there are several threads about defining "overlanding" and after this weekend...my definition of overlanding is "travel and camping as far from campgrounds as possible"
the wife and i started the traveling/camping thing right after we first met in 2018. we do a little bit of everything from desert camping in the back of the tundra to pulling our camp trailer into state parks and using it as a base camp. still being fairly new to this, our experiences with state parks have been generally in the off season where we have literally been the only campers in the area and in the case of spending a week at vogel state park in georgia during the month of january, we even had an entire heated bath house to ourselves.
this last weekend, brother-in-law invited us to go with them to buccaneer state park in waveland, ms (about 2 hrs away) just outside of bay st. louis. we havent gone anywhere in a while and although its peak season, we figured 'how bad could it be', and hitched up the camp trailer and on friday afternoon, headed thru the 5 oclock traffic taking I-10 thru new orleans and along the coast to our destination.
its been 100 degrees in the swamps and with all the rain and humidity, its pretty much a miserable sauna being outside. the campground is right on the gulf, so i immediately noticed the nice breeze as we got closer and i was feeing hopeful that the temps would be bearable and that the weekend just might end up being enjoyable even though we were in mississippi.
as soon as we entered the state park, we were greeted with swarms of unattended, very young children riding everything from motorized scooters, to bicycles and even some driving custom golf carts that they could barely see over the steering wheel. it was chaos. as we idled thru the swarm looking for our campsite, it soon became obvious that our site was dead center of the loudest and most crowded area. right across from us was a giant diesel pusher pulling an equally long trailer loaded with golf carts and junk. they had 5 giant dogs and and equal amount of kids. one of the giant dogs came over by us and immediately hunched over to produce a pile that would make an elephant blush. i looked up to see the owner actually scowl at me for noticing what his dog was doing. he obviously wasnt going to go pick it up and apparently i was "the bad guy" for witnessing it.
all i can say is that the rudeness and self-centeredness was on a level i never expected. i know theres no need to bitch and complain, and this past experience has just really solidified to me the reason people put in the extra time and money to be set up to be in remote areas, far away from this type of craziness.
we took our bikes and did some riding and ended up going into bay st. louis where the wife ended up meeting a local artist and bought some of her work and then we did some eating and drinking and mainly just sightseeing. it seemed like most of the folk in the campground just stayed there on their little plot cooking and drinking beer while their kids and dogs just ran loose all over. it seemed to be everyone in that area doing it, so apparently that is just an accepted thing. i was tripping out on how some folk will spend several $100,000 on giant motorhomes just to sit in a crowd and not go anywhere. and the people are so lazy that they have to have golf carts just to get get around in the campground.
a very interesting and a very weird experience....
the wife and i started the traveling/camping thing right after we first met in 2018. we do a little bit of everything from desert camping in the back of the tundra to pulling our camp trailer into state parks and using it as a base camp. still being fairly new to this, our experiences with state parks have been generally in the off season where we have literally been the only campers in the area and in the case of spending a week at vogel state park in georgia during the month of january, we even had an entire heated bath house to ourselves.
this last weekend, brother-in-law invited us to go with them to buccaneer state park in waveland, ms (about 2 hrs away) just outside of bay st. louis. we havent gone anywhere in a while and although its peak season, we figured 'how bad could it be', and hitched up the camp trailer and on friday afternoon, headed thru the 5 oclock traffic taking I-10 thru new orleans and along the coast to our destination.
its been 100 degrees in the swamps and with all the rain and humidity, its pretty much a miserable sauna being outside. the campground is right on the gulf, so i immediately noticed the nice breeze as we got closer and i was feeing hopeful that the temps would be bearable and that the weekend just might end up being enjoyable even though we were in mississippi.
as soon as we entered the state park, we were greeted with swarms of unattended, very young children riding everything from motorized scooters, to bicycles and even some driving custom golf carts that they could barely see over the steering wheel. it was chaos. as we idled thru the swarm looking for our campsite, it soon became obvious that our site was dead center of the loudest and most crowded area. right across from us was a giant diesel pusher pulling an equally long trailer loaded with golf carts and junk. they had 5 giant dogs and and equal amount of kids. one of the giant dogs came over by us and immediately hunched over to produce a pile that would make an elephant blush. i looked up to see the owner actually scowl at me for noticing what his dog was doing. he obviously wasnt going to go pick it up and apparently i was "the bad guy" for witnessing it.
all i can say is that the rudeness and self-centeredness was on a level i never expected. i know theres no need to bitch and complain, and this past experience has just really solidified to me the reason people put in the extra time and money to be set up to be in remote areas, far away from this type of craziness.
we took our bikes and did some riding and ended up going into bay st. louis where the wife ended up meeting a local artist and bought some of her work and then we did some eating and drinking and mainly just sightseeing. it seemed like most of the folk in the campground just stayed there on their little plot cooking and drinking beer while their kids and dogs just ran loose all over. it seemed to be everyone in that area doing it, so apparently that is just an accepted thing. i was tripping out on how some folk will spend several $100,000 on giant motorhomes just to sit in a crowd and not go anywhere. and the people are so lazy that they have to have golf carts just to get get around in the campground.
a very interesting and a very weird experience....
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