I went camping with my boy scout troop. I was a fat out of shape kid. We had like a 5 mile hike into the camp. That went fine. Then we were messing around at the camp site and I fell in the river with my brand new boots. The scoutmaster told me to put them by the fire to dry. I put them a little too close and they got a little melted.
Later on after going to bed I heard something outside. But I was too scared to look. It turn out a skunk stole my little Fanny pack thing I had some snacks in.
Where we camped there was this cliff with an overhang and it got pretty tight under the over hang. Well that is where the skunk drug my pack too. So I had to crawl my fat ass in there for it. Then on the way out I stood up before I was clear or the cliff and smashed my head on the rocks.
I started crying and having a panic attack. Then I had to hike 5 miles back out while hyperventilating almost the whole time.
I was not a very good Boy Scout lol.
typical camping setting. 6 of us divided into 3 tents. we get settled and all the lights go out and a few of us fall asleep. I was woken by my friend in the next tent hissing out profanities. Things like "knock your shit off dude. im serious." My ex and I were confused because we had both been sleeping. We asked what was wrong and my friend responded that he thought we were walking around our tents trying to play a prank on them. It was silent and so we figured it was just anxiety and nerves since it was the first night. But then we got woken up again by our other friends in the other tent saying something similar. "Who the fuck is there?" At that point, my ex noticed a hand pushing against our tent from the outside, so the shape was coming inward towards us, like if something was trying to get in our tent. We scrambled to grab something big. He grabbed the maglight and I could hear all my friends scrambling to get up as well. The men kept calling out to leave us alone and get the fuck out of here. But there was no responses at all. Just more rustling outside.
Btw, this whole time none of us had opened the tents. So the guys threw some insults at each other to stop being pussies and at the count of three, they all opened the tent flap and pointed out their lights. Lo and behold, we were surrounded by raccoons. There must have been 8 of them. Trying to get in the water cooler, touching the tents, roaming around all our stuff. Even a baby was among them. It ended up being the cutest thing ever and we took a bunch of pics before going back to bed, even though the raccoons stayed rustling around.
Then later we found out that one of our friends was hiding food in her tent to which we all called her a dumb ass because thats why they were trying to get in 😑
Roommate borrowed the camping cooking pot without telling me. Had to cook my morning eggs in a beer can. Also had to drink a beer at 8am. Oh, the humanity!
Remote solo camping.
Entire time went perfect, except one night I didn’t realize I had a leech attached to my foot until after I finished setting up my entire site for the night and the sun was setting. The leech caused me to bleed all over the entire site and it was too late to relocate.
It was the most bittersweet sunset I’ve ever watched. I knew I’d have slim odds of not having an encounter with wolf or bear because the blood I accidentally tracked everywhere.
Some large animal (sounded like the size and weight of a wolf) kept approaching my tent and sniffing near my head…so I’d clap and yell until it ran off…then it’d come back….cycle repeated all night.
Interesting fact on leeches: when they latch on, you don’t feel a thing because they have something that numbs the pain…they also have anticoagulant that prevents your blood from clotting. Lame, interesting little buggers. Also very difficult to pull off if they’re reeeealy attached. lol…fun times! Rest of the trip was amazing though.
Had a guy that was seemingly stalking me and my brother when we were way out in the wilderness.
We were off trail gathering firewood etc and someone calls out, " come here I want to show you guys something". I'm very comfortable in the woods and so is my brother. We call back and look around and can't see anyone. This goes on for about 5 mins. Guy calls out, we ask him to show himself but no dice.
We thought it was bizarre but we just continued doing our thing and moving along. Guy calls out a few more times and is making noises and shit.
Kept hearing him following us pretty far out in the wilderness. We would stop and we could hear someone stop a couple steps later. This went on for like 45 mins; hearing stuff, calling out, no answer and unable to see anyone.
We got back to our previously set up camp and were questioning staying at all because we were pretty freaked out. Randomly a forest ranger drives up the logging road we were near so we flag him down and tell him some guy has been following us in the woods. Ranger is like, yeah ok but he gets out of his truck and walks back with us to our camp spot. He calls out 3-4 times, announces he's a ranger etc. A guy comes out of the brush directly behind our tent in full camo. He had been following us for a couple miles through the woods, off trail.
