While I have done some backpack/bicycle/kayak camping, most of my camping is car camping with a tent. While I bring most of my food, I often grab one meal at a nearby non-chain restaurant a) because it is one less meal to prepare and b) I support the local economy in at least a small way.
Even if it isn’t a meal, I will often get ice cream.
My campsite in the Bighorns was somewhat remote but even there there was a lodge (Deer Haven Lodge) not too far away that had food. In Custer I had lunch and ice cream at Legion Lake Lodge.
So am curious if others do the same no matter what level of camping you do (obviously in the wilderness 20 miles from nowhere finding an ice cream shop will be tricky)
Brian
(my bike camping trips have included an unloaded [no longer carrying camping gear] lunch or ice cream run)
Of course I will hit up restaurants while camping, including bike camping. Camping is a personal customizable outdoor adventure, not an anchorite vow to shut yourself away from society and consume only what you can pack or forage and cook over open flames.
(I mean, if that’s how (generic) you roll when camping then fine, you do generic you, but I don’t think it’s anything like a conventional expectation of how camping is supposed to work.)
I do feel, though, that campers patronizing restaurants should at least make a good faith effort to comply with the basic hygiene and sartorial expectations that are generally in effect in the establishment in question. (Oh, and don’t monopolize the restaurant’s washroom to repair your hygiene deficiencies, either.)
When in doubt, politely ask the restaurant hostess/captain/greeter/whoever at the door if it’s okay for you to be seated even if you’re falling a bit short of the dress code, because you’re camping, see, and don’t have any proper dining-out clothing with you, but their food just looked/smelled so delicious that you couldn’t resist. (Treats can help, too. I once offered a restaurant captain a quart of fresh farm-stand blueberries that I didn’t want to haul on my bike carrier any further, and the chef was delighted to get them and comped me a salad. )
I’ve done three radically different kinds of camping:
True wilderness camping where you canoe over many lakes, carrying the canoe and all your supplies over portages. The campsites are beautiful, totally isolated, and you’re entirely on your own with nature.
Car camping with a tent, as you mention. The only kind you can really do with children. We brought food, usually cooked on a camp stove, built campfires and did all the rest of that good stuff. Yes, we would occasionally venture out to a restaurant if it was a long stay. One time, camping on my own in between house closings, I’d regularly get McDonald’s breakfasts and sit on a bench looking over the shoreline.
Boat cruises through the Great Lakes, which was sort of a combination of the first two. Our boat had a nicely equipped galley and we had a barbecue hanging off the stern so we could enjoy steaks and all the comforts of home while still being in beautifully pristine wilderness. But if we happened to dock for the night at a place with an interesting looking restaurant, we’d go for it! Some of those lakeside restaurants had amazing food like pan-fried trout freshly fished from the lake.
I’ve done all sorts of different camping trips. As mentioned, backpacking mostly means you are nowhere near any restaurants, except at road crossings or coming into a town on something like the Appalachian Trail. When I’ve backpacked there were no restaurant breaks.
You can car camp in remote locations without restaurants, and you can car camp on random BLM land or other public lands that are not near civilization. But you can also car camp at the KOA, or in private campgrounds near fairly well established towns. While I still like to cook over a camp stove or campfire, meals out are certainly in the realm of possiblity.
As said above, canoe camping generally gets you pretty far from civilization. Most of mine has been in the Boundry Waters, along rivers, or in the Adirondaks, only rare chances to get a meal out.
I lived in a town along the AT and we built and maintained about 75 miles of it. So we regularly picked up thru-hikers and brought them to the supermarket, a restaurant, or the Ben & Jerry’s store, then brought them back to their tent site or put them up for the night on our couch.
Main reason I ask is I watched a video where someone met some hikers doing all (or most) of the Superior Hiking Trail and they mentioned wanting a burger – I know they hiked near Silver Bay, MN and wondered why they didn’t get one there – perhaps it wasn’t lunchtime.
I know some through-hikers do take 0 days and presumably eat out
Also worth mentioning that Mom commented that there is a social hierarchy for Door County, WI. At the top are folks who have lived there for generations, at the bottom are campers (newcomers who live full time are in between) - this is partially due to economic impact which somewhat brings me to my “eat at a non chain restaurant while camping” practice
Never even considered it; there are not too many restaurants in the middle of nowhere, as you yourself point out. Will definitely stop for a nice meal on the way from the park back home, though.
I remember coming back from one of those wilderness camping trips I mentioned and thinking, wow, I can actually get a fully prepared hamburger now just by asking for it, and handing over some pieces of paper (today it would be “just by tapping a piece of plastic”). Ain’t civilization grand!
