Camping

San Angelo State Park, TX.

So, camping out by myself. So far, I have camped in four different parks, and at each one I’ve had a completely different experience.

I’ve already written about the first two, so let’s bring you up to date. On Sunday night after leaving Austin and stopping by the Longhorn Caverns, I reached the San Angelo State Park, where I had made a reservation the night before. I was assigned a site by a very friendly and helpful park employee, and I made my way thither.

Like at Trace State Park, there were plenty of RVs chilling in their groomed parking lot, and no tents. Well, if there were other tents, I couldn’t see them, because the tent-only sites were widely spaced apart. But I certainly didn’t glimpse any other tents while driving around the park to find my campsite.

But it didn’t bother me as much as it had at Trace, because the scenery was so stunning. The park itself wasn’t that gorgeous, it was mostly just flat land covered in scrub and some trees and cacti. But the views of the surrounding land were outrageously beautiful and the sky was just . . . it was unbelievable! The sky doesn’t look like that in New York, I’ll tell you that. And I think it’s because there is so much space out here. There are so many parts of this state that are just empty, wide open land. The sky has so much more room to spread out.

That Texas sky!

Plus, I liked my campsite.

Campsite 61

The girl at the check-in office had said it was close to the restrooms, but it was not. I mean, it wasn’t close to anything. Everything was widely spaced apart. I walked there once in the evening and once in the morning but otherwise peacefully peed in the wild.

Because it was isolated, though, I did feel a bit uneasy. I felt slightly exposed out there in my little tent. I obviously downplayed this to my family and Phil. And I didn’t really feel unsafe; the park was gated, and constantly patrolled by staff.

Still, any time I’m really alone, as in, there are no visible tenters around me, I get a little freaked out. I much prefer to be in a populated campground, and I don’t like being the only tenter (this is word I have invented, it is not actually some experienced camper vernacular that I’ve suavely picked up) in a park full of RVs. It’s not that comfortable. Yes, I am a strong, independent woman, but any woman alone in any scenario is always going to be on her guard.

I had a perfect view of the sunset, but unfortunately it was mostly obscured by damn clouds. The effects of the sun setting through the clouds was still stunning, though. And the weather was perfect - warm but dry, a little breeze, some raindrops. There had been sun showers all through the day. And it seemed like that infernal heat wave had ended.

So I was happily tucked into my tent, typing away in the light of my lantern, ignoring the accumulating of small bugs on the mesh of the tent (happens every time) when I made the very stupid decision to unzip my tent flap so I could get out to brush my teeth and let in at least two dozen tiny flying insects, attracted by the light within. I mean, they zoomed straight in like they had been waiting their whole lives for this moment. SHIT! There was nothing I could do but hunt them down one by one. At first, they were wily and escaped me easily, but soon I got the hang of it, squishing and smacking and smudging them into oblivion. This went on for quite some time, as you can imagine. There was only one of me, and so many of them. But soon the walls of my tent were dotted with bug remains, and I was once more alone in my nylon haven.

(….Or so I thought. A number of them escaped the massacre, waited until I fell asleep and then retaliated through biological warfare. In other words I woke up covered in bites. Well played, little enemies.)

It took me a really long time to fall asleep. I read for a while, but then I finished my book before I was really tired, so I tossed and turned. I was having trouble with my extra-firm pillow until I got fed up, pulled out my multipurpose tool, and knifed that pillow open to surgically remove some of its stuffing. After that I slept much better. In fact I slept through the night, only to wake up to a really uncomfortably hot morning pouring through the thin green walls.

I breakfasted and packed up. Now, I actually like breaking down and packing up the tent. It’s a methodical process, creating order with my hands, turning a roomy, hardy shelter into a small package to be tossed in my car. I love that. I like setting it up, too: building myself a temporary little home. I guess in that way it’s a lot like Sukkot, and building a sukkah is my absolutely favorite Jewish activity of all time. Possibly my favorite activity, period.

Building a tent is much easier and quicker than building a sukkah, as is taking one down. I’m pretty good at it by now, though it’s just an easy tent to use. (It’s a 4-person Coleman Sundome.) I just love how it goes from nothing to something in 5 minutes, and then back again. In fact it turns from nothing - a roll of nylon and plastic - into a home, one of the most important basic needs that humans have. A few sheets of nylon become an actual shelter that can protect you from rain, wind, bugs (if you’re doing it right), dirt, sand . . . I mean, it’s not an impenetrable home, of course. You can’t lock it at night. I guess you technically could lock the zippers on the door flap, but that wouldn’t change the fact that the walls could be comfortably slashed open in about a millisecond.

