Favorite Campsite Thread

Flying Guillotine

Flying Guillotine

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Jan 2, 2011
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Everyone's got a favorite place to camp or hike, what's yours?

For me, the best place I've stayed is up in Mineral King which is part of the Sequoia National Forest. They have what they call walk-in campsites, which work out to be semi-car camping since you park and then hump your gear up to the sites on short trails. The scenery is amazing in the sites, with an audible flowing creek rushing by in the warm months and wildlife such as deer, marmot, and sometimes black bear passing nearby.
The site makes for a great base camp for some strenuous day hikes, or as a first stop to acclimate to the elevation (7,500' at the base) before striking off into the wilderness areas to properly rough it. The elevation climbs up rapidly on some of the hikes, so one can start out in 80+ degree weather and end up hiking through areas with snow on the ground in August (the highest peaks are around 11,000').
The only gnarly part about the area is the drive to get up to it: 698 curves on a 25mile dirt road, most of which are hairpin turns on a more or less 1 1/2 lane track with mountain on one side and tree lined drop off on the other. Sometimes unexpected local cattle will wander onto the road for added driving entertainment. The good part about this is that it discourages the larger big family winnebago warriors from rolling up with their satellite tv's, diesel gennies, blenders, hair dryers and blasting music. Ensures that most folk up there are serious about their getaway :p

Here's a link to the info for the area: http://www.nps.gov/archive/seki/mkvc.htm

And here's an image of the Mineral King valley:
mk_vally.jpg
 
Not sure. I have been to some beautiful spots before, but none really stand out as "favorite". I know the ones I loved the most, but alot of my camping was done, as a place to fall out on hikes. We just stopped, and setup, got some grub, got some rest, and some sleep. Hit out early the next day. I want to get into hiking to a spot, instead of hiking for hiking. I want to take a trip to Mt. Cammerer with the wife soon, and there is a shelter there on the AT that looks pretty cool, so, I will have to say that one, even though I have never stayed in it, I'm sure I will like it.

Moose
 
i don't remember the place but have some real good memories about this hiking spot out in ogden utah. it also had a golf course attached to it, with some mountain type terrain off to the side, have a river and lots of forest. we used to go to the golf course late at night and eat pizza and drink bottled rootbeers. then throw our containers in the garbage cans on the golf course and go hiking late at night. this was right after highschool years.

i remember this one time a few deer ran towards us throw some trees. we were walking up a hill and these deer came running down face first towards us. scared us like crazy, there was a full moon that night and a slight breeze.

sometimes we'd go during the day on the hiking portion side of that golf course, we'd follow the sound of the stream and it would get a little cold the closest we got to the stream. somtimes it'd feel like the ground would vibrate or move alittle as you got more up the hill and closer to that stream. i miss those days.
 
Oh, hell. Pic's ,got a couple here somewhere.

Prineville OR. this is the prineville resvr.


Uploaded with ImageShack.us
That is an island in the middle of the resvr. We camp on the island. The crawdads are pretty big and we did eat a bunch of them, though this was basically car camping for most of the folks who were there. Sure do miss it.



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

campsite there in through the trees.
 
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Here's mine. It's LBL in Kentucky, great hiking, paddling, camping, fishing, hunting and good old fashioned bring the grandkids time. We go there a lot.

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To start i would say drive through most of the parkway and pick the area that fits your eye, at most every lookout point/parking area there are trails that lead to campsites. all the trails are interconnected allowing you to hike throughout the area.

that being said, i liked the one called graveyard ridge. you should get a map of the area(highly recommend).

all in all you can't go wrong there.
dave
 
I guess my best friend Arthur's place....dont really get much chance to go elsewhere.

Last time was late October when I (then we) decided to put my survival teachings to the test and stay out all night sans tent. We did okay....would have been better if he'd let me do the shelters the way I wanted to. But at least it stayed dry. (Central Ohio)

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I prefer to camp in the bighorn mountains in Wyoming. Elevation from around 6000 to 9500' or so. I will get some pics posted up.
 
OREGON FAL'ER said:
Oh, hell. Pic's ,got a couple here somewhere.

Prineville OR. this is the prineville resvr.


Uploaded with ImageShack.us
That is an island in the middle of the resvr. We camp on the island. The crawdads are pretty big and we did eat a bunch of them, though this was basically car camping for most of the folks who were there. Sure do miss it.



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

campsite there in through the trees.
Click to expand...

Wow ive been to that very spot paddling!
 
It's too hard to pick a favorite but one that ranks up there is dispersed camping at Opal Creek in the Bull of the Woods Wilderness in Oregon east of Salem. Pretty nice to wake up to this:
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