Well, I (we, my girlfriend and I) decided to finally make the plunge and go camping. We had been discussing it a while since she used to love the outdoorsy stuff when she was younger (she did this thing called "Outward Bounds", not sure what that is but it sounded kind of like group wilderness camping), and I was a scout so this brings up a lot of old (and good!) memories.
Anyways, just thought I'd drop in here since I registered a few months ago when I first started thinking about camping again. I dropped into Walmart yesterday after some planning and dropped about $350 on gear. Hoping I have the essentials covered. We're leaving tonight as soon as I am able to get off of work, and hope to make it to the campgrounds and pitch camp no later than 8pm while there's still sunlight. I hope nobody minds but I am going to list the things I bought here and you guys can maybe help me find a couple more things I might need for future endeavors? We may make another trip by the store tonight or in the morning to get extras. Also for anyone who bothers reading all of this, should I invest in a firearm? Thinking of getting a glock 9mm for personal protection. Open carry of course, don't have the time/money to get the conceal/carry right now. I am a fire-arm newbie and not sure if I want to go this route or not but I have been considering getting a shotgun for home protection for a long time and my brother thinks handguns are better for easy access.
So here's what we already had which saved us some money:
Sleeping bags x2
- Inflatable air matress x2 (1 queen, 1 twin... hopefully the queen is enough)
- Tent (old and nasty, ditched it in favor or a new model!)
- Cooler (old Coleman tailgating cooler, pretty good quality, has held up well!)
- Food (she's in charge of planning, I'm doing the grilling!)
- Folding table (I think she has one, may check Walmart if not)
- Grill: Just a little portable charcoal grill, should be a nice fallback if the campfire is an epic fail.
- extra clothes and lots of socks (read that you can never have enough socks when camping!)
- some heavy duty plastic stakes from her old tent, the ones that came with the Coleman I just bought are super flimsy. I bent two pretty bad when hammering them in while testing the tent setup in our back yard.
And here's what I picked up yesterday, had to put it on the charge card but hoping it will pay for itself over time!:
Tent: Coleman 9' x 7' Dome Tent (the $68 one). Was super easy to put up, so shouldnt be an issue. Also got a tarp for a ground cloth or extra rainfly if it rains (50% chance.. but I will not be deterred!)
Tools:
-Swiss Army Tinker knife, just like I had in the Scouts as a kid. These things are awesome! Going to find and whittle us some good walking sticks for hiking.
-Eating utensil multi-tools: It's a spoon/fork/knife/bottle+can opener all-in-one. Bought two of these, one for each of us.
- LED Flashlight: It's one of those 90 lumine LED flashlights, runs off of 3 triple A's and gets 10+ hours of light. For night-time potty breaks, etc.
Random odds&ends:
- Coleman CPX rechargable batteries x2: for the fan/light/lantern.
- Coleman CPX lighted tent fan + light: like a lantern and ceiling fan all-in-one when hung! Supposed to be in the 80's and a good chance of rain so we may be holed up in the tent a bit, want her to be comfortable as possible. Personally I could care less this is more of a comfort item for my girl.
- Coleman CPX LED lantern: extra light for nighttime.
- 4x D-cell batteries: backups for the fan/lantern.
- Rain poncho's x2: in case we get a torrential downpour!
- Campers first aid kit: also has a snake bite kit. I also added water purification tablets, soap strips, and a few other "conveniences" to it.
- Bio-degradable wet naps.
- 5 gallon collapsable water tank
- Two water bottles
- ETC (other things I have picked up that aren't jumping to my mind right now. Am bored at work typing this up because I am super excited to be going camping tonight!).
So that's about it. Anyways I've been RV camping a couple times with my brother and his family in recent years but this is my first experience getting back to true tent camping since I was a young teen (currently 31 years old, work in IT, little overweight and out of shape, hoping this will reinvigorate me and help motivate to get active again!).
We're going to Julian Price Park Campground in the Blue Ridge Parkway National Park in NC. Gorgeous campground from what I've seen, and we both love the mountains very much. I hope to do some hiking while there and we hope to (on later trips) get into kayaking as well. Leaving tonight and hope to get home Monday evening in time to wind down and switch back into real life mode before work starts up Tues. morning. So anyways, just thought I'd share! I've lurked these forums a while and then forgot while real life/work took over, but now I'm back and ready to get to it!