So actually, in some sense all a tent really offers is an illusion of safety and privacy. When you’re inside, you feel protected from the elements, you feel like you’re in your own little domain. But in reality, you’re just inside a pyramid of very, very thin plastic sheeting. You’re super vulnerable - if not to the elements, then certainly to other people or animals with sharp claws. And that part is scary. Usually, when you go to sleep, when you lay yourself down at your most defenseless, you’re behind a locked door. You’re probably behind several doors, in fact. There are so many layers between you and the outside world. If a wolf huffed and puffed at your house, he’d get nowhere.

But now pretend you’re in a tent. There are no doors; just a piece of the wall that you can unzip. There are no locks. There’s no brick, no mortar, no insulation, no wooden struts, no sheetrock. The only thing between you and that big, bad world is . . . a plastic bag.

My castle.

A wolf could get at you in seconds.

And yet for some reason, people want to do it! They want to strip down those layers of safety and go into the woods.

Many other people really don’t understand that impulse. (Formans, I’m looking at you.) Having come so far as a species, having reached a point in human history where all of our needs can be so easily and comfortably met within a safe, warm home, they can’t understand the appeal of going backwards, of forfeiting soft, cozy beds and indoor plumbing to sleep on the ground in a plastic bag in the woods and pee in an outhouse. And when I say it like that, I get it.

But at the same time, that’s exactly why I enjoy doing it. I like getting back to basics. Back to the source. Back to the beginning. I can’t say that I’m doing this to get closer to my ancestors, who wandered through the Middle East with tents made of animal skins, because to be honest that’s just not really a conscious thought that’s crossed my mind. No, the truth is just that within me, there’s a pull, a desire to shake off all the fancy trimmings of civilization and sit in a plastic bag listening to crickets.

Of course, that is also bullshit in a way, because I’m traveling in a car utterly filled with fancy trimmings - outfits for every occasion, eight pairs of shoes, pillows, blankets, all kinds of snacks, water bottles, just everything one could need. I’m certainly not going without. I’m not one of those real backpackers who strap everything they need onto themselves and walk into the woods for several days or weeks at a time. Now that would be impressive. Nah, I cheat. I’m car camping. I can bring as much crap as I want, throw it into my car, and then lug it out and toss it back in again. Actually, that part - the schlepping - is really annoying. But probably still a lot less annoying than having to carry a tent, sleeping bag, water, food, cooking equipment, clothing, and sundry other necessities on my back.

I don’t know. I know that I like camping, though. Last night I stayed at a Guadalupe National Park campground, and it was fantastic. From my four nights’ experience, I can tell you that I prefer camping in a national park, as compared to a state park. The biggest difference I’ve noticed is that tenters tend to go to national parks, whereas in state parks most of the campers are in RVs. So either tenters prefer national parks, or I personally just prefer being around other tenters.

For sure it’s muuuch nicer being in a place where there are other people in tents. I arrived at the park, which is in Texas but very close to the New Mexico border, yesterday afternoon. It was gorgeous, of course - crazy, cliff-like, soaring mountains towered over you as you drove in. I loved it right away.

Pine Springs is a first-come, first-served campground. First you drive in and find an empty campsite, and then you head to the self-registration booth, where you put your $8/night in a little envelope (honor system!), fill out your information, and drop it in a box. Very easy, very low-key process.

It’s a small campground; there were only about 20 sites. All of them were walk-in, meaning you park in a little lot and then walk a marked path a few hundred feet to your site, which includes, as all campsites do, a picnic table, a firepit and space for your tent. Colorful tents were visible here and there, but each of the sites was somewhat secluded, surrounded by trees, brush, and cacti. There was some modicum of privacy, and I liked that.

There were several open sites. I chose the one closest to the bathroom (I would later discover it contained neither a flushing toilet nor a sink, so that wasn’t a huge benefit), which was down a picturesque little path, and included its own tree for shade.

Campsite #12 at Pine Springs.

It was adorable. I immediately set to work pitching my tent, which was harder than usual because the ground wasn’t soft dirt, but hard-packed sand and rock. I bent several stakes trying to hammer them in. While I was setting up, a guy walking by warned me that a large rattlesnake had been seen nearby, so I should keep an eye out. Wowza! I was really in the wild now.

