If you and your family love being out in nature, camping is an amazing family getaway. Now more than ever before it’s possible to go green and go camping. As camping-friendly places like RV-friendly towns spring up, avid campers can not only find a place to dump their waste between their treks to the wilderness but also connect with services that offer repairs and respite. These resources plus a little know-how allow you to enjoy your no-trace camping trips without guilt. If you’re planning a no-trace trip, you’ll find these seven tips very helpful to your planning process.
Plan Before You Go
Staying green-friendly is going to require some thinking ahead. This is advantageous for a couple of reasons. Aside from allowing you to check out camp spots and their requirements, you also have the opportunity to see where the dump points are along your route.
While some people only want to backpack and camp in a tent, camping can be more than that. You can make it stylish and Instagrammable. You need to know where you’ll find an RV-friendly town or two along the way. Mapping out plans ahead of time allows you to do that.
Go Garden Green
Bet you haven’t thought about foraging as a path to environmentally-friendly camping trips. It’s one simple way to keep the rubbish out of your campsite. Depending upon where you are in the world, it’s possible to find items in the wild like berries. If that’s not your thing, you can still embrace green camping by eating fruit, veggies, and raw ingredients. Whatever is leftover like apple cores or fruit peels are biodegradable.
Avoid Single-Use Plastics
It may be tempting to bring single-use dishes and utensils that you can dispose of or throw away easily. However, it’s better to bring lightweight dishes that you can wash. A breathable bag and biodegradable soap complete your on-site dish-washing equipment.
Figure Out How to Dispose of Waste
You already know that RV-friendly towns exist. But not every town offers you a place to dump the contents of your portable camping day-to-day trash. In both of these cases, you need to plan on packing out what you bring in.
As for your food trash, make sure that you bring along plenty of biodegradable bags. If your food isn’t already raw, you can use these to carry your waste until you get to town. There’s a way to collect, sort, and dispose of waste.
Shoot Wildlife Only With Your Camera
Most green camping guides suggest that you bring back only your photos and not wildflowers, rocks, small animals, and the like when you camp. Following this principle allows you to enjoy your camping trip and still keep these treasured memories intact. As an extra precaution, make sure your camera is guarded against the elements.
Campfire Tips
Nothing says camping quite like the campfire, but eco-friendly camping requires more than just a stout flame. Eco-Friendly Africa Camping advises that you make campfires only from local driftwood. “Foreign” woods bring bugs and chemicals with them. Also make sure that you build a fire in only designated spots and to put it out completely when you’re done. That means dousing the coals with water, stirring them up, and then tossing dirt over the top of them and stirring them up again. However, with the advent of solar-powered cookers, you can avoid all that and still have a hot meal at the end of the day.
Bring Your Good Habits With You
Most people think of camping as a chance to get away from it all, and while that’s true, please be aware that other people will be on the trail with you. Therefore, keep your pets on a leash, avoid making loud sounds at night, and pick up after yourself. Finally, these trail sharers are on the trail for the same reasons that you are. Therefore, make sure that you keep the area as pristine as possible so that the next set of campers can enjoy it.
Going green and going camping don’t have to be mutually exclusive. Much of your ability to keep your campsite eco-friendly has to do with planning ahead. Knowing where you’ll find dump spots and places to throw away your trash will help you to cut down on your eco-footprint. RV-friendly towns offer additional options for those who want to do some RV-camping but still enjoy the outdoors.