Got a bit of cabin fever waiting for summer to roll around while dreaming about camping. Trust me I know exactly how your feeling. Till that glorious time comes I’m going to keep my blog alive with more than just my 52 Week Hike Challenge by starting a Camp Wisconsin Series. Every Wednesday of the week I’ll release a blog about somewhere I have personally camped in Wisconsin. Camping my whole life I have a few places to talk about including state parks, state and national forest, county parks, and campgrounds.  I’ll also include some info about the amenities specific to each place.

I’m motivated to do this for 2 different reasons. One being to promote all the great camping available in our beautiful state of Wisconsin and to make people realize no matter their gear or skill level with the outdoors they can and should camp.

Promoting camping in Wisconsin is important to me because I understand that most of us are in our adult never can find time busy lives and have to plan out vacations on limited time and money. Wisconsin is perfect for this situation. Found out you have the weekend off there’s a place close to home for that, have a week off and want to spend it on the beach or lake there’s a place for that, need a place to get mud on the tires we have that. Cant afford state park rates there’s cheap or free places everywhere you just have to research or follow this blog 🙂 I know this state may not be your first thought when thinking vacation or have mountain views at that but it is truly beautiful and family friendly with so many different type of campgrounds to choose from. Wisconsin deserves to be explored, remember the Ice Age created many must see geological features.

Now lets talk gear, I have gone from camping with my parents to using all my parents gear to me putting together what I had hoping to survive which usually just included a tent, cooler and a way to start a fire. Eventually camping became more serious to me and my gear slowly started upgrading. I got a good reliable tent, sleeping bag, air mattress, cooking stove, foldable table, a cooler that held ice. After Phoenix we upgraded even more to a large up in 1 min family tent, screen tent, totes to organize everything, portable highchair, solar power equipment and even a fan. Our final upgrade came when we started backpacking as a family. This is when weight truly matters and we went with as much ultralight gear as possible and affordable.

Skills needed range widely on the type of camping your doing. Camping at a full amenity campground/cabin/lodge is by far the easiest way to go with everything all in one area. Then there is backcountry camping where its in your best interest to have survival skills. In general think about your necessities to living, shelter, food and water. So average skills you need to have include how to set up your tent and how your going to prepare your food weather it be on stove/grill or do you have to start and cook over a fire? Is the water available drinkable or do you need a filtration system? Last note remember to always check the weather and dress appropriately.

I hope throughout all of this it motivates someone to start planning out their camping trip before summer even arrives. Remember you don’t have to have top of line gear either. Rummage sales, goodwill, thrift shops, Wal-Mart, Schnitzler’s Sport Store, even your parents garage all house great affordable quality gear that will help with making lifelong memories.

I would also like to point out that there are physical, mental, emotional and social benefits to camping or just being outdoors in general that only the outdoors can bring.

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