Camping in a Pandemic World

Read my review of Stone Creek Campground on TheDyrt.com

Stone Creek Campground sits just above the mountain tourist town of Idyllwild, California at 6000 feet of elevation. It’s a simple campground with basic amenities found in Mount San Jacinto State Park. The sites are big and private. Hiking trails leave right from the camp. Plenty of pine and manzanita trees offer spots for your hammock, and it’s only a few hours from most of the metro areas in Southern California.

By late July last year I had spent more than 40 nights in a tent or car camping. Any other summer, any other year, a quick weekend trip would be a no brainer, but under the shadow of COVID-19 even something as seemingly socially distanced as camping seemed like it could be fraught with danger. Leaving the house anytime has been anxiety heightening. Not only because of the danger of contracting the virus, but even considering the ethicalness of potentially passing the virus unknowingly. I sure as hell don’t want this thing, but even more so, I don’t want to be the reason someone else gets it, gets sick or even dies.

With decidedly less safe travel options, canceled visits to and by family, closed campsites it wasn’t until near the end of summer our family finally took the opportunity to sleep in a tent, to have a campfire, to risk it, and it really did feel like a risk.

Booking the campsite was somewhat different from normal. Many campgrounds hadn’t been opened yet, and there were warnings that reservations may be canceled if new California State restrictions were instituted. I always do a lot of research going to a new campground. I read reviews. I look for tips that might indicate the best campsite or to find a place I know we’ll like. I do that despite plenty of experience stumbling randomly into the best or worst sites regardless of my efforts, but this time I was doing it with COVID-19 on the brain.

I used Google Earth to scope out the campsite assuming we wouldn’t be leaving it as often. I chose the campground specifically for the lack of fancy amenities like flushing toilets or showers knowing that would limit the campground to campers who were more accustomed to camping. I made sure it was small. Less campsites meant less people, and there were multiple nearby campgrounds with more reviews, more photos and closer in proximity to the town that would draw a more party crowd.

I also chose Stone Creek because of its distance to our home base in San Diego. If everything went to hell, and we felt we weren’t in a safe environment we could get there and back to the safety of home on a single tank of gas. The coronavirus has become the pervasive invader into all of our plans, thoughts and 2020 experiences.

In the end, my worrying was for naught. With the exception of a check-in moment with a park ranger where they handed me a parking permit while we were both wearing masks our weekend was completely coronavirus free. We still wore masks when going to the bathroom, and took them along on the fairly vertical hikes up Mount San Jacinto, but otherwise it was just camping. Fires, contemplation, reading, napping, bird watching, waiting on the stars and taking in all the sights, sounds and smells of the woods. It was just camping, and it felt great.

The relaxation and freedom that came from escaping the daily routine of disinfecting deliveries, avoiding pedestrians and basically not leaving the house for five months was almost overwhelming. By nature I have a hard time sitting still, and maintain a high level of nervous anxiety at all times. Being out in the woods felt like the first time I was able to let down my guard this year. We don’t realize it, but the effort it takes to be vigilant is exhausting. At least in the woods we only had to worry about bears, mountain lions, rattle snakes and squirrels infected by the plague.

With the spare time I did have I was able to let my mind wander. Some highlights from my ever-present pocket note pad:

• I can see so many paths, each with pieces of a whole, and a complete puzzle at the end.

• Through the frame of manzanita trees into a pine forest the ground drops away. A nearby woodpecker taps morse code into a tree trunk, and the whispery whistling of hummingbird wings fills in the gaps.

• What is it about peeing outside that feels so inherently masculine?

• Have you ever been inside of a dream, knowing it was a dream, yet experiencing it as if it was as real as anything occurring during your conscious moments?

• “If you could have a super power, what would it be?”
  “You mean like flying or something?”
  “Yeah, like that.”
  “I can’t have a super power.”
  “What why?”
  “It would be too tempting to go looking for trouble. There is a reason The Invisible Man is a horror movie, and not a Marvel movie.”

• Have you figured out if you’re straight fire yet?

• We geared up to survive another night with the hope we’d get to do it all again.