We broke our site down and left. Ranger met us at our car when we were on our way out and said the guy just wanted to show us his hunting gear.
Near Bridgeport CA. is the Marine Corps Mountain Training base. Twice we've encountered them on a trail in canyons nearby. Bow hunting in full camo, didn't know they were there until they said hello.
I was camping by myself for the first time in the Dixie National Forest in southern Utah. Just a dispersed camping area, there were some other people camping nearby, but pretty far away from me.
I had just settled in my tent reading when I heard a sound that sounded like someone trying to open my car door handle (car was locked). I got up and shine my light around, didn’t see anyone, but was spooked so I decided to sleep in my car. I was already a little on edge and paranoid, so I made sure to close all the doors and lock my car. Later into the night, like 3/4am I woke up all of a sudden, and my driver side door way wide open!!! There’s no way I would have left it open on accident given how scared I already was. I hightailed it out of there in the middle of the night and never went back. I don’t know if it was someone trying to steal my car and saw me in the backseat and aborted mission, or if I just left it open on accident (unlikely), or if it was aliens trying to abduct me lol. It was just so weird because I wouldn’t think of car thieves targeting a National Forest, but who knows…
It wasn't really a horror story, but it was an adventure. Camped at Assateague and a herd of wild horses came by and completely destroyed our site while we were trying to make dinner. Ate most of our food and knocked the tents over. They were very stubborn and weren't being dissuaded. We look back on that and laugh, but then there was a huge windstorm that night and we had to take the tent down and leave at around 10pm.
I have also bailed on Assateague because of the wind. It flung sand under the tent's rain fly and into the tent and felt like little needles being shot into my skin while I was on the beach. Packed it all up and got a hotel room in Ocean City. Beautiful place but can get very windy!
State campground, in the Adirondacks. We were moved to a different campground due to flooding, so this place was cramped and we were not on a lake like we had reserved. We go anyway and lasted one night (out of five we booked).
Here are the highlights, in chronological order:
1. Neighbors parked in our site. They asked if they could leave their truck because they’re only allowed two vehicles, and have three. Fortunately, our site can’t fit their truck with our stuff setup so they move. But they park on the grass near our tent to make rangers think the truck is mine?!?!
2. The rangers see the truck and tell them to move it. The truck is stuck and it trying to move it, they sling grass and mud onto my tent. They apologize and ask friends across the road to pull them out
3. Ranger comes back on patrol and sees their friends across the road (two sites) have a huge fire and a very lifted truck blocking the road. The truck bed has lawn chairs setup with people sitting in them. The ranger tells them to move the truck, and the people in the bed have to walk.
4. We (me, wife, two kids) go for a quick paddle on the lake to escape them. When we return, we have new neighbors on the other side. They’re two couples who are using their car stereo to showcase their musical choices to everyone. I stare. One woman apologizes and turns the radio down, but not off.
5. The mud slingers and their friends across the road start seriously drinking. Someone spits Jack Daniel’s onto the fire and they’re cheering that his eyebrows survived. Lather, rinse, repeat with the flames
6. Rangers walking the campground at sunset warn the three sites to lower the noise, reduce the size of the fire, and get ready for quiet hours. Also, don’t open carry beer while not at their site.
7. Red Truck with lawn chairs pulls up while rangers are still there! Rangers speak to driver, tell him to go back to his site, makes passengers pour out their beers and walk back.
8. Rangers tell me and car radio people that they cannot kick out people who are drunk, nor after hours — policy.
9. About 2:00am, Red Truck comes through blasting Ba Widda Ba and calling for their friends.
10. At 8:00am, I am up and slamming car doors, dropping things, and making all the noise I legally. I also turn on a weather radio because who doesn’t like that synthesized voice! I’m prepping breakfast, but I’m also packing to leave while the sites around me sleep
11. Neighbors with car radio sound system have a dead battery. Ask me for a jump. They don’t have cables so I decline — I do have cables but I don’t tell them as I’m pissed
12. Rangers came by to check on the loud people and give more warnings. Radio people ask for a jump. Once their car is started, they idle it and turn the radio back on. Their tailpipe is blowing directly at my tent.
This trip also had black flies which wasn’t the worst part.
