tandempower

That shouldn't deter you from reflecting critically on it. I have explained numerous problems with statistical thinking. Do you just ignore them because you're on the 'statistics team?'

If 999 out of 1000 people submits to the norm that people must work to make money, which they must save up, in order to pay to camp on undeveloped land, that doesn't make it a non-issue. It just means those people don't bother taking it up as an issue. A slave in a plantation full of cooperative slaves might tell you that slavery isn't a problem for them but does that make it a non-problem, or does it just mean the slaves have learned not to question their masters because it doesn't help their situation? What if whole societies of people were indoctrinated with a culture of accepting wrong based on the rationale that there is no choice but submission to a sovereign?

That doesn't make their submission right. It just means they've been conditioned to submit unquestioningly to the prerogatives of sovereignty.

Machka 

You really don't get it, do you?

tandempower

Don't get what? Do you get what I'm saying?

Machka 

What you're saying has nothing whatsoever to do with what I'm saying.


I'm saying ...

Here in Australia, if I want to camp for free ... I can.
When I go to Canada, if I want to camp for free ... I can.
When I go to Scotland, if I want to camp for free ... I can.

I can camp for free in many parts of the world, if I want.

I realise this is not the case in your part of the world, but your issue with the lack of free camping in your particular area is not an issue in many other parts of the world.

If you don't like something that is specific to your particular area, take it up with the "powers that be" in your particular area.

tandempower

Are there no private property owners or do they just not have the right to evict people arbitrarily from their property?

I'm afraid you don't convince me. Are you saying that a traveller choosing to travel by bike between two cities can sleep wherever they feel like stopping on the way without any malice from the property owner or locals if they are seen?

I don't think it has anything to do with local culture. I think it has to do with general social cultures such as the idea that someone camping for free is 'freeloading' or 'mooching' as some have said in this forum. It has to do with fear that one's property could become a hang-out for homeless people or people seeking a spot to behave badly and then leave. Sometimes it's people who just think there are campsites for camping and they see it as clandestine for people to sleep in places that aren't specifically designated for sleeping.

This last idea is the one that especially bothers me because it simply normalizes the idea that people have to work to earn the right to camp on undeveloped land. This is what I call the 'slave mentality,' i.e. that people MUST work to pay for everything they do, regardless of whether someone else is actually giving them something or not. It's one thing for someone to want something you put effort into making for free. It's something else to convert all land into parcels (commodify it) and then make it a default prohibition for people to 'intrude on private property' without paying the owner.

People have to be able to own private property and have certain rights but there has to be a way to protect the right to free-camp, especially where private property owners would allow it if not for certain concerns about liability and potentially abusive campers. There should be no culture of fear to either allow hikers/bikers to camp or to seek a free-camping spot without the potential for irritation and consistent rejection. It should be as simple as having a hiker/biker camping permit and going to a prescribed area. And such areas should be plentiful enough to make hiker/biker camping travel convenient.

If this is already the case in the places you mentioned, please explain why neither property owners/managers nor hikers/bikers encounter any negativity and begin to avoid the interaction for this reason?

BTW, these posts should be moved to one of the other threads on camping. This thread is about simple living in general.

Machka 

Freedom to roam - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Free camping in Florida: Map of Free Camping Areas | Go Camping for Free!
Free camping in New Hampshire: Map of Free Camping Areas | Go Camping for Free!
Free camping in Colorado: Map of Free Camping Areas | Go Camping for Free!
Free camping in Oregon: Map of Free Camping Areas | Go Camping for Free!
(you can use that site to look up other states)


Type the words: Free Camping and a place (a state or country) into Google to find more around the world.


And yes, many cycletourists throughout the years have been able, and are still able, to find a place to sleep at night for free. I've done it on a few occasions, as have many of the people in the Touring forum and within the cycletouring community in general. Those of us who do this generally prefer not to trespass, so we find a nice little patch of public property somewhere, like for example, the edge of a ditch on a quiet country road. We quietly pitch our tent, and we spend the night. In the morning, we pack everything away, clean everything up, and we're on our way. Some call this "stealth camping" ... others use terms like "free camping", "wild camping", or "bush camping". There have been a number of threads talking about this in the Touring forum over the years, and you can do a google search on those terms to find out more as well.

