The difference? As a kid, you just went camping. There was no preparation. At most, all you had to do is pick what snacks you wanted and what clothes you wanted to bring. But as an adult, the planning and preparation is a whole adventure of its own. What food do I buy? What do I wear? What do I need to bring? I found myself stressing about these things a solid week before the day I was supposed to leave. 

With every adventure comes a set of lessons that you learn from the experience. So here are my lessons from my first adult camping trip!

Buy a tent off Craigslist

We left tent-hunting way too last-minute so it was quite difficult to find something brand new for a decent price. So we decided to look else where and discovered that Craigslist had some barely used tents for really decent prices. Not to mention buying off Craigslist means no tax, and sometimes you can even haggle a little to get a price even lower (which we shamelessly did of course). 

Buy a gas-fueled fire pit

This one is actually completely unnecessary for most people. But for people who are from Vancouver, which I assume you might be, having a gas-fueled fire pit is actually extremely useful.  Anyone that’s lived in BC for a while knows how easy it is for our province to initiate campfire bans due to the large risk of wildfires during the summer. This year has been extremely terrible in terms of widespread wildfires so the campfire ban has been taken even more seriously than usual. Living in a province that has campfire bans every year, having a fire pit makes it so you can still sit around a “campfire” at night and roast marshmallows and sausages. The fire is completely controlled and is easy to start and distinguish. 

Having the fire was also extremely nice at night for extra warmth and light.r Not to mention it gave us something to do! There are even some that come with a cooking grate that converts your fire pit into a partial grill. 

I bought mine from Canadian tire and it was by the brand For Living. The price has since gone back to $140 but a great alternative would be the Outland one from Amazon which is the same price that I paid for the For Living one when it was on-sale. 

Brush up on your safety knowledge

If I wasn’t with my awesome camping partner, I definitely would have made some potentially fatal mistakes on this trip. The biggest one being my (lack of) awareness for the danger of bears. I definitely would not have known to bring bear mace or to put all food items and scraps in the car before heading to bed. I also learned to always set up your fire downwind from the campsite. We had the fire pit for this trip so this wasn’t a huge worry of ours, but it’s still definitely something important to know. 

Buy stew

We pretty much lived off of beef stew and croissants this trip for our main meals. My grocery list for this trip consisted of:

• sausages
• marshmallows
• stew
• croissants
• hot dog buns
• eggs

We ended up having food left over for the week and our groceries only cost us about $40. Given we just ate croissants, eggs, and stew in the morning, hot dogs for lunch, and then more stew and hot dogs for dinner. But everything was actually delicious so I was a happy camper (literally). 

OH and definitely bring a portable stove or grill to cook your food on.

Bring snacks

Since our fire pit made it so easy for us to make roasted marshmallows, we pretty much just ate roasted marshmallows every time we wanted a snack. However I definitely still should’ve brought some chips or cookies or some other sort of snack to munch on throughout the day. 

Don’t forget to buy/bring water

WE FORGOT TO BUY WATER. Thankfully he had several jugs of tap water from his last camping trip that was still in the bed of his truck. And I bought a 6 pack of Gatorade and some iced teas while grocery shopping so we didn’t die of thirst on this trip. But I definitely won’t be making that same mistake again! Boiled river water for instant coffee wasn’t an ideal situation. 

Bring a knife!

I definitely did not think I would need a knife or a hatchet but I was very wrong. Again, thankfully I had a camping partner that knew what he was doing and he had both those things. Whether it’s for cutting food, opening packages, or whatever other reason it may be—it was, without a doubt, extremely useful to have a knife. 

Warmth and comfort is KEY

Although the night-time wasn’t as nearly as chilly as I thought it would be, the wee hours of the morning were still FREEZING to me. So a huge tip I have is definitely to have a WARM sleeping bag. Also, I’ve been told that sleeping naked in your sleeping bag is the best way to create warmth. But I found that when wearing clothes inside my sleeping bag actually kept me warmer. 

As for clothes, I ended up living in my sweatpants and hoodie for the entire weekend with the exception of some sweat shorts for when it got hot in the middle of the day. So here’s my advice as a fashion blogger: don’t worry about having cute outfits. Just bring comfy clothes and you will be happy. 