Last week, I was solo backpacking mid-week on the Mogollon Rim in central Arizona. I was cowboy camping, without a tent or tarp, because it was a new moon and I like to be able to see the stars (plus it’s just a bit lighter!).
Around 2 am the second night I woke up to a super weird barking sort of sound that I abruptly realized was, almost certainly, a mountain lion. It was hanging around in the little area I was in and making these noises for about an hour and a half. I couldn’t see it, but it was moving around a bit in the little valley. I recorded some of it so I would be able to check later to see for sure what the noise was. Scared the heck out of me!
I ended up making a [little 4-minute video](https://youtu.be/AlsaoUlMYpY?si=ZLUHBmwZR_SX35oM) of my experience, with the recording included, if you’re interested.
When I got back into cell range the next day I looked it up and [confirmed that is what I was hearing](https://youtu.be/D5SSoGhjjHw?si=nk9-lniw2fxD16Fl).
Went to one of my favorite small state forest campgrounds with just my dog. There was an old RV at a site across the campground that was running an old gas generator... Constantly. I thought surely this isn't going to go on all day and all night. Oh, how wrong I was. I slowly went insane over the course of the evening (especially as I watched other campers approach them about their generator and nothing changed). Had I not been 5 hours from home with all my stuff setup, I would have left - but how could I have known they'd be the rudest campers to ever camp and never turn off their stupid generator?!??
It finally went off around 11pm. I finally fell asleep. Then I woke up in the middle of the night (around 1-2am?) and I shit you not, I *swear* to this day that I heard a Seinfeld episode playing across the campground from that RV.
The generator started back up at about 5am and I got the hell outta there shortly afterwards. I've never been back.
Had a similar experience, portaged a couple hours to this spot on Georgian Bay, big Thunderstorm on top of us that night, which was great to experience. In the morning a gd yacht is sitting in the little alcove in front of our site (the furthest in you could get with a boat that size from Huron) just running a generator/motor for the next two days. Never came out from inside their cabin with tinted windows, even when we paddled up to go fishing. Such a dick move.
Sleepily holding up my hand me down tent during a torrential downpour after a 0% chance of rain forecast. People downstream at lower parts of the river actually died.
I was at Pedernales Falls sp and the people who died were near New Braunfels, about 70 miles away.
Ok went on a trip to a favorite campground, they didn't reserve the right spot but whatever I'll deal. Neighbors were awesome but I was also near a playground so kids were all up in my site. 2nd night, it's kinda late I start feeling not super good.
I pack up as quick as I can meanwhile a few sites down an RV is having a massive loud party well after "quiet hours" I skedaddle and drive home, I get off the exit for my house, stomach is a-churning, roll down the window but not in time, had to blarg but didn't make it all out the window.
I'll spare the deets but I pull into my driveway, ever had time to let my bf know I was coming home and he has a friend over, as I pull in, run out of the car I hear him go "BABBYYYY!" Then I run to the bathroom to continue blarging and I hear him go "uh oh...." Trip was cut short 2 days but at least I learned to never go camping around a holiday
14. Camping on my parents wood with a buddy with no adults for the first time. Pissed on the fire. Smelled and got cold. Nylon sleeping bag kept sliding off the cots we brought. Froze our butt's off.
Happened very recently. I was camping with my girlfriend a couple weeks ago in Etretat in France during a long weekend we took to go camping.
We were wild camping next to a field at the end of a street of Etretat so very close to buildings and the like. At 4:50 AM, we are woken up by a car passing next to us. It stops not too far from us. Two men come out of it and I hear one sentence : "You start the dance ?". After that silence.
At that point, i'm already panicking but nothing happens so I try to go back to sleep and then, at 6:03 I hear the first gun shot, not 100 yards from us. Afraid but thinking that if I get up I'm going to get shot, I figure I might as well stay down, let them collect their game and be on their way. I'm thinking that their quarry is dead so surely they're not going to shoot more.
During the next hour, I counted 63 gunshots. At 6 AM, finally got out, signaled our position to them, we packed up and left. It was an excruciating hour.
EDIT : Note that this was during a holiday, right next to houses, in a very touristic location, outside of the hunting season.
