I had an upcoming family event in San Diego, and decided it was a great opportunity to drive there and back from Colorado, and camp along the way. A testing of the waters for the possibilities of slow & cheap travel now that I am FIREd, as well as a confidence building exercise after recently leaving a bad relationship. This would be the first time I'd ever camped alone, so I did have some anxiety around this.
I got a 2016 Subaru Crosstrek a few months back, and one of the reasons I wanted this car was because I would be able to lie entirely flat in the back, and could thus explore car camping, something I've done a single time before, and have wanted to explore more as a protected way to camp and a cheap method to travel overnight by car.
I picked up a few things to help make this happen:
- Therm-a-rest mat - $25 used off of Facebook Marketplace. It's a bit longer than what I need, but the price was right and it works great. I think it's a older model as you do have to manually blow it up, but it doesn't take much effort to do so.
- Sierra Designs women's sleeping bag - Also $25, and used a single time, from Facebook Marketplace. Very happy with the bag thus far, and as a bonus its material makes it really easy to shove into its storage bag. Made sure to get a women's-specific bag as well - my last sleeping bag was too long for me and left my feet cold, and I have since learned that it's best to have a bag that matches your height, and that women's bags have more insulation in the feet area. Not that I really needed the warmth for most of the trip, but will be good for future trips.
- Windshield sun shade - $6. I needed one of these anyhow given how hot my car gets in the sun, this served well as a privacy shield.
- Netted car window shades - $9 plus shipping. I bought these after reading someone's article on camping in a Subaru, as they make it possible to sleep with the windows rolled down while not letting any insects in. Very glad for this purchase - and the dark netting gives some additional privacy as a bonus.
First night was spent in Lower Piedra Campground close to Durango, CO. Pretty basic campsite with pit toilets and fire pit with attached grill. $27 for the night (paid in cash) which feels high for camping but based on some searching it seems this is the general price point for many campsites in Colorado these days. Pretty sparsely populated campground - and mostly RVs - and my site was right by a small river which made for nice background noise. This was the only site where I was able to build a fire, as everything west/south had fire restrictions or wood gathering restrictions.
I headed into New Mexico the next day. Did a bit of hiking in Bista/De-Na-Zin Wilderness, which was free, had few other visitors, with other worldly rock formations and very little shade. For Night 2, I camped at Bluewater Campground. This was a great campsite for the price - $8 a night with hot showers. You had to keep pushing the button to get the hot water out, but for that price I'm not complaining. Lake and nearby canyon were beautiful. Horse poop everywhere as there was a wild horse population in the area (with distant neighing at times), but it was mostly dried. I was lucky to be there on a weekday night, as the campsite was sparsely populated. There wasn't much tree or other separation between sites so I could see that being there when the site was at capacity could feel overcrowded. Nice & cool at night which helped me sleep well (along with my surprise hot shower!). High wind as well - I brought a campstove with butane and needed the case to block the wind, so I was able to make my dinner ramen and breakfast coffee & oatmeal successfully. Also had the chance to chat with a woman who'd been solo camping with her dog for years now and really enjoyed doing it, so got some good tips from her.
I headed west into Arizona the next morning. I stopped in Flagstaff for lunch and ended up paying $17 + tip for a fairly decent tamale, beans dumped directly out of a can, and a very sad salad. I either should have done my research or should have stuck to camp food, oops!
After a bit of kayaking on Lake Mary (with a $5 day use fee IIRC), I took a detour to Sedona for a short hike, and then treated myself to a $3 bag of Cheetos Puffs. This put me a bit late getting into my planned campsite in Prescott National Forest, and the site was completely full. I continued driving into the park and discovered a dispersed camping area, but all of those spots were full as well. As it was getting dark, I ended up driving down a random dirt road (and discovered the next morning the "road closed" sign, oops) and pulling off to the side once I found an area to do so. Some trees in the area were marked for removal, and a few had already been taken down, with holes remaining where there trunks were. This worked out very well for me, considering I otherwise would have had to dig my own poopin' hole. No time for dinner thanks to dusk, so I chowed down on a cucumber and prepped for bed. It was very unnerving being alone in a foreign park in the woods at night, and I had a terrible time falling asleep until I accidentally triggered my car alarm, promptly waking up everything in the area. I then realized that I was surrounded by birds and rodents and, in the distance, a barking dog, and really had nothing to worry about, and was eventually able to fall asleep. The next morning was lovely having absolutely no one around while I enjoyed my breakfast, and I'd like to work towards getting over my "being alone in the woods at night" anxiety to enjoy this style of camping more (the "in a locked car" part makes it feel silly, though to be fair my paranoid mind was worried about my open back windows). Price: $0!