That's probably why you got a rather puzzled reaction to your thread(s) in Touring ... if we want to camp for free, we either find a free campground or we free/wild/bush/stealth camp. Not a big deal.

tandempower

I read this but, unfortunately, it is identified as ethnically specific, Scandinavian and more broadly European. It helps when rights/freedoms are identified as universal or 'self-evident' in the case of the US constitution. Unfortunately, many US citizens (and others) have been pushing the idea that 'self evident' freedoms are only 'self evident' for citizens. These universal doctrines were written as such and should be respected as such. It's unfortunate that ethno-cultural specificity has come into such strong favor in modern times because it automatically excludes everyone who doesn't identify with the ethnic-label as their primary cultural identity.

Thanks for the tip. There are, unfortunately, not free camping areas listed between the cities where I travel most frequently. I don't feel like getting in a territorial battle (by mentioning names) that could result in retaliatory actions but suffice it to say I'm a bit grumpy about free camping being too limited in my area (and anywhere else it is because I would ultimately like to spend a long, early retirement traveling around freely by bike and budgeting lodging would have a negative effect on my planning because I would shorten my journeys to save money for the future. - part of simplicity is being able to live in 'the now,' as Eckhart Tolle calls it. Obviously you always have to plan for food, money, etc. but if you are free to wander wherever you want and camp there with the supplies you have, it liberates you from that aspect of budgeting and future-concern.)


Yes, I was doing this as well but I decided to look up the rules for camping where I was camping and found out it wasn't a "designated camping area" and that even to camp in the designated area there was a per-night fee that wasn't even reducible by buying an annual permit. Suddenly I had to overweigh camping as a budget item instead of just doing it and leaving no trace.

What I should probably just do is camp where I think it is legit (or should be) and then tell anyone who confronts me that I thought it would be a legit spot to camp for the reasons I chose the spot. The problem is that I camp with my son and he can't handle being told-off by authorities and/or strangers as well as I can. So if someone ends up harassing us for where we're camping, it's going to produce negative camping experiences for him that may deter him in later life. That would defeat my purpose of raising him with the skills of free leave-no-trace dispersed camping.

Camping in a designated area just doesn't cut it. There is something special about surveying undeveloped land for a good spot and pitching a tent there to 'make it your own' in a way that doesn't detract from anyone else's future use of it. It's like sharing a special moment with a loved one by a public monument like the Eiffel tower. You may not have been the only couple to hold hands on the bridge while the moon beams were peaking out from behind the cloud and reflecting off the river onto the tower in that particular way, but it makes that moment special for you. It's the same picking a random spot in the woods and becoming familiar with the particular trees and features of that area. You don't own it but it's yours in a way. You don't take anything away from the land, the animals that live there, or anything else by using it. You don't owe anyone anything for having pitched your tent there. It's one of the simplest forms of freedom.

wolfchild

Basically what you're saying is that, you want property owners, land owners and home owners to loose all their rights over their own land and property which they bought with their own hard earned money, just so that some freeloader or some wanderer who doesn't believe in hard work can come over and make a campsite on their property. Your ideology sounds like a "Freemen on land movement" or "Occupy movement".. What's next ??. Strangers forcing themselves into peoples homes when they weren't invited ??. If your ideology ever took hold in this world then the whole world would descend into complete anarchy and chaos.

Roody

The idea of free use of private property is the law in some countries. (According to Machka, including your own country of Canada.) Even in the US, there are limitations to the property owner denying access, such as liens and public right-of-way. This is not a new or radical concept--it stems from legal systems that are hundreds of years old.

Machka 

No, Machka never said that.

Roody

You said you camped free in Canada, including stealth camping.

Machka 

No ... I said a person could camp free in Canada ... in designated free-camping areas and on small, quiet out-of-the way pieces of public property. I also indicated that it is not a good idea to trespass on private property.

wolfchild

Canada has millions of acres of crown land (public land), where anybody can camp for free, no permit is required. There is enough crown land here that a person could disappear or wander around for the rest of their life...Private land is a different story. You can't just go and trespass on another persons property and set up a camp without their permission.

