Need Help For CAMPING...

Okay, I'm old. When I wasn't old I used to go camping in a Triumph Spitfire though, so I know what it mean to have to pack fairly lightly. I've actually made coffee in empty beer bottles.

Freeze the steak, DMP. Make it an extra large one and you can warm it up for breakfast as well. Pack the eggs next to it in the make-shift cooler somebody described earlier. Take an extra potato or two, and maybe some onions/carrots. You are going to be hungry. Take a whole roll of tinfoil....there's never enough tinfoil when you get there.

Other stuff.

A tarp. Those pup tents are great, but they tend to leak (even with the fly) if it rains hard. An 8X10 tarp weighs next to nothing, is waterproof, and can be used to provide shade as well.

Rope. There's never enough. Cheap 3/4" nylon rope can save your ass. Again, it weighs next to nothing. Take about 20 feet of it.

Socks...twice as many as you think you'll need. Good thick ones without any holes. Wet socks or socks with holes will give you blisters in a hurry.

A jack-knife. It doesn't have to have all the toys, but you need at least one sharp blade.

A Bic lighter and matches. The lighter is for melting the ends of the rope if you cut it and lighting whatever you plan to smoke. The matches are for lighting fires. Get the water-proof matches.

A small axe. Nobody ever brings one or they bring the one their gandfather gave them and the fucking handle breaks before you have kindling.

And now that I'm old, here's how I camp. I back the truck under the camper, roll up the jacks, toss half of my belongings in, toss 3/4s of Mrs Rev's belongings in, call the dogs, stop at the off-sale on the way out of town to load up my beer cooler (it has wheels on the bottom in case I have to move it more than three feet), then head to a field where there are few rules, no children, no people who aren't used to me, no park rangers, and no cops.

The rest of our holidays and long weekends we use the camper as a moving house when visiting relatives...a place to hide from the children and people who aren't used to me.

[align=center]SPAM![/align]
I don't mean the email kind, I mean the pork type product kind. Don't have to keep it cool, tastes okey raw and good cooked (just in case you're hungry and there's no fire). I've also had success using it as bait fishing for jack. Handy packaging and the list goes on and on. It's just good to have a couple cans in the backpack.

The less I have to carry the better. I figured I could freeze the steak, freeze the egg mixture, use milk from tettra packs. Eat non perishable food second night, use pre cooked bacon that you can buy. It'll work

My wife checked her 30-some year old Joy of Cooking, and yes you can freeze eggs. They recommend "stabilizing" them, by adding two teaspoons of sugar per PINT (seems to me a pint of cracked eggs would be a lot).

If youre like most folks that like French Toast sweetened with something, that would probably be okay. (I always have French Toast with salt and pepper; its eggs and bread after all - would you put syrup on your fried eggs and toast?)

And how about a "make-ahead" idea - Clubhouse sandwich(es); you know: The triple decker with turkey, bacon, lettuce, possibly tomato. A clubhouse doesnt have to be hot to be enjoyed, and it's small and light, but filling....

Where you going that is an hour's hike each way? Cathedral?

OH! and ps: if you make any kind of sandwich ahead of time, resist the temptation to use Mayonaisse - it develops bacteria very quickly at room temp.

oh boy! i like this topic!
i was in cadets (army) for 6 or 7 years and so i know a thing or two about camping.

while in cadets, i was also enrolled in the DofE program where an expedition is a required activity, so in the spring of 2000, a bunch of us spent a week hiking in Wales (yes, the country that is to the left of england). we found that, while IMPs (which we were used to) are good, they produce a lot of garbage which we had to pack with us in order not to damage the environment. pretty much all the foodwe ate was dried. NO CANS!!!!! cans are heavy, and they produce bulky garbage, which ou can't burn. (btw, we were not allowed to have open fires in wales, we used a stove that runs on methyl alcohol, basically it is a cup that holds that fuel which is on fire with a grille type of thing over top so keep the pot from smothering the flame). for breakfasts, we usually had packaged quaker instant oatmeal, (which u just need to boil some water to eat) and lunch one day we had dried soup, also just add water. we had dried chili one supper which i added dry spices to taste. basically make a menu with no fresh items. murphy's law: if you bring anything perishable, it will.
b/c our hike was 5 days, most of our packs were made up of food, 1 change of clothes (except socks b/c wales is a very wet country), tents (easy light weight pop up types, but i still prefer an army half-shelter) as well as stoves pots and pans and utensils. (basically 1 of each...) umm the way we did it we had 2 ppl per tent and so we shared the req'd equipment between the 2 of us in each group. oh, right...plus the sleeping bag. the bare minimum is all you need. anything else will just add weight and clutter.
also, depending on what kind of pack u r using, try and keep as much weight as possible close to ur body, not on the outer limits of ur pack.

any other questions i can probly answer....

You guys are the greatest. I learned so much, I am gonna be the ultimate camper! I forgot to mention that this is a camping trip that I am going on with the grade 12 geography class that I am in (even though I am in grade 11, they let me into that class). So rev, I will only be lighting fires with the matches. To answer the other questions, I am going to the ainsworth hot springs and underground caves. The reason it is such a big hike is our geography teacher wants us to see the geography around us. I have to pack in my own tent because I wasn't there on the day the camp groups were chosen, so I got jipped out and I have to make my own meals too. Thanks for the help, telliung me how to freeze eggs, and saying I can freeze a steak.

You guys/girls for all your help, this will be a great trip.