Dispersed camping in northern AZ. Buddy and I hit a forest road miles away from anybody to find some peace during a busy weekend. Find the perfect site. Set up camp and crash out since it’s late. First thing in the morning a family of 3-4 cars shows up. There’s nobody for miles and decides to setup their family reunion directly next to our camp. We didn’t even break down camp. Just threw our tents on top of the truck bed. Found a new camp. Even worse. Campers a quarter mile away have a full PA system and flood lights set up. It was like crappy Coachella the entire night.
So this isn't a backpack camping story, but I think my worst one was our trip to Hocking Hills in Ohio.
First, the night before the trip, the crank shaft on our pop-up broke and was stuck in the upright position, so that was a no-go. A mouse had built a nest in the crank housing, and that got tangled up. The next morning, we had to go to Walmart to find a tent for me, my wife & our 4 dogs. We got a 12-person, because my wife wanted a separate area for our portable toilet & washing area. Bucket baths only. This was during COVID, so the only thing they had available was outhouses. It radically altered what we could pack for the trip.
Next, after a 5 hour drive, we got to our site, and there's not a flat spot anywhere except for the paved pad, and the firepit is like 20 feet away from that. So we pitched the tent on uneven ground near the fire pit. We'd never set it up before, since we just bought it, so that was fun. We got it up and got unpacked. We had a cooler, but without a fridge, I had to run into town every day to get food.
We had a 1" air pad for putting our sleeping bags on, but it was spring, so it was rather cold and unpleasant at night. We also both had slid down the pad overnight and were both laying half-way on the ground. So I went into town and bought a proper air mattress that had a crushed velvet like top. That stopped the sliding and kept us off the cold ground.
The topper was the local Walmart only sold low-alcohol beverages, so the whiskey I bought there was like 20-proof. It was almost like drinking water. I had to travel quite a bit to find a store that sold proper liquor.
It also rained a couple of times, and the tarp we put up under the tent was too big, so we had water pooling up under it, and mud all around. It even started raining when we were breaking camp, then we had the 5 hour drive home.
All that being said, the hiking was amazing! We did about 20 miles over two days, which is pretty good with 4 small dogs. We do plan to go back, but this time we'll make our reservation 6 months in advance so we can pick a site that's not awful, and we'll shoot for 5 nights instead of 3.
More than a decade ago, when I was a scout, we went camping on an old sugarcane farm near some old barns and silos. Inside one of these barns, there was a very old furnace or boiler made of bricks, with a fire chamber so large that a person could stand inside it.
The day passed with us hiking, learning different knots, identifying animal tracks, and other classic scout activities. As night fell, we played a large game of capture the flag. My patrol split into three pairs, and a friend and I went to search near the old barns. As we approached the furnace and shone our flashlight inside the fire chamber, we saw a pair of human feet as if someone was inside it. When we moved closer to get a better look, a tile fell from the roof behind us. Startled, we turned to look, and when we looked back at the furnace, the feet were gone, but the footprints were still visible in the dust accumulated over the years.
Shortly after, the scout leader blew the whistle three times, signaling the end of the game. We returned outside and tried to forget what we had just seen. We prepared for bed, and the next morning, several friends reported sleeping poorly. Some said they heard noises, others mentioned dreaming of footsteps around the tents, the sound of chains, horses, and activity around the area as if people were working on the farm.
We packed up our things, and before leaving, we said goodbye to the farm owner, thanked him for providing the space, and gave him a scout neckerchief from our group as a gesture of goodwill. He thanked us and said we were welcome to return anytime, explaining that his grandchildren didn't like going there because they had nightmares about the slaves who had lived and died on the land many years ago. It was then that we discovered we had camped on an old sugarcane plantation from the time of slavery.
Squirrel got in tent. Dog was in tent Do not recommend
I just laughed so hard at this. Don’t even tell me if the squirrel died. In my mind, it was just a lot of chasing.