Machka 

+1

Ekdog

You can if they don't see you and never realize you were there.

tandempower

This is not the thread to discuss this. If you would read my other posts on this, though, what I'm talking about is a permitting system and the right (not obligation) to make private land available for hiker/biker camping without being liable for the campers (or their insurance companies). All I'm saying is that private property owners who otherwise would be fine with no-trace camping on their land be liberated from fears of getting sued.



That's great if the crown land is en route to your destination. If you're traveling between two cities, however, is there going to be a parcel of crown land where you can overnight? If not, and you have to pay to camp, it runs up the cost of multi-day travel by bicycle.

This sounds like what used to be called, 'don't ask don't tell.' It's sort of tempting to keep free camping unregulated in this way because at least there's not a lot of attention on it. Once you create a permitting system for it, the opponents activate and suddenly you have to listen to a bunch of aggressive language calling free-campers 'freeloaders' because some people think every aspect of life has to be commodified to force GDP growth and job-creation.

I-Like-To-Bike

Why should independent free campers be limited to camping/sleeping while exposed to the elements?

Why shouldn't resourceful independent free campers skilled in breaking and entering into residences or business establishments (without causing damage or stealing anything) be permitted to do so wherever they feel like it just as long as the residents/owners don't see them and never realize they were there?

Heck, if the independent free camper plans well and picks the homes of people on vacation they can stay for quite awhile for free. Just make up the bed before they leave.

If independent free campers are really skillful and quiet they could camp out inside and catch 40 winks even while the residents sleep away in other parts of the house. Why not, eh?

Machka 

In many/most parts of the world ... this is not necessary. There are enough free camping options now.





A good stealth/wild/free/bush camper can always find a quiet ditch.

B. Carfree

In Oregon, one may camp on private property provided the property isn't marked with a no trespassing sign. However, if the land owner or an agent of the land owner asks you to leave, you must do so or you are trespassing. State law also protects property owners from liability if their land is used for recreation by others. Both of these provisions were codified in response to the large tracts of land owned by lumber companies; their own employees wanted to be able to hike and hunt on company land, so the timber barons made it so. A bike tourist who likes to ride in the hills, in which tree farms are quite plentiful, would be hard-pressed to not find plenty of free camping throughout the state.

Unfortunately, most of our "campers" are just drunk bums who camp in our urban parks so as to be close to the free food, liquor stores, drug dealers and people who will trade food stamp cards for cash or drugs (like I said, lots of free food). There's nothing sustainable about their lifestyle, it's all parasitic. They have lately developed the nasty habit of attacking women on the bike paths, so we are losing females from the local car-free population; some are returning to cars and others are moving out of state.

I-Like-To-Bike

Other than the attacking women bad habit, sounds like what is being touted as a group of independent free campers just wanting to live free as is their natural born right. Why use such "aggressive language" to describe them just because they have not been conditioned to submit unquestioningly to the prerogatives of sovereignty and arbitrary rules and regulations, eh?

Roody

So this stealth camping is against the law? What happens if you get caught?

plustax

Who cares if bums are around? People will just drive cars if bums scare them.

Roody

I think y'aal are missing the distinction between "bums" and people who are living simply. Also, a touch of compassion toward those who are less fortunate would be a good thing.

bragi

Um, let's review the principles of living simply thus far:

1. Don't consume more than you need to.
2. Spend less than you make.
3. Try to live in a way that makes a decent future possible for our descendents.
4. Independence is good, but so is interdependence.
5. Participating in the economy is not slavery if you enjoy the work you do and find it meaningful, or even if not enjoyable, it is voluntary and allows you to eventually reach your personal goals in an honorable way. (Tandem, you really need to reflect on this one.)
6. Living simply doesn't mean you're allowed to be a jerk. It also doesn't protect you from your own stupidity and/or laziness. In fact some versions of simplicity may actually be more work than you ever imagined (but that depends on your definition of simplicity).
7. Bicycles are really helpful in simplifying your life, no matter what other decisions you make.

Roody

I can get behind this post.

I can be a jerk sometimes, but I think it's independent of my simple lifestyle.