Set up your camp while it’s still bright out!

We had quite a bit of trouble looking for a camp spot that we were happy with since we decided not to go to a campsite. We didn’t find our spot by the water until it was dark outside so we ended up setting up camp with the help of lanterns and headlights. AND BOY WAS IT DIFFICULT. I 10/10 do not recommend it. Get there early. Set up while it’s bright out. End of story. 

Bring LOTS of TOILET PAPER AND INSECT REPELLENT

And last but not least…

I think this one is pretty self explanatory. 

I hope that I was able to shed some light on camping for those of you who lack the experience, like me. Even though I did get laughed at a few times for my cluelessness, I truly enjoyed my time and would definitely do it again. 

What was your first camping experience like?

Until next time, 

Had the most exciting Monday ever this week. Just so happened that Monday was one of my days off this week so Vern and I decided to conquer another BC hike. We wanted to do one that we’ve both never done so we decided to tackle Garibaldi Lake. The Garibaldi Lake trail is a 18 km (roundtrip) hike that leads to a beautiful glacier lake. It’s different from the Chief or Grouse Grind because it doesn’t really have man-made stairs/steps that help with the incline. Instead it is just a inclined trail, which got pretty hard on your calves and knees especially on the way down. 

About 5 km up there’s a small divide where you can choose to take a quick 100m detour to Barrier viewpoint. If you’re planning on doing this hike I DEFINITELY recommend going to check out this viewpoint. It was magnificent. You can look into a beautiful valley and see all the mountains behind it. It was breath-taking. 

Once you’ve passed the 6 km mark where you get to decide whether you want to continue on to Garibaldi lake or take on a (WAY) larger challenge, The Black Tusk (I’ve heard people cried on that one) you will reach an amazing little waterfall about 15 minutes in. There’s a bridge that lays just on top of the falls for you to cross and it is SUCH an amazing photo opportunity. Not going to lie it was a little daunting at first but the beauty of it really takes the fear away. 

And there you have it! That’s my awesome Monday hike to Garibaldi lake. Overall I definitely wouldn’t recommend this hike to you for your first hike of the summer. It was pretty intense. I’ve got to say my body has never hurt more than after walking down 9 km on a steady decline. My knees, hammies, and lower back definitely took a toll. However, it’s definitely one to tackle if you and a friend are up for a challenge. We felt AMAZING when we finally reached the lake. It was definitely well worth it. 

Hope you guys enjoyed this little adventurous post and I hope that I’ll be able to do more of these throughout the summer. 

Until next time, 

On Sunday, some friends and I decided to make good use of the sunny day, and do something productive ! We’ve been talking about hiking for some time now, and so we finally found a nice day when everyone was free. It was probably not the best idea to do the Stawamus Chief hike as our first hike of the year, BUUUUUUUT what the hell, definitely showed us how unfit we’ve all become after the winter, and motivated us to be a lot more healthy this Summer.

It took us about an hour and a half or two to make it to peak 2 of the Chief, and only about 20 minutes to get back down. There were signs right at the beginning of the trail that warned us that the Chief is NOT a walk in the park, but oh man, we were a little surprised. After about a half hour, our bodies finally started to adapt to the incline and it became a lot more manageable the rest of the way.

There were even parts where we had to climb along the edge of a rock, or scale a rock, with only a chain to hold on to. It was extremely fun to say the least.

Although it was definitely a challenge for my unfit body and lungs, the spectacular view at the top made it WELL worth it. NONE of the photos or videos I took did it any justice. It’s definitely one of those experiences that you’d need to see for yourself to understand. Absolutely breath-taking.

(and yes I am sitting on the edge of the cliff. YOLO.)

I will leave you guys with this amazing photo of my friend Stephanie KILLIN’ IT on the top of the mountain with her flexibility….

…. And then there’s me. LOOOOOOOOOOOL. so bendy (NOT.)

I will definitely be taking a lot more hikes this Summer so keep your eyes peeled if you want to see more of “beautiful British Columbia” !

ALSO I’m going bungee jumping next week ! Definitely come back for an exciting video !

Much love,