I got my tent up, ate a snack, and immediately set out on a hike, as the campground was near several trailheads, and I had many hours of daylight left. I won’t write too much about that hike now, as this is a post about camping. Suffice it to say it wasn’t marked at all, making it kind of frustrating at points, but the views of the surrounding mountains were spectacular.

What a spectacle!

It was still daylight when I returned because I had crossed over into Mountain Time. My phone was really confused, and kept jumping back and forth between the hours until I had no idea what time it was supposed to be. But that doesn’t really matter when you’re camping: either it’s light or warm enough to sit outside, or it’s dark or cold enough to tuck in for the night. The hour itself is unimportant. Last night, it got cold before it got dark. I could hear thunder in the distance, and it was drizzling on and off, but what finally sent me inside was the wind. Good thing too because not too long after night fell it started pouring. I think it’s rained on three of the four nights I’ve camped. But I honestly don’t mind. As I’ve mentioned, it’s really cozy being in a waterproof tent in the rain. As long as your tent is already set up and you get inside before the rain starts, there’s nothing really inconvenient about it. Of course, if you have to pee while it’s raining that’s not the best, but so far I’ve had success just waiting until the drops abate, hurrying out and hurrying back in again.

So I ended up having a good night. Thank God for my sleeping pad/exercise mat - definitely worth the $30! If I hadn’t had it, the hard, rocky, pointy ground would have driven me crazy and I wouldn’t have been able to sleep at all. But I didn’t even notice the rocky ground, that’s how thick and wonderful it is. I had a solid night’s sleep. The only thing that freaked me out was hearing people move around their nearby campsites and walking on the path that led past my site. In a tent, you know, sound carries.

And the bathroom situation - yeah. The single-stall bathrooms each contained what I guess is a pit toilet, which is what it sounds like: a toilet on top of a pit. I didn’t look inside, but there was no running water, I can tell you that much. And there wasn’t a sink for handwashing, either, but a hand sanitizer dispenser instead. I was a bit taken aback by both of those things. I mean, I’m camping, so I can’t really complain about primitive facilities, but I just wasn’t expecting it.

Now I am! Each experience has widened my knowledge a little bit of the different eventualities at campgrounds. Now I have a much more complete basic understanding of how things work, but I’ll still always encounter something new, just because every site is different.

This week was the first time I’ve camped two nights in a row. Takeaways: I was very much looking forward to relaxing in a hotel after two days and nights of sweating, bug spray, sunscreen, and setting up and pulling down my tent. But not for the reasons you might think. Yes, obviously I was very excited to take a long, hot shower, but I was also psyched about the prospect of WiFi and being able to plug things in. You don’t realize how much you rely on electricity! Once my laptop battery dies, it’s gone. I can charge other things in the car, but not all at once, and not as effectively as in an actual outlet. AND, after two days of eating nothing but snacks, I was excited about having access to hot water so I could make a cup o’soup. Yes, on this trip that’s the closest I can come to a hot meal.

And this may shock you but most national parks don’t have great cell reception. To say goodnight to Phil, I had to wander slowly around my campsite with my arm in the air for five minutes in hopes of finding a spot with enough service to support an internet connection. So using a WiFi hotspot is out of the question, as is doing any real planning, and we all know how much I love to do things last minute. This was never a problem on my last trip because I was always in a place with WiFi. Camping is a different story.

There are campsites with WiFi, actually. KOA is a private (and expensive) “chain” of campgrounds all over the country which offers all kinds of fancy amenities, WiFi included. Nightly rates start at $35 and that’s before tax. Let me remind you that the rate at the national park was $8! I couldn’t bring myself to pay an amount that would have gotten me a room at a really crappy motel just for the privilege of setting my tent up in a WiFi zone. Forget it! I’m going to stick to the basic principles of camping. I just don’t think that free WiFi follows the SPIRIT of the thing, you know? What’s the point of getting out in nature if everyone is just staring at their phones the whole time, just like in regular life? I actually think it’s a good thing that most parks don’t have service.

That’s not to say it isn’t inconvenient. I really need access to internet for planning purposes. Usually I like to plan for tomorrow today, but when I camp, I need to plan for tomorrow and the day afterwards because I can’t plan tomorrow. It’s annoying. I don’t like having to think so far in advance.

There are many other things I had wanted to tell you about - the cool things I’ve been doing, the hikes, the cavern explorations, the national monuments, etc. As opposed to the first few weeks which were mostly just driving, I’m finally getting to do and see amazing beautiful nature things. It’s making my trip much richer, and also making me much more tired, so I’m going to end here for now.