spring pressure, wait five or so seconds, and light it with the piezoelectric gadget or a butane lighter. When it lights a ball of flame will project forward, so make sure there's nothing flammable in the way. Keep lighting it every couple of seconds until you stop getting a flame. Then the catalyst will be glowing red all over and you'll be getting the most efficiency from it.Bathing
This is where civilized camping comes into its own. You can clean your body enough that you can mingle with other people and don't have to stand downwind. The product you're looking for is called No-Rinse Body Bath, which can be bought online. You mix up a dilute solution per the instructions in a squeeze bottle something like a pint in size. You can warm the solution either by soaking the bottle in hot water or, if you're driving, suspend it in a bag of some sort you can hang up inside the engine compartment. When you're ready to bathe, lay down a piece of plastic, maybe a piece of shower curtain, on the tent floor. Over that lay a bath towel to catch water drops. Have another small towel ready to use. You may wish to sit on a piece of newspaper for reasons that will be clear when you do this. Once you're undressed and have heated the tent as necessary, just rub some solution |
| Solar Shower |
Note that if you are really dirty from, for example, hiking on dusty trails, you should rinse off outside when you get back to camp because it will take an inordinately large amount of solution to clean off the dirt. Then put on long pants and a long-sleeved shirt to hold off mosquitoes. Also, note that if there are two of you you'll want to take turns in the tent because you'll need plenty of room to bathe. There's nothing sexy about it.
For some people, a better option is a solar shower. The idea is to set up a plastic water container where it can soak up sun to warm up. To use it hang it over your head and use the little nozzle-ended tube to shower. For about $70 you can buy a container and a tent-like shelter that provides privacy. The requirements are that you have a secure place to hang up the container during the day and that you'll be able to use it before the outside temperature drops.
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| Alternate Solar Shower |
An alternative is free and works better. Find a dark-colored gallon jug and drill a dozen or so 1/16-inch holes in the cap. It's easier to use because you don't have to fumble with the valve on the nozzle: just hold it upside down over whatever body part you want to wet or rinse. The chance someone will steal it is almost nil.
In either case, if you can't warm it in the sun you always can heat water on your stove.
Customize
Everybody's different. And what's important to them is also different. For example, one unusually-civilized camper carries two stemware wine glasses with her and has done so for twenty-five years. She also made herself a kitchen box to hold all her accoutrements so she doesn't have to rummage around in boxes to put a meal together. Is that right for you? Maybe.There are millions of people who believe they're not camping if they don't build a fire. Then there are others who prefer not to fuss with firewood and coat themselves with creosote. There are ascetic types who disdain any concessions to comfort. And there are other people who bring their pillows from home.
Do a web search and you'll find many websites offering "camping tips." Most of them are solutions in search of problems (really, how many emergency lanterns does a person need?). And many others are too obvious to deserve publication ("Choose a sleeping bag that has a lower temperature rating for winter camping trips.") Still, if you're bored, you can spend a few minutes browsing and might find something useful to you. The point is, you're different from every other camper and you'll be making decisions based on what's important to you and how you camp. Start simple and make adjustments based on your own experience.
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| Sleep in your car in style |
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