Any comments/thoughts on gear/etc is welcome, remember we're (sort of) camping newbies and any advice is DEFINATELY welcome! THANKS!! GOD BLESS!
~Chris in NC~
Anyways, just thought I'd drop in here since I registered a few months ago when I first started thinking about camping again. I dropped into Walmart yesterday after some planning and dropped about $350 on gear. Hoping I have the essentials covered. We're leaving tonight as soon as I am able to get off of work, and hope to make it to the campgrounds and pitch camp no later than 8pm while there's still sunlight. I hope nobody minds but I am going to list the things I bought here and you guys can maybe help me find a couple more things I might need for future endeavors? We may make another trip by the store tonight or in the morning to get extras. Also for anyone who bothers reading all of this, should I invest in a firearm? Thinking of getting a glock 9mm for personal protection. Open carry of course, don't have the time/money to get the conceal/carry right now. I am a fire-arm newbie and not sure if I want to go this route or not but I have been considering getting a shotgun for home protection for a long time and my brother thinks handguns are better for easy access.
So here's what we already had which saved us some money:
Sleeping bags x2
- Inflatable air matress x2 (1 queen, 1 twin... hopefully the queen is enough)
- Tent (old and nasty, ditched it in favor or a new model!)
- Cooler (old Coleman tailgating cooler, pretty good quality, has held up well!)
- Food (she's in charge of planning, I'm doing the grilling!)
- Folding table (I think she has one, may check Walmart if not)
- Grill: Just a little portable charcoal grill, should be a nice fallback if the campfire is an epic fail.
- extra clothes and lots of socks (read that you can never have enough socks when camping!)
- some heavy duty plastic stakes from her old tent, the ones that came with the Coleman I just bought are super flimsy. I bent two pretty bad when hammering them in while testing the tent setup in our back yard.
And here's what I picked up yesterday, had to put it on the charge card but hoping it will pay for itself over time!:
Tent: Coleman 9' x 7' Dome Tent (the $68 one). Was super easy to put up, so shouldnt be an issue. Also got a tarp for a ground cloth or extra rainfly if it rains (50% chance.. but I will not be deterred!)
Tools:
-Swiss Army Tinker knife, just like I had in the Scouts as a kid. These things are awesome! Going to find and whittle us some good walking sticks for hiking.
-Eating utensil multi-tools: It's a spoon/fork/knife/bottle+can opener all-in-one. Bought two of these, one for each of us.
- LED Flashlight: It's one of those 90 lumine LED flashlights, runs off of 3 triple A's and gets 10+ hours of light. For night-time potty breaks, etc.
Random odds&ends:
- Coleman CPX rechargable batteries x2: for the fan/light/lantern.
- Coleman CPX lighted tent fan + light: like a lantern and ceiling fan all-in-one when hung! Supposed to be in the 80's and a good chance of rain so we may be holed up in the tent a bit, want her to be comfortable as possible. Personally I could care less this is more of a comfort item for my girl.
- Coleman CPX LED lantern: extra light for nighttime.
- 4x D-cell batteries: backups for the fan/lantern.
- Rain poncho's x2: in case we get a torrential downpour!
- Campers first aid kit: also has a snake bite kit. I also added water purification tablets, soap strips, and a few other "conveniences" to it.
- Bio-degradable wet naps.
- 5 gallon collapsable water tank
- Two water bottles
- ETC (other things I have picked up that aren't jumping to my mind right now. Am bored at work typing this up because I am super excited to be going camping tonight!).
So that's about it. Anyways I've been RV camping a couple times with my brother and his family in recent years but this is my first experience getting back to true tent camping since I was a young teen (currently 31 years old, work in IT, little overweight and out of shape, hoping this will reinvigorate me and help motivate to get active again!).
We're going to Julian Price Park Campground in the Blue Ridge Parkway National Park in NC. Gorgeous campground from what I've seen, and we both love the mountains very much. I hope to do some hiking while there and we hope to (on later trips) get into kayaking as well. Leaving tonight and hope to get home Monday evening in time to wind down and switch back into real life mode before work starts up Tues. morning. So anyways, just thought I'd share! I've lurked these forums a while and then forgot while real life/work took over, but now I'm back and ready to get to it!
Any comments/thoughts on gear/etc is welcome, remember we're (sort of) camping newbies and any advice is DEFINATELY welcome! THANKS!! GOD BLESS!
~Chris in NC~
Comment