Nature provides the sustenance our spirits crave as we journey towards our destiny in the Great Wide World. We should take every opportunity to get out there and explore; learning what she has to teach us. Vickie and I are delving into the possibilities to do exactly that, as we transition into ” The Golden Years.” I think our connection with nature becomes even more vital and meaningful as we mature.
“In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
When we were young, we would race off to the wilderness with backpacks loaded to the bursting point and hike deep into the wilderness, seeking the succor and solitude that only nature can provide. Heck, we just went backpacking a few months ago; that’s when we decided we needed a smoother path to tread as we mosey into “The Golden Years.”
The Middle Way
We have an RV that we use to get out there and explore too but it’s big and it’s a lot more expensive to drive than when we bought it, (about 3 times more; but I don’t want to get off track, crying about runaway inflation). The RV’s perfect for heading off to warmer climes, (Texas) for the winter, when the north wind’s howling around the eaves at our little cottage, but it’s not designed for the gravel roads of Colorado’s mountains and forests.
So after our backpacking adventure we began to ponder what the middle way might look like. We already have a 1 person tent, a 2 two person tent and a three person tent but I can’t stand up completely in any of them. We used to have a pop up trailer too, a decade or so back and we’ve studied the various 4×4 adventure trailers looking for the perfect way to explore nature in our neighborhood.
Memories of my childhood got me to thinking about a canvas tent. I remember back in the early sixties, going on vacation to the Great Smoky Mountains in a big three room canvas tent that dad bought at Sears & Roebuck; a Coleman, I think. It was huge. we could fit all 6 of us in it, with room to spare. What a monster, it probably weighed close to a hundred pounds with all the poles and stakes.
We continued to camp every Summer, (Spring and Fall too). Dad built custom wooden kitchen boxes to store food and provide a cook surface. We’d jam everything in the Ford Country Squire (early sixties SUV), along with the six of us and hit the road. Some of the names are still alive in my memory, over a half century later; Apple River Canyon, Geode State Park, The Palisades. A love affair was born and I was hooked.
Then I got the backpacking bug; I wanted to explore every wild place I could find and I did but packing everything in on your back is an adventure in minimalism. There’s no big, spacious warm tent, no glowing mantles on the Coleman Lantern. Just boiling water on the miniature Svea 123 stove was a chore; bacon, eggs, pancakes and fresh ground coffee were out of the question.
Under The Big Top
Canvas tents have gone out of favor with the recreational crowd since the sixties for a few reasons, primarily because they’re heavy and expensive. They’ve never gone out of favor with the folks that actually go out into the wilds and stay for extended periods. In hunting camp, canvas domiciles outnumber their plastic counterparts by a considerable margin. A quality canvas tent isn’t really more expensive than plastic, considering it can last for multiple generations when it’s well cared for.
A plastic tent won’t do that. The UV rays from the sun can lay waste to a plastic tent in just a few seasons and the Walmart variety seem to be designed to fail when you need them most. At least that’s what I’ve witnessed at campgrounds over the years. The rain comes, the wind picks up and the poor bastards are running for the car, their tent flapping in the wind, like so many prayer flags, high in the Himalayas.
I’ve experienced it personally with a fairly stout one, in a crazy spring storm down in Texas. A fiberglass pole shattered in the heavy wind and the tent fabric snapped and popped all night long. Junior slept right through the entire ordeal but I stood guard, to make sure the fabric stayed intact until morning. A solid, heavy, well-anchored canvas tent will pretty much stand against almost anything nature can throw at it.
“It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds for the opportunity to rain on a tent.” ― Dave Barry
So, we bought one. We poked around on the internet for a week or so doing the research, reading hunting, camping and glamping blogs. Watching YouTube videos and studying reviews and ratings. Most canvas tents are made by American companies that actually make them right here in America and they back their products with amazing warranties as if their tents are supposed to be handed down to your grandchildren. That’s refreshing in the planned obsolescence, made in China shit-show, that dominates a significant portion of the recreational industry.
Test Drive
We gave it a test drive the other day to get an idea of what life in the middle would be like. There’s definitely an investment of energy with a big canvas tent. I can set up any of the other three tents we have in about five minutes and the RV has electronic leveling and slide outs, so it takes about the same, perhaps 7 minutes when I include hooking up the water, sewer and electric.
The newest member to the 3MPH gear closet has more stakes and tie downs than all the other tents together. Twenty-six stakes and 13 tie downs; so we practiced once in the backyard to get a feel for it. About 15-20 minutes if the dogs don’t get in the way but they have every time so far, whether we’re putting it up or taking it down. Thirty minutes at least with dogs.
The big question then was; can we fit all the luxuries we wanted, food, gear, tent, dogs and two golden age retirees into the Subaru for a respite from the High Plains heat wave into the cool Colorado Rockies? Yes indeed; the dogs had to sacrifice a bit of romping room in the back but I promised them cooler weather and they settled in comfortably.
I wanted to go straight away to the middle of nowhere on some desolate Forest Service Road, as far away from humanity as possible but Vickie outvoted me and said we should go to a nice campground up in the mountains where we could test out the middle way around a few other like minded folks. So it was off to the Wet Mountains, San Isabel National Forest and Ophir Creek Campground.
A lot has changed since the 1960’s. The population has nearly tripled; from around 3 million to nearly 8 million. That’s a lot of people and camping has become quite popular. They keep a few First Come First Serve sites at the Forest Service Campgrounds but sadly you almost need to file an online reservation, (at least 4 days out) to secure the good sites. And humanity was on full display at Ophir Creek.
The folks to the east of us had a one year old with night terrors; screaming like a mating Mountain Lion, late into the night. The folks on the west had a 15 passenger van and I never did get an actual count but a conservative estimate was like 8 or 9 kids; noisy kids. So solitude was definitely not in the cards for our little Middle Way – Test Drive. I’m going to follow my instincts on the next glamping adventure and head for some dispersed camping spot in the middle of nowhere, where families fear to tread.
One thing that hasn’t changed is the beauty of nature. And as we hiked away from the campground, the noise receded and nature took over; providing solitude and sustenance. We’re looking forward to getting “out there” more frequently, seeking the succor that nature provides, to deal with a world that seems to be moving faster and faster. Nature slows life down to a speed my spirit understands now, in “The Golden Years” just like it did in the 1960’s.
“There is beauty, heartbreaking beauty, everywhere.” ― Edward Abbey
Here’s a link to the image galleries – Ophir Creek and Saguache Creek.