Camping is a great recreational activity enjoyed by many and is described in different ways depending on your personal choice.
A campsite could be out in a forest alongside a river or creek. You can wake up to the sound of the birds singing, a beautiful sunrise, go for early fish, go for a nature walk, relax with a good book, watch the sunset, sit around the campfire and watch the stars shining, go to bed exhausted.
Holiday parks are great if you like the convenience of all the amenities, they usually have a pool, a camp kitchen, groceries & fuel, kids play area sometimes they will have mini golf, tennis court etc.
The variety of ways to go camping is endless here is a few ideas.
- Some like to go hiking and survive with what they have in their backpack.
- Touring on bicycles, motorcycles sometimes in remote areas traveling long distances each day.
- Canoeing or boating down a river carrying your belongings in the canoe/boat and camping overnight alongside the river.
- The most popular would traveling in your own car, anything from ‘roughing it' with basic tent and equipment in the forest etc. up to the large 3 or 4 room tents with all the camping gadgets available on a powered site in a holiday park.
- Camping trailers, caravans and RV/motor homes are other alternatives to the tent if you find the tenting part of camping does not appeal, the range of options is enormous, this usually is decided by how much you want to pay and what suits your style of camping and traveling.
Camping is all a matter of choice as to where and what suits your family, if you can, try a few different places and styles of camping. If this is your first camping trip, ask experienced campers for advice or even better go with experienced campers.
How long you stay usually depends on many days or weeks you have available. My family has been camping and traveling in Australia for many years now. We have done the 2-3 day trips, others have been for a week, and we stayed in the same place these trips.
Longer trips of 2-3 weeks we traveled further from home and usually moved at 2 or 3 times, this depends on the location and how far the traveling is between destinations.
Our best ever trips were for 6 weeks both times we traveled about 10,000kms (6500 miles) We stayed a about 20 places, sometimes we stopped overnight other times it was for 2-3 nights.
When we return we are always looking forward to the next trip in our great outdoors.
Which ever way you go camping you can be sure you will take home some great memories, be sure to take photos of your campsite, the scenic locations, and the big fish you caught, the campfire, the kids doing activities, the sunset and sunrise, anything you like.
In this guide I am including information about the equipment required, setting up and packing up, camping tips to do and not to do, the very important checklist and some photos I have taken on our holidays.
First thing you need to do is to decide where to go, and when to go, who is going and how long for. When you have decided where find out all the information you can about the location. Phone the Park or the tourist information in the area, or get online information.
Does it have amenities? Are their any shops nearby? Can I get fuel? Can I get mobile phone service? If it is a remote location how can I get help if required? Can I go fishing? Can I take my dog? What are the weather conditions likely to be? Can I get fresh water?
Can I take my boat? What condition are the roads?
If you have not camped before, you feel like you need to buy a lot of equipment and learn a lot of skills to get started. Camping does not need to be complicated; it should be simple and fun.
You can start by looking at a checklist and seeing what equipment is required, do you have these things or do you need to purchase anything, make a list of any thing required.
Use a checklist list as a guide to make your own to list to suit your own situation.
A great place to start looking for equipment is at a camping show or event where camping equipment suppliers display their goods and you can compare all the brands and prices. Or maybe you have a large camping store nearby they will be able to advise you.