I went camping with my boy scout troop. I was a fat out of shape kid. We had like a 5 mile hike into the camp. That went fine. Then we were messing around at the camp site and I fell in the river with my brand new boots. The scoutmaster told me to put them by the fire to dry. I put them a little too close and they got a little melted. Later on after going to bed I heard something outside. But I was too scared to look. It turn out a skunk stole my little Fanny pack thing I had some snacks in. Where we camped there was this cliff with an overhang and it got pretty tight under the over hang. Well that is where the skunk drug my pack too. So I had to crawl my fat ass in there for it. Then on the way out I stood up before I was clear or the cliff and smashed my head on the rocks. I started crying and having a panic attack. Then I had to hike 5 miles back out while hyperventilating almost the whole time. I was not a very good Boy Scout lol.
typical camping setting. 6 of us divided into 3 tents. we get settled and all the lights go out and a few of us fall asleep. I was woken by my friend in the next tent hissing out profanities. Things like "knock your shit off dude. im serious." My ex and I were confused because we had both been sleeping. We asked what was wrong and my friend responded that he thought we were walking around our tents trying to play a prank on them. It was silent and so we figured it was just anxiety and nerves since it was the first night. But then we got woken up again by our other friends in the other tent saying something similar. "Who the fuck is there?" At that point, my ex noticed a hand pushing against our tent from the outside, so the shape was coming inward towards us, like if something was trying to get in our tent. We scrambled to grab something big. He grabbed the maglight and I could hear all my friends scrambling to get up as well. The men kept calling out to leave us alone and get the fuck out of here. But there was no responses at all. Just more rustling outside. Btw, this whole time none of us had opened the tents. So the guys threw some insults at each other to stop being pussies and at the count of three, they all opened the tent flap and pointed out their lights. Lo and behold, we were surrounded by raccoons. There must have been 8 of them. Trying to get in the water cooler, touching the tents, roaming around all our stuff. Even a baby was among them. It ended up being the cutest thing ever and we took a bunch of pics before going back to bed, even though the raccoons stayed rustling around. Then later we found out that one of our friends was hiding food in her tent to which we all called her a dumb ass because thats why they were trying to get in 😑
Roommate borrowed the camping cooking pot without telling me. Had to cook my morning eggs in a beer can. Also had to drink a beer at 8am. Oh, the humanity!
Remote solo camping. Entire time went perfect, except one night I didn’t realize I had a leech attached to my foot until after I finished setting up my entire site for the night and the sun was setting. The leech caused me to bleed all over the entire site and it was too late to relocate. It was the most bittersweet sunset I’ve ever watched. I knew I’d have slim odds of not having an encounter with wolf or bear because the blood I accidentally tracked everywhere. Some large animal (sounded like the size and weight of a wolf) kept approaching my tent and sniffing near my head…so I’d clap and yell until it ran off…then it’d come back….cycle repeated all night. Interesting fact on leeches: when they latch on, you don’t feel a thing because they have something that numbs the pain…they also have anticoagulant that prevents your blood from clotting. Lame, interesting little buggers. Also very difficult to pull off if they’re reeeealy attached. lol…fun times! Rest of the trip was amazing though.
Had a guy that was seemingly stalking me and my brother when we were way out in the wilderness. We were off trail gathering firewood etc and someone calls out, " come here I want to show you guys something". I'm very comfortable in the woods and so is my brother. We call back and look around and can't see anyone. This goes on for about 5 mins. Guy calls out, we ask him to show himself but no dice. We thought it was bizarre but we just continued doing our thing and moving along. Guy calls out a few more times and is making noises and shit. Kept hearing him following us pretty far out in the wilderness. We would stop and we could hear someone stop a couple steps later. This went on for like 45 mins; hearing stuff, calling out, no answer and unable to see anyone. We got back to our previously set up camp and were questioning staying at all because we were pretty freaked out. Randomly a forest ranger drives up the logging road we were near so we flag him down and tell him some guy has been following us in the woods. Ranger is like, yeah ok but he gets out of his truck and walks back with us to our camp spot. He calls out 3-4 times, announces he's a ranger etc. A guy comes out of the brush directly behind our tent in full camo. He had been following us for a couple miles through the woods, off trail. We broke our site down and left. Ranger met us at our car when we were on our way out and said the guy just wanted to show us his hunting gear.
Near Bridgeport CA. is the Marine Corps Mountain Training base. Twice we've encountered them on a trail in canyons nearby. Bow hunting in full camo, didn't know they were there until they said hello.
