The first time Jill and I camped at Anastasia State Park we were newlyweds. We had a two-person dome tent that was state-of-the-art.
For its time.
Which is to say it was purchased before some genius figured out you could connect the tent pole sections with elastic cords so they would snap together for insertion into corresponding tent sleeves
Our tent had numerous unconnected pole sections that had to be painstakingly fitted together, one by one. And then very carefully threaded through the sleeves, lest they all come apart before the tent could be raised.
We loved it.
One of the first times we used the tent was on a Thanksgiving weekend. We brought a smoker, and got up periodically that first night to replenish the water and fuel – all so we could have an outdoor turkey feast the next day.
That was more than 40 years ago. And we have many times since been back to that enchanting realm of ancient dune and spreading oaks sandwiched between St. Augustine and the Atlantic Ocean.
My kids grew up camping at Anastasia. Jill and I have grown old sitting around its camp fire rings and riding our bikes to nearby restaurants.
And over the years, over the decades, we have set up camp in an astonishing variety of tents.
Dome tents. Cabin tents. Pop-up tents.
Tents of all sizes and configurations.
Tents that I had to wiggle into with almost no room to spare.
And an REI tent so large it practically required a building permit to set up.
So when I let it be known that Jill and I had just purchased a Teardrop trailer I got this response from my old backpacking pal Buddy Irby:
“I remember when you loaded your home on your back and hiked 15 miles through the snow just to sleep under the stars.”
Too true. But here’s the thing, Bud:
I got old.
Dunno how that happened, really. Best I can figure I just kept going to bed at night and getting up in the morning until…one day…I was old.
For the record, I still have a tent.
The guys on my annual winter camping expedition would laugh me all the way into the dead of summer if I showed up in a Teardrop equipped with AC, television, fridge and built in kitchen.
Old I may be. But I still got my pride.
So, yeah, I’m still a so-called tent guy.
But here’s the thing.
The last time Jill and I were at Anastasia – in our condo-sized REI tent that, of late, had begun to spring leaks – we realized that we had been doing less and less camping in recent years.
And that the process of putting up and taking down a tent the size of Rhode Island – not to mention getting it home, hanging it up on the fence to dry out and then stuffing it back into its sack – had gotten more and more labor-intensive.
And with both of us now safely retired, we actually wanted to do more, not less camping.
This summer we will be spending a month in a cabin by a lovely lake near Perth, Canada. We have been there before, always driving for three days or so, checking into motels along the way and eating fast food.
This summer will be different. No more than six driving hours a day. We have already decided which state parks we will be checking into along the way.
And when we roll in each evening with our Teardrop there will be a cold bottle of wine in the fridge and food ready to cook on our propane grill.
If that makes us Glampers, so be it.
It’s a tiny rig to be sure. But it’s actually got an ample mattress, albeit in a sleeping space not much larger than the Apollo 7 astronauts had on their initial excursions into space.
Now if we can only figure out how to back the damned thing into a campsite without sending the neighbors into hysterics, life will be perfect.
Oh, did I mention that we’ve already gotten a pop-up tent that attaches to the roof rack of our Teardrop to give us extra living space?
Listen, pal, old habits are hard to break.
FreeGNV 