I made the very intelligent decision to arrive in Joshua Tree the next day around noon (a $30 spurge - I hadn't originally had this on my schedule but the woman I chatted with in NM highly encouraged this visit), and the entire time I was in the park the temperature was in the triple digits. I had hoped to camp in the park, but learned that you had to pre-register, and I had zero internet as well as not nearly as much water as I probably needed. So I stuck to many short hikes as I worked my way northwest across the park, and ended up grabbing a campsite right outside the park, at Black Rock Canyon Campground.
This was $25 (and close enough to the suburbs that I could access internet to purchase in advance online), but I expected a higher price being so close to Joshua Tree. (There was dispersed camping on the end I came in, which would have been nice, but that would have been a looong drive back). It was a nice site, and a better planner than I would camp there and either hike Joshua Tree in the evening, or first thing in the morning. A fair number of people at the site, but I had a site at the edge of the campground and angled my car towards the park and the Joshua Trees so it didn't feel too overpeopled. Very beautiful, lots of interesting birds to watch and squirrels who were very interested in my meal. I picked up supplies to make wraps at a local Save a Lot, which ended up roughly the cost to buy a nice pre-made wrap, with plenty of leftovers.
The campsite had bathrooms with running water and sinks. I was very grateful for this as, when I filled my water container at the water pump, I failed to notice the many many bees clustered around the pump and spigot until several of them were already in my water bottle. Oops!
Next few nights were at an airbnb with a hot shower with a knob that I only had to twist once and the hot water kept coming out, which felt wonderful.
The trip back is a bit less exciting as I wanted to make good time (or as good of time as you can make when trying to drive anywhere near LA), and managed to get all the way across Nevada on Day 1. I took US 15, and camped at Virgin River Canyon Campground in the northwest corner of Arizona. Got there just as dusk hit, which incidentally was around the time the temperature dipped below 100 degrees fahrenheit. This site ended up costing $0 despite my best efforts to pay for it. There was a QR code at each campsite you could use to pay. I could not get any network access, and they neither provided wifi nor accepted cash. I figured if a camp host came and bothered me, I'd explain the predicament and try to give them cash. No one came and bothered me, so I figured they must not need my money if they made it this difficult to pay them. I was the only one in my part of the campsite until later that evening when I was in bed, and a camper and car rolled in. It was an absolutely beautiful area that I slept terribly in, thanks to the heat (and thanks to a mystery object that landed in my eye and stayed there until mid-morning the next day).
The rest of the trip I treated myself. Lunch was in Richfield, Utah at a place called The Ideal Dairy. Place was pretty legit, my milkshake & Santa Fe beef bagel sandwich were heavy and luscious. I think I paid around $14 with tip.
I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express in Silt, CO using some IHG points for the final night (so another $0 night). After the poor sleep I got the night before, it felt very luxurious, and I enjoyed the labor-free breakfast buffet the next morning very much.
Overall the trip felt very successful. I hadn't set a budget, nor did I track spending outside of what I noted above, but my main expense was gas. Nice cheap way to travel and enjoy nature.
I'm hoping to do some more car camping soon, possibly a drive to Iowa as well as overnight trips to nearby hiking/kayaking destinations. A few things I'm wanting to figure out are:
- More privacy/light-blocking. Thinking it would be pretty easy to make a curtain for the back window, and something curtain-like to hang across the front row of seats. Ideally something a bit translucent, similar to the window covers, so I could have some visibility outside.
- Better food strategy. I had a bin and a bag for food and then other bags for other food related items. I brought a kitchen pan, pot, bowl, set of utensils, etc. I really need a mess kit. Something bear-resistant for food storage could be useful as well, as I worry about camping in bear country with the food inside my car - if I put the windows down, would a bear try to get inside? That'll keep me up at night in the woods if I don't solve that problem.
- I only needed the sleeping bag the first night, and it was too warm after that, so I might bring a light sheet as well in the future, as well as a battery-powered fan for nights with little breeze.
- Investing in a road atlas. I checked one out of the library for this trip, and was glad I did for the times I didn't have internet access. Good place to keep notes on good campsites, etc. as well.
Anyhow, this was a very long post. Hope this was interesting or useful to anyone who read through it, and am very open to advice and tips from more seasoned car campers!
