DO: Lock food in your vehicle to keep animals away.
DON’T: Leave a half-eaten bag of Cheetos and box wine in your tent or you’ll return from your hike to random trails of orange pawprints being ground into your sleeping bags by a drunk raccoon.
DO: Pitch your tent near paths so you can get around the campground easily.
DON’T: Assume paths near campgrounds are made by humans or you’ll be awakened in the middle of the night by a herd of free-range cattle mooing and pooing.
DO: Secure your tent by pounding tent stakes deeply into the ground after moving to a new campsite because you woke up to hordes of flies covering reeking manure mountains at your old campsite.
DON’T: Assume the weight of three people in their sleeping bags is all you need to keep the tent in place without stakes, especially when you’re at the top of a hill with a river below and a gust of wind shoves the tent over the edge causing it to lurch down the hill pinballing everyone against each other until the tent plunges into the river.
DO: Put your boots near the fire to warm them up on cold nights, especially if they’re still damp from the river.
DON’T: Put your friends’ boots near the fire to warm them up without first confirming that they’re made of real leather and not some leather-adjacent vegan pastiche that looks like leather but melts like butter.
DO: Tell scary stories around the campfire at night.
DON’T: Assume your spooky tales made your friends scream. Sometimes they’re screaming from their boots catching on fire.
DO: Make s’mores around the campfire at night.
DON’T: Toss marshmallows to the orange-pawed drunk raccoon who turns up looking absolutely adorable in the firelight because five seconds later your campsite will be overrun by dozens of raccoons recreating a miniature version of MMA without cages, referees, or rules but with plenty of blood-curdling growls, hisses, and screeches so terrifying you drop the s’mores to cover your ears as you sprint to your tent through the melee of biting, scratching and fur-pulling.
DO: Remember that little things matter when camping, like a good flashlight at 4:00 A.M. when you have to pee and it’s dark. When this happens, your trusty flashlight will lead the way to the latrines where two forest rangers can be overheard talking about raccoons testing positive for bubonic plague and the campground being quarantined for a week and a truck on its way up the mountain carrying traffic barricades to keep everyone inside.
DON’T: Doubt your own ears. Thank your bladder for waking you up and decide what to do.
DO: Act quickly when an unexpected itinerary change is called for, like hearing rangers in latrines discussing bubonic plague and realizing you need to vacate the campground pronto.
DON’T: Vacate the campground so pronto that you fail to vacate your bladder because your body froze up when you heard the words bubonic plague and you forgot that you had to pee.
DO: Check around your vehicle before leaving the campsite so you don’t forget anything, especially when you’re in a ranger-induced panic and it’s dark.
DON’T: Fail to check inside your vehicle before leaving the campsite or halfway down the mountain you’ll notice Orange Paw in your rearview mirror, sitting in the back seat sniffing the pile of filthy t-shirts your friends had been wearing on their feet, and have to call 911 for a hospital where you can get tested for plague while you desperately search for a place to pull over and pee because you’re one pothole away from disgorging Niagara Falls.
DO: Plan your next camping trip taking into consideration all you learned on your first trip.
DON’T: Lie to yourself – if once was enough, sell your camping gear on eBay.