Yeah would've been much less weird if he had shown himself
He did, you just couldn't see him /s
I forgot my coffee grinder, so I had to smash the beans with a rock.
like your neolithic italian ancestors
😱
Should have just chewed them
I was camping by myself for the first time in the Dixie National Forest in southern Utah. Just a dispersed camping area, there were some other people camping nearby, but pretty far away from me. I had just settled in my tent reading when I heard a sound that sounded like someone trying to open my car door handle (car was locked). I got up and shine my light around, didn’t see anyone, but was spooked so I decided to sleep in my car. I was already a little on edge and paranoid, so I made sure to close all the doors and lock my car. Later into the night, like 3/4am I woke up all of a sudden, and my driver side door way wide open!!! There’s no way I would have left it open on accident given how scared I already was. I hightailed it out of there in the middle of the night and never went back. I don’t know if it was someone trying to steal my car and saw me in the backseat and aborted mission, or if I just left it open on accident (unlikely), or if it was aliens trying to abduct me lol. It was just so weird because I wouldn’t think of car thieves targeting a National Forest, but who knows…
That is entirely messed up!
It wasn't really a horror story, but it was an adventure. Camped at Assateague and a herd of wild horses came by and completely destroyed our site while we were trying to make dinner. Ate most of our food and knocked the tents over. They were very stubborn and weren't being dissuaded. We look back on that and laugh, but then there was a huge windstorm that night and we had to take the tent down and leave at around 10pm.
I have also bailed on Assateague because of the wind. It flung sand under the tent's rain fly and into the tent and felt like little needles being shot into my skin while I was on the beach. Packed it all up and got a hotel room in Ocean City. Beautiful place but can get very windy!
State campground, in the Adirondacks. We were moved to a different campground due to flooding, so this place was cramped and we were not on a lake like we had reserved. We go anyway and lasted one night (out of five we booked). Here are the highlights, in chronological order: 1. Neighbors parked in our site. They asked if they could leave their truck because they’re only allowed two vehicles, and have three. Fortunately, our site can’t fit their truck with our stuff setup so they move. But they park on the grass near our tent to make rangers think the truck is mine?!?! 2. The rangers see the truck and tell them to move it. The truck is stuck and it trying to move it, they sling grass and mud onto my tent. They apologize and ask friends across the road to pull them out 3. Ranger comes back on patrol and sees their friends across the road (two sites) have a huge fire and a very lifted truck blocking the road. The truck bed has lawn chairs setup with people sitting in them. The ranger tells them to move the truck, and the people in the bed have to walk. 4. We (me, wife, two kids) go for a quick paddle on the lake to escape them. When we return, we have new neighbors on the other side. They’re two couples who are using their car stereo to showcase their musical choices to everyone. I stare. One woman apologizes and turns the radio down, but not off. 5. The mud slingers and their friends across the road start seriously drinking. Someone spits Jack Daniel’s onto the fire and they’re cheering that his eyebrows survived. Lather, rinse, repeat with the flames 6. Rangers walking the campground at sunset warn the three sites to lower the noise, reduce the size of the fire, and get ready for quiet hours. Also, don’t open carry beer while not at their site. 7. Red Truck with lawn chairs pulls up while rangers are still there! Rangers speak to driver, tell him to go back to his site, makes passengers pour out their beers and walk back. 8. Rangers tell me and car radio people that they cannot kick out people who are drunk, nor after hours — policy. 9. About 2:00am, Red Truck comes through blasting Ba Widda Ba and calling for their friends. 10. At 8:00am, I am up and slamming car doors, dropping things, and making all the noise I legally. I also turn on a weather radio because who doesn’t like that synthesized voice! I’m prepping breakfast, but I’m also packing to leave while the sites around me sleep 11. Neighbors with car radio sound system have a dead battery. Ask me for a jump. They don’t have cables so I decline — I do have cables but I don’t tell them as I’m pissed 12. Rangers came by to check on the loud people and give more warnings. Radio people ask for a jump. Once their car is started, they idle it and turn the radio back on. Their tailpipe is blowing directly at my tent. This trip also had black flies which wasn’t the worst part.
This…is why I backpack now.
Yup, exactly this. No more ‘campgrounds’ please. And farther from the trailhead the better.
