second time ca(r)mping

My second time car-camping, also in the late summer of 2021.

You can read/watch more about my first time car-camping over here. For this one, my second time, I will not write as much as for the first one, but the video is a bit longer:)

This time I went a little further away, which meant a little bit more driving for me, but that’s okay, because this needed to be more of a challenge from the previous one.

It was a September weekend in 2021.

The night sky was pretty cloudy, so I wasn’t able to take any pictures or time lapses like the last time (here), but I actually didn’t mind it, because it got a bit chilly out.

I'd improved my sleeping set-up a little bit and I'd bought myself my own sleeping bag, (the one I used in my first car camping was actually my brother's- thank you, Q). And while it was a great purchase, what I didn’t realize (until I was trying to fall asleep in it) was that it was made out of much more slippery fabric and since the “bed” I’d made wasn’t exactly leveled I kept sliding down all night. But even though it wasn’t very comfortable, I actually found it more funny than annoying, to be honest. I tried to lie the other way around, but that didn’t work either. Mostly because of the bright moon and lots of clouds which made the night very bright and therefore felt like a lamp above my head if I tried to place my head under the rear window, like I did the last time. So I ended up using some clothes and towels to elevate my legs and prevent my sliding all the way down, just enough so I could actually get any sleep that night.

It certainly wasn’t the most comfortable night ever, but I was actually glad that that sleeping bag slide situation happened, because it was a great tip about what to improve before a longer get-away when I may not necessarily have the means to fix such a thing, and sleeping like that for more than one night would definitely not be fun.

In the morning I took a bit of a walk to a lovely meadow where I did my morning meditation and yoga. Later on, I had some breakfast and went on a hike to the top of the mountain.

You can watch it all in my video. I know it still is far from what I envision it could be, but this is still one of my first times ever recording and video editing. I do, however, think that I managed, at least to some degree, to portray in it the feelings I felt and wanted to convey, so if you watch it, I hope you enjoy it.

There are, however, two things the video doesn’t show.

One is my encounter with a huge deer with antlers the size of what seemed like.. me. I didn’t record it because we were way too close to each other for me to think about taking my camera out and capturing the moment. I was just praying he would pass by and not feel in any way threatened or offended by me and decide to fight me. And I am sooo grateful he just went his own way, because in that moment, I was able to see a whole bunch of alternative endings to this hike (and me) and, let's just say, they weren't pretty.

The other thing that the video doesn't show is how many people there were on the top of the mountain. I was mostly completely alone on the trails I chose (I always go for the less common, less crowded ones), I think I passed maybe 2 or 3 groups of hikers, so when I reached the top I was stunned to see a literal crowd- people everywhere. This certainly wasn’t the feeling I was aiming for when embarking on that hike so I left the top as fast as I could and found a quiet, more secluded spot for a short break before I made my way down.

I didn’t want to include that in the video, because it’s supposed to remind me of happy feelings of being surrounded by nature and not by crowds (I do realize crows of people are nature too, but I hope you know what I mean). So anyway, while 99% of my time during this second time car camping was really like the video, full disclaimer, there was that 1% of it being a little different and I just chose not to include that in my video souvenir of that excursion.

Overall, I really enjoyed that short get-away but I think even more than the get-away itself, i enjoyed the simple fact that I went again, that I chose to drive further (overcome my fears of driving here) and that made me feel more capable of (and therefore a step closer to) traveling this way for waay longer and much further distances.

If you’re interested, you may want to check out the "first part" of this story in my first first car-camping post over here.

Until next time,

love & light-

PV