Caveat: This was a one night trip with only a couple miles of hiking involved. It also occurred less than 30 miles from my home near Washington, DC. So, it may be a stretch to call it "backpacking" but that's what I'm calling it and if you don't like it you can go suck on a dead dog's nose (name that movie).
Prince William Forest Park is located in close proximity to the nation's capital. For this reason I was a little skeptical about the supposed "backcountry" area (click picture to see detail). Overall the park covers 15,000 acres which is pretty decent. Certainly bigger than your mom's back yard - giggity.
Prince William Forest Park is located in close proximity to the nation's capital. For this reason I was a little skeptical about the supposed "backcountry" area (click picture to see detail). Overall the park covers 15,000 acres which is pretty decent. Certainly bigger than your mom's back yard - giggity.
As it turns out, the backcountry section of the park is separated from the rest entirely (see the Chopawamsic Area in the map above). You need a key to get through a gate letting you into the area and onto a dirt/gravel road. We noticed a sign that read something along the lines of, "All persons and vehicles entering this area are subject to search, humiliation, rape and torture by the United States Marine Corp." or something like that. Apparently the park shares a border with the Quantico Marine Base (oorah).
Some of us have been camping and hiking forever, some not so much, and one or two may have trouble distinguishing between a deer and a duckbill platypus.
Some of us have been camping and hiking forever, some not so much, and one or two may have trouble distinguishing between a deer and a duckbill platypus.
The group (from left): Erin, Heather, Joe, Allison, Mike, Ben, Matt and myself. The hiking was great, if not short. I believe the trail was something like a 2.2 mile loop. We took a detour or two to hike from the main trail back to a few of the designated backcountry camping sites. There was a bit of a mix up on sign painting day apparently because the sign supposedly leading us to site 4 plopped us out at site 5, sign 7 led to site 10, and so forth. At some point I was expecting to see sign x=(a+b)/c leading us to site 3.14159265.
Taking care of a few necessities on/before the hike.
After we let the rest of the group out the locked gate Heather, Joe and I hiked back in to the site we'd picked out (#4 or 5 or Pi or something). I believe it took us a grand total of 7 minutes to get the tents all set up. It took me significantly longer to blow up my air pad, after which I spent some time pretending to ponder the contents of my pack while really just leaning against a tree so I didn't pass out.
Many backcountry areas limit the number of tents allowed at each site.
After camp was set we made food. I think you can see my gourmet masterpiece sitting on a log with a plastic bag and spork over it. Mmmm, nothing like hot instant soup to warm your... but wait, what's this? Joe and Heather are chomping down on spaghetti that's probably better than anything I can cook at home with Martha Stewart giving me directions.
The Jetboil stove (center) can be limiting in some ways, but it can boil water in no time.
Joe used an MSR Pocket Rocket stove and a lightweight cookset to prepare this feast.
As it started getting dark we thought it might be a good idea to practice the art of hanging a bear bag. Except in our case there are no bears to worry about so we went for the "varmint bag" instead.
If we were in bear country the bag would need to be hung MUCH higher.
Turns out that when you can't have a camp fire, things get kind of dull right after the sun sets. We spent a little time watching Invader Zim (Gir rocks!) on Heather's phone until the battery ran out. Next I pretended to know something about astronomy by pointing at anything in the sky and claiming it was a constellation whose name I couldn't remember. Joe and I also spent a few minutes dorking around with the shutter speed on my camera and our headlamps. The effects were pretty cool.
Always ground your tents in case of lightning... I'm kidding... or maybe not.
Well we made it through the night, had a bite to eat in the morning and got the heck out of dodge, by way of Bob Evans. I'll definitely be going back to PW Forest Park. Mostly cause I'm lazy and it's right down the road but also because it really is pretty secluded, particularly considering the region where it's located.
Leave No Trace means you leave your camp looking the same as it did when you arrived, if not better.
-Dave
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