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| Photo by dziner |
Cutting a live tree for fire wood while camping is a good idea. (True/False)
Don't know? Definitely know but wondering why I'd ask? Read on:
Yesterday morning, Meghan J. Ward's outdoor adventure blog post promised to show me "5 Steps to Eco-Friendly Camping." It's never too early to up your environmental friendliness, so I clicked in. Each tip held a piece of unique advice and I nodded along as I read.
Then I got to tip #4. "Instead of cutting wood directly off a living tree, use fallen timber."
Seem to go without saying? A year ago, I would have thought so, too, right along with A. being quiet after 10pm (insert stern look here); and B. not putting up your tent two feet away from an established camper (more stern looks). However, after experiencing real-world infringements on all of these situations, I have learned not to be so liberal in pairing "common" with "sense."
*Gasp* There are actually still campers out there who would disobey any of these rules? (Please note my sarcasm.) If your face legitimately just bore the marks of incredulity, let me spin you a tale of just one such happenstance.
Last June, my climbing partner and I embarked on The Most Epic Trip, a six-month climbing trip across North America benefitting Access Fund. We set up camp at our first stop, City of Rocks National Reserve, in the wee hours of morning. From our groggy view, the area looked like any other campsite.
After a frigid night that ended with being encased in frost by morning, I got up to brush my teeth and prepare for climbing day 1/180. As I was pearling up my smile, I spied a plume of dust rising from the road and watched as a hard-faced ranger rolled up, yanked on the parking brake and jumped out toward me with her citation pad.
"Day one. Great start," I muttered.
She barked out questions as she checked the campsite for signs of a chainsaw or any downed green wood. I wondered why anyone would bring a chainsaw to a National Reserve, and bewildered at the thought of someone trying to build a fire with smoke-inducing fresh timber.
She was quite furious. Turns out where we were camping was not a campsite at all. I quickly told her our story and how we were working alongside one of the nation's top conservation organizations; as she listened, her rigidity loosened.
It was then that she let us in on her concern — seems some folks had camped there the night before, built their own fire ring and had used a chainsaw to cut limbs off a few of the area's rare trees.
*Smacking head*
May you never doubt the witlessness that can be exemplified by our fellow man.
If you're one blessed with common sense, then yes, this might go without saying. For all others: Take a minute to collect firewood from the ground if legal, or purchase clean wood from a nearby shop if not. Oh yeah, and leave your 1-in-the-morning-drunken-joke-telling-loud-laughing-country-playing-rock-n-roll-swearing shenanigans at home. Please.
Consider this my public service announcement bolstering Meghan's already well-qualified tips. ;)
Great post, Gina! I think it's important to keep sharing. Working with Parks Canada to write the new camping brochure for Banff National Park I got an earful of stories about campers (leaving a rice cooker running?). But they weren't telling me the stories just so that we could laugh or be shocked at peoples' lack of awareness. We were using theses scenarios to create helpful materials that could be understand by all sorts of people.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! If I think back to my early days of backpacking and camping I'm sure I could find a cringe-worthy example of bad behavior, but I like to think I've learned over time. I usually do dispersed camping on BLM/NF land and avoid campgrounds so that 1) I can avoid the 1-am-drunken-campfire-song-neighbors or 2) I can BE the 1-am-drunken-campfire-song-singing person without bothering anyone else. It's the same reason I tend to drop my pack and wander around for a while when I get to a backcountry camp spot. So many people stop at the first obvious site, but if you spend a bit of time looking around it's easy to find a spot away from anyone else even at popular destinations.
ReplyDeleteThis past weekend I had an experience with lack-of-common-sense in the backcountry. Our group of three tents were base camped at a lake, a bit away from the well-used campsites near the trail and perched on a nice rock outcropping with a view. We spent all of day 2 off climbing a peak, and when we got back to camp two tents were crammed right in the middle of our little community, next to our tents, close enough that we could hear these guys breathe. Now, when space is limited I have no problem being friendly and camping close, but there were plenty of other spots around this beautiful valley and lake. Eventually, after one of my climbing partners made it clear to them that she was uncomfortable with their direct line of sight into her tent and that "she felt her personal space was being attacked" they passive aggressively moved their tents to another perfectly reasonable site. One of the guys apologized, explaining that he was uncomfortable with their campsite choice but he was overruled by his common-sense free friends. I was mostly annoyed by their "well, clearly you're not comfortable with us here so I guess we'll just move then, even though it is inconvenient" attitude. Ugh.
Idiots riding dirt bikes at 9 am is worse than the drunk at 1 am dude.
ReplyDeleteIdiots who ride dirt bikes before 10 am are worse. Staying up late to party is fine, try to move away, but I hate dirt bikers. Or fat kids on atv
ReplyDeleteI love your comments, NC. ha ha
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