camping near roads

[mudcap]

I like beer drinkers... much better than people that can not handle their booze and condemn everyone that can. Not everyone acts like a fool w/ a little alcohol in them. Yoga? How do you do that with a can of beer in your hand? Semi-kidding !

[dreamsoftrails]

I like beer drinkers... much better than people that can not handle their booze and condemn everyone that can. Not everyone acts like a fool w/ a little alcohol in them. Yoga? How do you do that with a can of beer in your hand? Semi-kidding !

some of the best folks and best times i have had on the trail have been running into others sharing booze. i don't really see what the big deal is, and as far as i have seen its the norm.

i dont really fear the 'wild road craving boozers' at the road crossings.

[mudcap]

some of the best folks and best times i have had on the trail have been running into others sharing booze. i don't really see what the big deal is, and as far as i have seen its the norm.

i dont really fear the 'wild road craving boozers' at the road crossings.

Well said,I agree with you 100 % . The self-important folks are the ones that really annoy me the most.

[Tipi Walter]

Well said,I agree with you 100 % . The self-important folks are the ones that really annoy me the most.

Let me get this straight. So if you're camping near a trailhead by the side of the road and in the middle of the night someone drives up and does donuts around your tent and fires off random gunshots while yelling and screaming, you'll most be worried about the self-important folks?

Hasn't anybody backpacked to a favorite campsite and found a smoking firepit filled with burning food and 12 beer cans stashed under a rock overhang?

Or went into a wilderness and set up camp along a pristine creek and walked upstream to find a totally trashed camp with a giant wad of clear plastic and a firering filled with wet clothing, a wet bag of Wonder bread, a couple Jim Beam bottles and other garbage?

These are all signs of the inebriated human interacting with the woods as if a visit to the outdoors is a perfect excuse to whoop it up and overindulge. Granted, there are some here and there that "drink responsibly", and I have met many solo backpackers who carry a flask and scurry away at nightfall to the warmth of their tent. It's when they gather in groups and add alcohol to the mix that the noise levels go way up. Am I the only one who has been kept up all night by the bellowing drunks around a firepit? I guess so.

[Big Dawg]

don't camp near Catpen Gap. nuff said.

[dreamsoftrails]

Let me get this straight. So if you're camping near a trailhead by the side of the road and in the middle of the night someone drives up and does donuts around your tent and fires off random gunshots while yelling and screaming, you'll most be worried about the self-important folks?

i definitely don't make a habit of this.

Hasn't anybody backpacked to a favorite campsite and found a smoking firepit filled with burning food and 12 beer cans stashed under a rock overhang?

nope.

Or went into a wilderness and set up camp along a pristine creek and walked upstream to find a totally trashed camp with a giant wad of clear plastic and a firering filled with wet clothing, a wet bag of Wonder bread, a couple Jim Beam bottles and other garbage?

nope

These are all signs of the inebriated human interacting with the woods as if a visit to the outdoors is a perfect excuse to whoop it up and overindulge. Granted, there are some here and there that "drink responsibly", and I have met many solo backpackers who carry a flask and scurry away at nightfall to the warmth of their tent. It's when they gather in groups and add alcohol to the mix that the noise levels go way up. Am I the only one who has been kept up all night by the bellowing drunks around a firepit? I guess so.

the only time i have been kept up by drunks is when camping near a road. it was my own fault for doing so. on that trip, i traversed 30 miles of trail and chose to stay at the one camping area where the road was. i asked for it.

however, didn't you say most of your trips took you where the 'road craving inbred' would die if he tried hike? because you sure have a lot of stories otherwise.

[Wilson]

I hate a drunk, when I'm sober...when I'm drunk, I hate sober people.

[MintakaCat]

Tipi, let’s look at some of what you’ve said:

Rolling Couch Potatoes

gas guzzling car-addicted drunks

While all this was going on they pulled out their pacifiers and started nursing their whiskey and rum.

Could it be that maybe in some of these encounters these people sense your anger and are a little defensive? Just asking.

[mudcap]

Let me get this straight. So if you're camping near a trailhead by the side of the road and in the middle of the night someone drives up and does donuts around your tent and fires off random gunshots while yelling and screaming, you'll most be worried about the self-important folks?

Hasn't anybody backpacked to a favorite campsite and found a smoking firepit filled with burning food and 12 beer cans stashed under a rock overhang?

Or went into a wilderness and set up camp along a pristine creek and walked upstream to find a totally trashed camp with a giant wad of clear plastic and a firering filled with wet clothing, a wet bag of Wonder bread, a couple Jim Beam bottles and other garbage?

These are all signs of the inebriated human interacting with the woods as if a visit to the outdoors is a perfect excuse to whoop it up and overindulge. Granted, there are some here and there that "drink responsibly", and I have met many solo backpackers who carry a flask and scurry away at nightfall to the warmth of their tent. It's when they gather in groups and add alcohol to the mix that the noise levels go way up. Am I the only one who has been kept up all night by the bellowing drunks around a firepit? I guess so.

It is quite obvious you hate acohol for some reason,and yes I would rather be around somone under the influence of rather than some self-important fool. Alcohol drinkers are much more honest than the ego dudes by far. You can be anyone you want on the internet or the trail,who is there to prove you wrong?

