We camped a lot when I was a growing up. Fishing and staying the whole weekend on the deck boat, tent camping with no amenities, pop up camper, travel trailer and finally by the time I was in my teens we had a motorhome. And I camped some with my oldest kids but haven't camped in a long time. Until last summer.

I went on a bear photography trip last July and was very excited that it would be camping. We flew to a remote area in Alaska in a float plane (out of Homer). There was a 3 man crew with all of the camping gear, cooking tent, toilet tent (very basic - toilet seat over 5 gallon bucket) and the camp was all set up (2 man tents). Every thing had to be brought in by plane and paid for by the group. So no showers (water too heavy to fly), no generators so no charging of camera batteries, minimal supplies. Cool! This kind of camping is fun! (In my experience, the wife/mom has the most work on camping trips with all of the packing, food, cooking, cleaning and unpacking so this show up and everything is taken care of for you camping is nice. We planned on shooting from sun up to sun down so no time to do the camp work even if we wanted.

Anyway, we hiked to a spot on the river the first afternoon and photographed the bears while standing in knee deep water. Even though we wore waders the water was so very cold. We photographed again the next day but by late evening the wind had picked up. That night, the wind was horrible and blew down 3 of the 5 tents. We (11 people) spent 36 hours holed up in the remaining 2 tents while the wind howled around us. You couldn't even stand up straight when you went outside. They estimated the wind was ~70 MPH.

Finally the wind died down enough that the float plane could fly in and pick us up. Thanks goodness for satellite phones so they could communicate with the pilot. Our group was larger than the plane so it took all day to fly out two groups of people and all of the mostly ruined gear had to stay there that day. Flying out there was an hour. Flying back into the wind was between 3 and 4 hours. The first group had enough time to shower, eat and catch our flight back to Anchorage for flights that night. The second group couldn't get back in time and had to spend another night. Thankfully I was in the first group. :)

Here are a few pics from the good part of the camping trip.

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Cindy, I think you've got us all beat. I was content with no more excitement than the sounds of raccoons knocking the metal lids off trash cans in a state park and fighting loudly over the pickings in the middle of the night.

Love tent camping! My fiancé and I met in Montana and Glacier National Park is our favorite place to camp. We bike camp and canoe camp. I love camp cooking especially. We have a "cooler pannier" on one of our bikes and around 4 or 5 o'clock, we check out a local market wherever we are and find something good to cook up for dinner. It's inspiring to hear that you're still camping after 41 years!

Our backs aren't good enough to tent camp & sleep on the ground. We have a pop out trailer that is super light & is towed by our car. Not much stuff in it (but has electric so I can sew, have my cups of tea & music or see a movie, all a requirement!). We each have a bed that is comfortable, and the pups snuggle down with each of us. Good way to vacation, and most of all, its clean. We camp only in safe areas, and are always very aware of what's going on around us.