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Tent camping sites - listings - advice

or,for a free training & demo:
Go to a/the rally with a tent, sleeping bag & pad & $ to eat on & wander around each day to be "amongst those that know". You'll see every brand & variation of minimal to the whole enchillada style of camping & be in the midst of "friends" too. Some will have $400 tents while others will be in a $50 Kelty(me:nyah). Bigger rally= more demos.
I had the genuine delight to have had an "Uncle Dean" (bless him!!!) that knew the ways of the wild & was out on weekends with my cousins & me, camping and fishing. I had a canvas pup tent ala U.S. Army & slept in an old worn out quilt (my Mom had made a foot pocket in the bottom after folding) & on the ground.
FWIW, of that large group one cousin & myself have been in the "pass it on to your kids" category as we know camping and made it available to our kids.
 
I've been tent camping all over the USA over the last couple of years and never once worried about where I was going to be camping until about a couple of hours before I wanted to stop. If you have a smart phone, there are several apps that will show you all the camping sites near your location or near a location you specify and they'll let you filter out the RV parks and focus on tent camping. This works most of the time to find a suitable camping spot in a real campground with a shower and some power for recharging your stuff if you haven't already figured out how to do that on your bike. One app I've used successfully is AllStays - it's about $10 which is pricey for an app but totally worth it as long as you're someplace you can get network access.

I say most of the time... there has been a few times where this serendipitous attitude has bitten me and I've ended up camping in amongst motor homes in an RV camp ground but even those will generally point you to a place that's suitable and not just stick you in the middle of an RV park. There's also been a few times where I've popped my tent or sleeping hammock in a church yard or state/community park and slept right next to my bike. I was on my way from Santa Fe back to Annapolis MD last year and just never got tired until about 1am in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma. But even there, I was able to pop up on my iPhone the nearest state park that was just 4 miles off the expressway. I rode into the park at 1am and had my camping hammock slung between two trees within 5' of my bike and was asleep under a starry sky in about 15 minutes. Up before anyone was stirring and 80 miles down the road before breakfast for a total cost of $0 for 5 hours of sleep.

That's not the norm though. More often than not, I'll find a camp ground where there's tent camping sites, hot water showers, and a power outlet nearby a picnic table right by my tent. After a couple of years of doing this kind of camping, sometimes thousands of miles from home like in Yellowstone, Big Sky, Colorado, ... I honestly get a better night's sleep in my tent than any hotel bed.
 
Glad somebody mentioned state park camping. Many states have GREAT state parks. Pennsylvania in particular has some really wonderful state park campgrounds. Maybe not as cheap as you could get, but always pleasant. Some you'll find (in PA) to be more crowded than others.
And it's no surprise that "there's an APP for that". Of course there is! Ha ha.
Safe travels everyone!
Cheers.
 
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