Whether you’re a newbie or you’ve been camping since you can walk, we are all human and all make mistakes or forget things once in a while (or regularly, with myself). Here are some of the typical camping mistakes that everyone will make at one time or another:
> Forgetting Toilet Paper
This is my most common mistake, embarrassingly. Not exactly the end of the world (as long as you stick to number ones!), but always makes me feel pretty mingin’ (Scottish word for gross or disgusting) by the end of a camping weekend.
> Pitching a tent on an area that SEEMS flat…but turns out not to be.
This mistake is usually only realised in the middle of the night, when you’ve either got a hump of mud underneath you, skewing your spine in a variety of manners, or you find yourself pressed against the side of your tent/partner multiple times throughout the night, as you realise you’re on a slope.
>Leaving late
I feel like because a camping trip normally starts with a car journey, and it’s all in your own hands it’s easy to be chilled out about what time you hit the road. Which is, of course, one of the fantastic things about camping. But if you find yourself stuck in traffic or lost (like we were), you usually find pitching your tent in the dark or rain is never as easy nor as fun as it would have been had you left at half 10 like you planned.
> Getting that packing balance all wroooooong
We are ALWAYS overpacked or underpacked! I find if I’m heading out on a hill-walk, or a hike and camp, packing is easier as there’s such limited space, it is literally the bare essentials. Whereas when we camp fairly near the car, it’s too easy to pack the car full of items we don’t particularly need. We’ll either have a ridiculously full car, then realise we don’t need or won’t use half of the things we’ve packed, OR, I become so aware that I normally over-pack, that I end up completely underpacking and forgetting essentials.
> Forgetting the map!
See link above in “Leaving Late” section
. Don’t rely on sat nav. ALWAYS BRING A MAP! Mine now sits in my car and does not move!
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