(See also: the related phenomenon of #VanLife, which I have a hard time reading about without getting so annoyed that my heart goes arrhythmic.) Where camping and camping-adjacent outdoor activities (canoeing, climbing, angling, etc) were previously conceived as a way to rekindle a relationship with nature, that relationship has become just another luxe commodity. Outdoorsy brands like Patagonia, North Face, and Arc’teryx have grown from purveyors heavy-duty performance equipment to coveted dadcore lifestyle brands-allowing you to dress like a serious rock climber, even if you don’t know a bowline from a belay. The rise in popularity of more luxurious outdoor accommodations (the nauseatingly termed “glamping”) and expanded access to cell and wi-fi networks, have removed perceived “barriers to entry,” leading to would-be-campers across Canada (and North America) reporting an uptick in interest. A 2019 Global News story pegged the price of a basic outlay of gear-tents, sleeping bags, heavy-duty backpacks, bug balms, etc.-and reservations between $978 and $1,333 CDN. Like so many activities, camping-roughly defined as lodging temporarily somewhere in the out-of-doors-has become a lifestyle. I saw a $300 backpacking tarp the other day at the camping store!” We're buying RVs and campers that are just ridiculous. We're paying to reserve campsites, which are just parking lots. “The most wholesome form of camping is going out with a bedroll, and a fire, and a can of beans and sleeping out under the stars. “It's turning into a pastime for the affluent,” he says. In a damning indictment, he compares contemporary camping to golf. He is, he tells me over the phone from Edmonton, “taking back camping for the people.”īeyond the appeal of his content-which combines man-vs.-nature survivalism, ASMR, and the camping scene from Fubar-Camping Steve’s approach is refreshing in part because camping itself can sometimes seem so rarefied. He forgoes both the back-to-the-land foraging and the pricier gear many campers pay hundreds-if not thousands-of dollars for, all in the pursuit of bushwhacking primitivism. He starts fires with hand sanitizer, cooks in closed quarters with propane grills, and is the only camping YouTuber I’ve ever seen who rigs his pop-up tent with a CO2 monitor, precisely because he cooks in closed quarters with propane grills. He “hunkers down” (another of his favourite turns) in a rented U-Haul in the long-term parking lot of the Edmonton International Airport, braving the elements while avoiding the prying eyes and piercing Maglites of security personnel. He builds rafts out of rain barrels and floats downriver. He camps under tarps in residential areas. It’s also, in the case of popular programs like Alone or Naked and Afraid, about that more modern romance of going on TV to win a bunch of money.Ĭamping Steve is no modern primordial man, born naked into nature’s unfeeling bounty. It’s that romance of (to paraphrase Thoreau) existing more deliberately, of fronting only the essential facts, of sucking all the marrow out of life itself. The current vogue in survivalism-popularized by programs like Survivorman, Alone and Naked and Afraid-vaunt some primal relationship to nature, where the aspiring outdoors-person must start fires from scratch, trap their own food with deadfalls, and fashion sun-shielding bonnets out of woven reeds. In time, while exploring the niche of people who forgo tents in favour of camping in heavy-duty hammocks, I stumbled into “Urban Stealth Camping With Hammock In Residential Area,” a video posted by a charming Albertan named Steve Wallis, who calls himself “Camping Steve.” (Really, it was this latter facet that kept me hooked: witnessing the ability of the human mind rambling in total isolation.) From there, I developed an interest in camping YouTubers, who similarly recorded their own solo survivalism (mis)adventures. A few years back, while severely depressed, I mainlined the History Channel reality series Alone, in which survivalists attempt to outlast each other in Canada’s most unforgiving hinterlands-with minimal supplies and no crew (all the footage is recorded by the participants with handheld camcorders), armed with their bushwhacking know-how and ability to withstand their own company. Like any worthwhile obsession, I came across Wallis while tumbling deep down a YouTube rabbit hole.
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