[Wise Old Owl]

Another time I was camping atop, yes, a hill overlooking a town, when in the middle of the night(it's always in the middle of the night), a homeless drunk showed up and didn't see me in my bivy sac under a bush. He yelled out, "God! Why don't you come to me!! Where are you!!" and a few seconds later I felt a wallet hit me in the face. He flung it threw the air in a fit of renunciation and it happened to hit me.

Tipi if you were steath camping and you replied at that moment with something like....Stop yelling son...Can't you tell I'm busy?

Mudcap, I can honestly say folks at bars that are social drinkers do not like drunks.

[Manwich]

Must be a southerner thing. I've camped by roads dozens of times in NJ, NY, CT, MA, VT and NH.

[Jester2000]

It's a good thing too. Wildfires near roads started by drunks are easier to extinguish and are more likely to be caught early.

Most people know what happens when fire and alcohol are mixed. Drunks forget. Beyond a certain point, they don't drive well either. Actually, there isn't much they do well, save for maybe make asses of themselves and cause problems for other people.

This is why I do all of my drunk fire juggling near roads.

. . . Hasn't anybody backpacked to a favorite campsite and found a smoking firepit filled with burning food and 12 beer cans stashed under a rock overhang?

Or went into a wilderness and set up camp along a pristine creek and walked upstream to find a totally trashed camp with a giant wad of clear plastic and a firering filled with wet clothing, a wet bag of Wonder bread, a couple Jim Beam bottles and other garbage?

These are all signs of the inebriated human interacting with the woods as if a visit to the outdoors is a perfect excuse to whoop it up and overindulge. Granted, there are some here and there that "drink responsibly", and I have met many solo backpackers who carry a flask and scurry away at nightfall to the warmth of their tent. It's when they gather in groups and add alcohol to the mix that the noise levels go way up. Am I the only one who has been kept up all night by the bellowing drunks around a firepit? I guess so.

Sorry about the Jim Beam bottles.

Actually, they're all just signs of people with no respect for the environment or other people. And I've met many people like this who don't drink. It's a fallacy to find one common thread in some of your experiences (because I'm sure you've found poorly treated campsites where no alcohol bottles were present) and use that as proof of causation. There are jerks who drink. There are jerks who don't. I've met both kinds close to and far away from roads.

I could regale you all with tales of my friends and I getting (slightly) more drunk than planned (probably due to altitude) in the Sierra far from any road, and how we bothered no one. But this is a thread about roads, so here's my take:

Camping near roads is, generally speaking, a bad idea. There may be times when you choose to do it -- because you want to nearo into and out of town, or because you're exhausted and there happens to be a road close to the end of your day.

But if you're the kind of person who complains about the many, many times you've been kept awake by people near roads, then you're also the kind of person who chooses not to learn.

Two experiences:
Heading into Kent, I stop for a moment at the last shelter before the road. There's no gear there, but there's an unattended fire right next to a tree with a sign on it saying "No Fires Allowed." So I put out the fire. As I hit the road I see two cars, and people unloading gear, getting ready to haul it up the hill. These people weren't drunk, at least not yet. But they were morons. I was glad I wasn't staying at that shelter.

While Southbounding the Long Trail, two other hikers and I were tucked away in the back of Governor Clement Shelter, starting to drift off to sleep after a long day. Three cars and a truck full of teenagers and two kegs pulled up and started unloading. We emerged from the darkness of the inside of the shelter and unintentionally scared the crap out of them. After explaining that we were exhausted from a 25 mile day and asking if there was some other place around they could party instead, the teens apologized, packed up, and moved off to a spot far enough away that we weren't bothered by them (but close enough that they invited us to walk over to it if we wanted a beer).

Got a good night's sleep, and bumped into Baltimore Jack heading northbound on the AT the next day. We stopped and got pleasantly drunk together on the trail in the middle of the day.

[Wise Old Owl]

Must be a southerner thing. I've camped by roads dozens of times in NJ, NY, CT, MA, VT and NH.

Yep... No I won't do it... I need a stream and 500 feet from the trail.

Here in PA.NJ.NY.MD

[sheepdog]

Must be a southerner thing. I've camped by roads dozens of times in NJ, NY, CT, MA, VT and NH.

Yep, the only thing you have to worry about is people dumping dead bodies,

[Manwich]

Yep, the only thing you have to worry about is people dumping dead bodies,

Ain't never been a murder on the trail north of PA

[Wise Old Owl]

Can't post one word answers.... YET!

[toegem]

Camping near a road does have it's benefits.
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[Wise Old Owl]

This thread was so wrong on so many different levels......................... now for the one level that wasn't mentioned- two words Politics and Mrs Cliton.... oops forgot to run the spell check.

[Erin]

I know better....I know better than to camp near a road. On the AT, we were so careful. In Arkansas, we are so careful. Last weekend, our hiker group of women were inthe Mark Twain National Forest in southwest Missouri and camped miles from anything but near a gravel road a a tiny campsite at a trailhead. Friday night, kids in a pick up. Apparently pretty funny but I slept thru it. Saturday night, at two am, unnerving and scary since it was men in a pickup and angry cursing. I had a bad feeling about that place. I would never have camped there alone. But we got careless in a group. Never. Again.

[TimeSnake]

Deffinately do not camp near roads, especially in the south. Also avoid powerlines, for trucks and atvs can usually have access. In PA at a shelter near near some lines we had some midnight visitors back roading, blaring their sound systems. Bottom line is avoid camping near roads, or atv accesssable intersecting trails as well as short side trails to trail heads and roads.