I have seen people deliberately hike out to the middle of nowhere with all the necessary supplies and basically prepare a gourmet meal. If you are backpacking for weeks, of course it is a different story,
There have been only a few times where I have either gone to a restaurant after I’ve pitched my tent, or brought restaurant-prepared food to my tentsite. Usually I eat packaged foods at a campsite.
The one time I hiked into the wilderness and camped alone in my adult life I tried to do this, hiking 5 miles down the mountain but didn’t find anything I wanted so I just brought up more packaged food from my car.
But:
When I sleep in Allegheny National Forest, I sometimes get a prepared meal from the deli at the Super Giant in Franklin beforehand. Not sure why I don’t do the same other places.
There is a full service campground at Mesa Verde National Park and one time when I camped there, I did eat the campground’s pancake breakfast. It’s not quite as full-service as KOAs and Jellystones, not having thigns like a pool or shuffleboard, but I’m usually not into those anyway. But it does have wi-fi and a laundromat in addition to a breakfast diner and mini store.
When I camp at Guadalupe Mountains National Park, sometimes I will drive all the way to Carlsbad to go to the Chinese buffet there. Because I can fill up on all the calories in the form of hot food that I can stuff into myself, and it has better service than Carlsbad’s Chili’s.
One time I did go to a restaurant while hiking, though, which feels unusual for America. My brother and I went to a trailhead below the Blue Ridge, and then hiked several miles up to the top of the ridge, and the trailhead on that end had a restaurant, which was a refreshing break from walking. I assume that while there are places in Europe where you can eat while on a scenic hike, it feels like in the majority of places you can do that in the US it would be less than scenic, (albeit on a trail that’s still more scenic than an average road.)
We used to do a LOT of SCA weekend car camping. Arrive Friday, set up camp, leave Sunday. Yes, we do sometimes grab something on the way in, but rarely do we leave the site to eat at a restaurant. (There was one site with some sort of coffee kiosk within two blocks, and yeah, my wife would join a car full of dedicated caffeine addicts to get their brew) .Of course in the SCA, sometimes someone offers us a feast, so there is that.
In “A Walk in the Woods” Bill mentions getting food- usually burgers- when a town interrupted the AT.
I’m not a real avid camper - had enough of sleeping on the ground when I was a Boy Scout - but when we do go, we usually stop for a restaurant meal en route home. Typically it’s within the first hour or so of wherever we camped, and usually a place where we can eat outside so we don’t offend the other patrons with our ripeness. It’s nearly always for burgers.
I have done a camping trip on Cape Cod without a car (we’ve done many with a car, but this was solo and on a bike).
Over five days and four nights I biked about 60 miles from the train station to Nickerson State Park to North of Highlands Camping Area to Provincetown. Then took the ferry back to Boston.
Since I carried everything on my bike, and I’m not very fit, I ate most meals at restaurants, except for dinner at the campsite which I cooked on very simple equipment. I wasn’t carrying cast iron cookware and not loading up on fresh or canned food. Just a can of beans and some meat or fish to cook on the grate in foil bought from a store near the campgrounds each evening.
When we go car camping, breakfast and dinner is at the campsite, lunch is at a restaurant.
Well, some places still have a somewhat higher sartorial standard than the sweaty-tshirt-bike-shorts-sneakers that I’ll be wearing on a bike camping trip (and I won’t be carrying backup “nice” clothing in a saddlebag, either).
Even if they wouldn’t actually have refused to seat my scruffy self, I figure it’s still nicer to ask.
True, but the ones that have them (or even not so much formal “codes” as just “a general ambience of nice attire that patrons generally conform to”) are less likely to offer takeout, IME.
I’m not sure why I seem to be getting (mild) pushback on this practice of openly requesting a sort of camper’s nice-attire exemption before expecting to be seated, when I show up to a nice restaurant all scruffy. They can tell me ”That’s no problem, please follow me!” or they can tell me ”I’m so sorry madam, we’d love to serve you some other time”, their call, I don’t care.
But if they’re going for an overall restaurant ambience that’s a little less casual than hard-worked campers in bike shorts, I think it’s only polite to acknowledge that up front, and they tend to appreciate it when you do.
If the restaurant is near a campground or along something like the Adirondack Trail, you’re almost certainly not the first scruffy camper they have seen.
The absolute best place in town is Skogen Kitchen. It’s a fantastic restaurant and rivals some of the best places I’ve been.
Most of my camping these days is with my sons’ Scout troop, and we tend toward fast food, unfortunately. Partially because some of the scouts are picky bitches, and partially because some of them have limited funds and fast food isn’t very expensive. It’s always on the road as well; typically camp cooking is something we emphasize.
My wife and I rarely eat at restaurants on vacation, whether it’s a camping vacation or otherwise. We’re much more likely to pick up some prepared food at a grocery store.
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