Originally Posted by
MuddyWaters
Newbies to the outdoors seem to be heavily influenced by : 1) clue-less peers and 2) Walmart
I recall when my son started Tiger cubs in cub scouts, around age 6-7. Car camping, first campout, only 2 nights and one day, friday night and saturday/sat night.
Most people could not fit all they brought into the back of a pickup truck, some actually hauled trailers.
One guy brought lawn equipment and mowed, then weed-eated his camping area, no $hit. Another brought out a huge fogger , walked around spraying, and basically tried to kill every bug in 100 yd radius. Several brought their huge home propane barbecue grills, big canopys to cover them, astroturf to put down, several folding tables, generators, put up lighting, big propane stoves, lounge chairs. You know, all the essentials for a 1 day, 2 night trip with a 6 yr olds. One guy brought satellite TV and a projector to put it on the side enclosure panel of a canopy. Basically, they brought their college football tailgating to the woods. Throw in the kids bicycles, fishing gear, etc and it was ......a horrible spectacle. Sleeping required queen size air mattresses and electric air pumps to inflate, more than one had sheets and pillows, a made up bed in the tent!
So much stuff, that most dads had to take the day off of work just to get ready. Packing actually had to start a couple days before. Of course , since everyone else brought that stuff, you wouldnt be as proficient of a "camper" unless you did too!
Maybe I was fortunate, I didnt own any of that stuff.
And after all that, the tents were $50 tents Magellan tents from Academy. Huge, 6-8 person cheap chinese made "family" tents with 2 or 3 rooms. Not waterproof, not with taped seams, and most definitely not seam sealed. You know the kind, theres clear plastic panels on the roof so you can view the stars, and the unsealed rainfly overlaps the netted roof areas by ~1/2 inch. But hey, most were looking for the cheapest tent to buy, and this was it
And the rain rain rain came down down. Everyone got wet, soaked actually. A few put their canopys over their tents to help mitigate the damage. Water ran across the ground, stacked up agains the walls of tents, and came in the bathtub seams even. some people had inches of water in their tents.
And every fall, about October, at a Boy Scout camp near you, the spectacle repeats itself.