More campsites opening in NYC’s “urban outback”
Spending the night outdoors in New York City doesn’t necessarily mean glamping on the “wraparound terrace of a penthouse suite” with scented candles. Or huddling under a bridge. You can actually pitch a tent and lay out your bedroll in the Gateway National Recreation Area, an expansive (26,000-acre) urban outback that’s spread across parts of...
Mother Nature’s drive-through
Can it be that Americans prefer to enjoy the outdoors from the climate-controlled womb of their cars? That’s one way to read recent stats from the National Park Service, as relayed by USA Today. Overall, visits to the parks are up, but the time spent in each park is down by about 15 percent. In...
Gear videos are a mostly justifiable time-suck
When you’re outdoors, gear isn’t everything. It just enables everything. Good gear usually equals good performance: it lets you go farther, faster, with less exertion. It also, often, embodies admirable design. And it’s reliable, which matters always and especially in sports where an equipment failure can mean injury or death. Gear also gives you something...
Glamping: return to nature without touching it
We suspect the glamping bubble is about to burst. Why? Because movie stars have climbed on the bandwagon (as witnessed by the recent McConaghey-Alves wedding) and (the surest sign that a trend is in freefall) glamping apparently showed up on one of the Housewives reality shows. On the other (manicured) hand, most days we get...
Good gear: L.L. Bean’s Microlight FS2
In camping gear we like three things above all others: we like durable (because nothing else matters if a pole breaks or a seam rips), and light (less is more), and cheap (because). So we’re very attracted to the new Microlight FS2 backpacking tent from L.L. Bean. We can’t vouch for its durability because...
We’re so done with glamping
We’re done with glamping. So over it. We’re over thinking about it and looking at the pictures. There’s no future here. But we can’t quit it. Not just yet. Soon, but not now. One reason: we like the pictures. We don’t know why we like them. It might be for the same perverse impulse that...
Ultralight camping: Dropping 20 pounds of gear is like losing 20 years
Snow melts, summer seems like a possibility, and suddenly hiking and biking gear seems fascinating in a way it didn’t three weeks ago. The seed takes root; a few days later you invent a reason to swing by your local outfitter. You daydream about day hikes. Then something a little longer. And gear that...
Glamping sites trending more toward glam than camping
If you are confused about luxury camping (also called glamorous camping or, awkwardly, glamping), you are not alone. Some of these places, like the “romantic” English shepherds’ huts found on goglamping.net, look like slightly-more-claustrophobic-than-normal ice-fishing shacks. But there seems to be a trend toward more upscale hospitality, where guests are coddled with opulent...
Sunday quote: November 27, 2011
“I never knew a man who took a bedroll into an Idaho mountainside and slept there under a star-studded summer sky who felt self-important that next morning. Unless we preserve some opportunity for future generations to have the same experience, we shall have dishonored our trust.” ~ Sen. Frank Church, 1924-1984...
Camping out in someone else’s garden: fake, irredeemably lame travel trend for boomers
Last month we reported on the rise of glamping—a conflation of “glamorous” and “camping” that makes us wince every time we write it. We were skeptical. Even dismissive. But then we looked at a few web sites and thought about it, and decided it might be a very acceptable way to...
Today’s John Muir Trail video suggests it’s a lark to hike 230 miles
Almost There – The Muir Project Given the number of people who hike California’s John Muir Trail, which runs along the backbone of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, and given the number of talented cinematographers in that part of the world, you would think that the internet would be awash with breathtaking videos of the...
Car camping, the early years
You can be impressed by Thomas Coleman du Pont (1863-1930) because he supervised the construction of the DuPont Highway through Delaware, or because he was a two-term U.S. senator from that state, or because he had the good sense to be born a great-grandson of the founder of...
