When do you set up camp?

[MoreGone]

On those multi-day multi-destination trips, when do you set up camp?

Do you keep going until you reach a pre-planned place?
Or do you try to setup camp after X amount of Miles, or at X O'clock?

As a planner, I usually know where I want to camp each night and sometimes that is a bit ambitious. It also removes that feeling of freedom to explore since I feel like I am on my Somewhere. Sometimes we get to the spot so late we barely have the energy to set up camp, prepare a quick meal and eat.

So I am curious how you approach where you stop each night.

I think I might want to try an approach where I camp at the best spot I can find around a certain time so we have some time to rest at camp, cook without a big rush etc.

 

[4wheelspulling]

Hello,
Your last sentence is my answer most of the time! Especially , if I am traveling in a new area, and now my health dictates how long and far I can go! I still tent camp most of the time with tent on the ground, so nice if I have some daylight left to pitch camp for the night. I just bought this pop up camper this spring, so here is a picture of my first real night of impromptu camping, with the new camper anyway. Benz.

 

[MoreGone]

Hello,
I just bought this pop up camper this spring, so here is a picture of my first real night of impromptu camping, with the new camper anyway. Benz.

That should prove to be nice! Bed = Always ready

 

[brien]

We have three kids so we typically start looking for camp at 3pm, that gives us an hour or so to find a decent dispersed spot and still have time to set up camp and get dinner cooked for the kids before they start melting down.

 

[justjames]

The wife and I just got back from a week on the road and we had this very conversation. We're definitely in the "no planned destination" camp as it takes away too much of the freedom of being out there. Our new end of day trigger is 4pm. Some of that is being senior citizens and some from wanting time to relax. Does this mean we always stop at 4, no but we are seriously looking for the spot be it dispersed or campground. Winter time and shorter days will bump that up to 3.

 

[RedRob]

Backpacking we always looked for a spot around 16:00. You’re ready by then, and it seems one pays a steeper price for a bad spot or pushing on too far when backpacking.

Traveling in the truck, heck, if you really have to you can sleep in the cab, so there’s more flexibility. Still, I like to be all set up before dinner, and I like the dishes done before sunset. I have some meals that need work and some simple meals partly so that if I get to a camp site late I don’t have to worry so much about timing. Sometimes you find a spot that’s just too cool to drive past and your travels for the day end early. Plan easy days and have fun, and if you have to really push occasionally that’s okay, just don’t try to do it all the time or you might as well have stayed home and mowed the lawn.

 

[Craig M]

When we first started remote and dispersed camping (only about 10 years now), I was always a bit anxious if we didn't have a planned destination / site. Even knowing where we planned to stay didn't help much because we never knew if our target would be taken.

As the years have gone by, we've dialed in our gear and and gotten way more confident in our abilities to adapt. We have a couple sleeping options we bring along and all are pretty easy and quick to set up. During our last trip (9 days in Colorado in July) we stayed at 5 different sites and arrived at none before dark. And only one of those sites were targeted, and we'd stayed in none of them before (though I was aware of a couple of them from previous trips and scouting).

Nowadays we usually just put together a loose itinerary so that we have a general idea of what stuff we're going to need, and leave a lot of flexibility in between. We know our routines very well so when we decide on a spot and configuration, we both jump right in and get it knocked out.

Here's a time lapse of finding our second site this year.


This was the earliest we arrived at a spot. My starter went out just before leaving Lake City and heading up the loop. Luckily I have friends in Lake City that were already making a trip down to Gunnison, and they picked me up a starter. This video starts about 30 minutes after I had slapped the new starter on and repacked everything. It was nice knowing I had all of the tools and was able to do the swap pretty quickly, though the tarp I was laying on didn't help much with the rocks. :o

 

[RedPreRunner4x4]

Depends on if I've been in the area before or not and how many days I'm traveling! I definitely try to get the basics set up before dark... tent, fire built, kitchen set up. Cooking in the moonlight doesnt bother me as much and if that's the case I keep it real simple. I normally try to start looking for a place to pull off a little earlier (4-5pm) if I've got several days of riding but if its just a short weekend then I'll push it to 6pm sometimes to try and get more trail in. Also if I'm solo i don't mind riding a little later into the night. If I'm leading other vehicles I may stop earlier because socializing around camp is part of the experience too!

 

[systemdelete]

Different trips have different goals, lately this summer I've been volunteering a lot to camp at a trailhead and wait for scouts that are completing multi day orienteering treks to get them rides back to where they started. (Basecamp was about 40 miles away by road) That's more of just hanging out in an extremely remote place with another leader for hours upon hours. Last personal trip I did was an exploration of a bunch of logging roads my dad had started exploring with his side by side so there I just stopped whenever I felt like it. One day I stopped at a nice spot for lunch and decided to make a night of it. other days I drove until near dark. When I did a chunk of the AT years back it was ten miles per day min. then I could crash.

 

[RedRob]

Just yesterday a fire diverted me from where I was planning to camp. I did not have a “Plan B.” So I figured one out and headed that way. Then something interesting looking popped up, so I went to “Plan C.” It didn’t work out. “Plan D” was “Hope for the best,” so when I came to an acceptable looking place I just stopped looking. Only 15:00, but I also knew I had to find a new way home today, so it just seemed like enough adventure for one day.