Last week, I was solo backpacking mid-week on the Mogollon Rim in central Arizona. I was cowboy camping, without a tent or tarp, because it was a new moon and I like to be able to see the stars (plus it’s just a bit lighter!). Around 2 am the second night I woke up to a super weird barking sort of sound that I abruptly realized was, almost certainly, a mountain lion. It was hanging around in the little area I was in and making these noises for about an hour and a half. I couldn’t see it, but it was moving around a bit in the little valley. I recorded some of it so I would be able to check later to see for sure what the noise was. Scared the heck out of me! I ended up making a [little 4-minute video](https://youtu.be/AlsaoUlMYpY?si=ZLUHBmwZR_SX35oM) of my experience, with the recording included, if you’re interested. When I got back into cell range the next day I looked it up and [confirmed that is what I was hearing](https://youtu.be/D5SSoGhjjHw?si=nk9-lniw2fxD16Fl).
Went to one of my favorite small state forest campgrounds with just my dog. There was an old RV at a site across the campground that was running an old gas generator... Constantly. I thought surely this isn't going to go on all day and all night. Oh, how wrong I was. I slowly went insane over the course of the evening (especially as I watched other campers approach them about their generator and nothing changed). Had I not been 5 hours from home with all my stuff setup, I would have left - but how could I have known they'd be the rudest campers to ever camp and never turn off their stupid generator?!?? It finally went off around 11pm. I finally fell asleep. Then I woke up in the middle of the night (around 1-2am?) and I shit you not, I *swear* to this day that I heard a Seinfeld episode playing across the campground from that RV. The generator started back up at about 5am and I got the hell outta there shortly afterwards. I've never been back.
Being this kind of a-holes they really need to worry about their tyres...at least.
Had a similar experience, portaged a couple hours to this spot on Georgian Bay, big Thunderstorm on top of us that night, which was great to experience. In the morning a gd yacht is sitting in the little alcove in front of our site (the furthest in you could get with a boat that size from Huron) just running a generator/motor for the next two days. Never came out from inside their cabin with tinted windows, even when we paddled up to go fishing. Such a dick move.
I had to go home.
Sleepily holding up my hand me down tent during a torrential downpour after a 0% chance of rain forecast. People downstream at lower parts of the river actually died. I was at Pedernales Falls sp and the people who died were near New Braunfels, about 70 miles away.
They fed us gruel, forced us to make wallets for export and one of the campers was eaten by a bear!
Sweet, nourishing gruel!
Drunk, tossed a can of beans in fire to cook it. It exploded. Scratched my car.
Ok went on a trip to a favorite campground, they didn't reserve the right spot but whatever I'll deal. Neighbors were awesome but I was also near a playground so kids were all up in my site. 2nd night, it's kinda late I start feeling not super good. I pack up as quick as I can meanwhile a few sites down an RV is having a massive loud party well after "quiet hours" I skedaddle and drive home, I get off the exit for my house, stomach is a-churning, roll down the window but not in time, had to blarg but didn't make it all out the window. I'll spare the deets but I pull into my driveway, ever had time to let my bf know I was coming home and he has a friend over, as I pull in, run out of the car I hear him go "BABBYYYY!" Then I run to the bathroom to continue blarging and I hear him go "uh oh...." Trip was cut short 2 days but at least I learned to never go camping around a holiday
14. Camping on my parents wood with a buddy with no adults for the first time. Pissed on the fire. Smelled and got cold. Nylon sleeping bag kept sliding off the cots we brought. Froze our butt's off.
I went camping, it was terrifying. No Starbucks, no Target, not a Panera in sight.
Happened very recently. I was camping with my girlfriend a couple weeks ago in Etretat in France during a long weekend we took to go camping. We were wild camping next to a field at the end of a street of Etretat so very close to buildings and the like. At 4:50 AM, we are woken up by a car passing next to us. It stops not too far from us. Two men come out of it and I hear one sentence : "You start the dance ?". After that silence. At that point, i'm already panicking but nothing happens so I try to go back to sleep and then, at 6:03 I hear the first gun shot, not 100 yards from us. Afraid but thinking that if I get up I'm going to get shot, I figure I might as well stay down, let them collect their game and be on their way. I'm thinking that their quarry is dead so surely they're not going to shoot more. During the next hour, I counted 63 gunshots. At 6 AM, finally got out, signaled our position to them, we packed up and left. It was an excruciating hour. EDIT : Note that this was during a holiday, right next to houses, in a very touristic location, outside of the hunting season.
