Hey guys, I’m here again, and after going to somewhere that has lots of raccoons and ticks! I recently have been camping with girl scouts, ones that are older than myself (I think, I only asked some of them what age they are currently at, but not all of them). I went on a backpacking hike/camping trip with Girl Scouts at Kettle Moraine State Park! The place is the leftovers of a moving glacier doing deposition, leaving all these bumps in the ground known as kettles. I want to talk about my experiences there and what to bring when you are backpacking.
The experience there was one of the best I had in my life. We found this plant called lamb’s leaf, which is usually known for being natural toilet paper, due to it being so soft in touch. Not to mention the weather there is very unpredictable if you’re just a beginner! The night’s very peaceful, and the birds in the morning are very charming to wake up to! I didn’t really bring the correct materials for the trip, but I really loved going on said trip.
1. Bring the lightest things you have
If you’re going backpacking, you will be hiking a LOT. So you have to bring anything with backpacking as a label. This means backpacking tents, backpacking chairs, backpacking sleeping bags, you name it, you have to bring it light and in your backpack, because you’re going to hike a lot with the backpack on, therefore you need to make it light as possible (you better listen to this because it’s hard for me to spell the word “backpacking” correctly on the first try). On the trip, I had no backpacking gear, so I had a sore back the entire time. DO NOT DO WHAT I DID!!
2. Do not bring any items that contain cotton
A very common saying in backpacking (and camping in general) is “cotton kills”, and they say this for a really good reason! You see, there are three different types of materials that people use in their cloths: cotton, which comes from plants, wool, which comes from sheep, and fleece, which comes from plastic that has been obtained from petroleum, so the next time you wear a fleece sweater, remember that you’re technically wearing oil😁.
Fleece is the best choice for camping, due to when it gets wet, it easily dries up. Wool is also great (you can kinda shred it to make fire fuel), but it kinda shrinks when it gets in hot water, but COTTON is the last thing you want in your camping bag. It absorbs water and takes hours to dry, not to mention it also has horrible insulation, which increases your chances of getting hypothermia, which can lead to death, so no cotton while camping.
3. Always have a shovel in your backpack
To break it to you guys, there are going to be times where there is no bathroom in the wilderness. Hey, it’s the wilderness, what do you expect? You never know when there is no outhouse in your camping area, and if there is no car to drive you to the nearest Walmart to go do your business in. You can dig these things called catholes, and what you do is the simplest thing in the world, but it’s still hard. You have to dig a hole, and go to the bathroom in it. Hey, it’s the wilderness, what do you expect??
That’s all! Nothing more, nothing less!
See you all next week!
– Nova S