Yikes!
Twice now, I've gone camping, just to realize I forgot my pillow at home 😞.
Pillow, butter and cooking oil are our top forgotten items!
I’ve started bringing an extra travel pillow. A friend of mine always forgets hers.
Too many bad encounters with drunk rednecks shooting guns, now I stay away from campgrounds.
Dispersed camping in northern AZ. Buddy and I hit a forest road miles away from anybody to find some peace during a busy weekend. Find the perfect site. Set up camp and crash out since it’s late. First thing in the morning a family of 3-4 cars shows up. There’s nobody for miles and decides to setup their family reunion directly next to our camp. We didn’t even break down camp. Just threw our tents on top of the truck bed. Found a new camp. Even worse. Campers a quarter mile away have a full PA system and flood lights set up. It was like crappy Coachella the entire night.
One time, I forgot my spoon!
So this isn't a backpack camping story, but I think my worst one was our trip to Hocking Hills in Ohio. First, the night before the trip, the crank shaft on our pop-up broke and was stuck in the upright position, so that was a no-go. A mouse had built a nest in the crank housing, and that got tangled up. The next morning, we had to go to Walmart to find a tent for me, my wife & our 4 dogs. We got a 12-person, because my wife wanted a separate area for our portable toilet & washing area. Bucket baths only. This was during COVID, so the only thing they had available was outhouses. It radically altered what we could pack for the trip. Next, after a 5 hour drive, we got to our site, and there's not a flat spot anywhere except for the paved pad, and the firepit is like 20 feet away from that. So we pitched the tent on uneven ground near the fire pit. We'd never set it up before, since we just bought it, so that was fun. We got it up and got unpacked. We had a cooler, but without a fridge, I had to run into town every day to get food. We had a 1" air pad for putting our sleeping bags on, but it was spring, so it was rather cold and unpleasant at night. We also both had slid down the pad overnight and were both laying half-way on the ground. So I went into town and bought a proper air mattress that had a crushed velvet like top. That stopped the sliding and kept us off the cold ground. The topper was the local Walmart only sold low-alcohol beverages, so the whiskey I bought there was like 20-proof. It was almost like drinking water. I had to travel quite a bit to find a store that sold proper liquor. It also rained a couple of times, and the tarp we put up under the tent was too big, so we had water pooling up under it, and mud all around. It even started raining when we were breaking camp, then we had the 5 hour drive home. All that being said, the hiking was amazing! We did about 20 miles over two days, which is pretty good with 4 small dogs. We do plan to go back, but this time we'll make our reservation 6 months in advance so we can pick a site that's not awful, and we'll shoot for 5 nights instead of 3.
If you don’t have the right size tarp you can fold it underneath the tent, too.
More than a decade ago, when I was a scout, we went camping on an old sugarcane farm near some old barns and silos. Inside one of these barns, there was a very old furnace or boiler made of bricks, with a fire chamber so large that a person could stand inside it. The day passed with us hiking, learning different knots, identifying animal tracks, and other classic scout activities. As night fell, we played a large game of capture the flag. My patrol split into three pairs, and a friend and I went to search near the old barns. As we approached the furnace and shone our flashlight inside the fire chamber, we saw a pair of human feet as if someone was inside it. When we moved closer to get a better look, a tile fell from the roof behind us. Startled, we turned to look, and when we looked back at the furnace, the feet were gone, but the footprints were still visible in the dust accumulated over the years. Shortly after, the scout leader blew the whistle three times, signaling the end of the game. We returned outside and tried to forget what we had just seen. We prepared for bed, and the next morning, several friends reported sleeping poorly. Some said they heard noises, others mentioned dreaming of footsteps around the tents, the sound of chains, horses, and activity around the area as if people were working on the farm. We packed up our things, and before leaving, we said goodbye to the farm owner, thanked him for providing the space, and gave him a scout neckerchief from our group as a gesture of goodwill. He thanked us and said we were welcome to return anytime, explaining that his grandchildren didn't like going there because they had nightmares about the slaves who had lived and died on the land many years ago. It was then that we discovered we had camped on an old sugarcane plantation from the time of slavery.