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A great friend will listen to your dreams, but a best friend will help you achieve them. When my friend Mama Donna learned I wanted to fully immerse myself in the dispersed camping experience, she found a way to put aside all of her many responsibilities and took me out into the forest for some off-grid, no amenities living in the backwoods scrub of the Ocala National Forest.
In terms of camping, I have always leaned toward staying at established state or private campgrounds, places with bathrooms, showers, and, yes, neighbors. Although exploring more primitive camping options has been of interest to me, my attempts have been limited to the (at times amateurish) forays of my twenties. I hadn’t wanted to go off into the forest alone again until I had some guidance. As a side note - dispersed camping is also referred to as boondocking, off-grid, and dry camping. Government agencies, including town, county, state, and federal, manage lands that offer campers the option to drive or hike off into the forest, find a spot, and camp – most of the time for free. There are rules and regulations, of course, and for more background info on our national forests, please see part II of this article, This Land is Your Land. The big difference from established campgrounds is, with dispersed camping you bring everything you need with you – and take it all (except maybe your poops and peeps) when you go.
Donna and I began our trip by visiting a nearby dispersed camping site in the national forest that had, unbeknownst to us, recently had a controlled burn. While smoke still hung between the stalks of trees and tiny seeds of fire sprouted periodically and then wilted almost as fast, we set up camp feeling fairly certain we were safe. That is, until an elder hollow tree a couple of sites away began to smoke with such evident intent that Donna grabbed her shovel and heaved load after load of sand into the gap. It was then we realized it was time to leave the area to the rangers and we headed out to find a site in Juniper Springs.
At times referred to as the Ocala National Cemetery, the forest roads there stretch out in straight lines of white sand bordered by hickory thickets and stands of sand live oak. Areas not dominated by pine are canopied low and dense by subtropical sand plants that thrive on the acidic and well-draining sand. These dwarf forests are eerily desolate and nearly as soon as we arrived I noted the absence of much bird song or animal sounds. A sense that anything could, and does, happen out there was pervasive. By the time we reached Juniper Springs we had only half an hour of daylight to collect firewood and start a fire. Undaunted by what I saw as an unapproachable landscape, Donna was off into the scrub for wood and had a fire going before I could get my bearings.
Our days passed in quiet companionship. We breathed. We cooked (Okay, Donna cooked, I opened stuff up). We hiked. Donna played guitar and sang. And, she taught me about lighter pine, easy ways to start a fire, cat holes, and the art of Zen doodling. So serene and complacent were we that on the third day when we heard a significant crashing and bashing sound coming from deeper into the woods, the uptick in our heart rates was noticeable.
Nearly every day since I had met Donna it seemed I had mentioned bear at least once. It had become a bit of a joke. Now, the reality of the sounds we were hearing slammed into me as if someone had picked me up and pointedly dropped me into an entirely different day. Donna grabbed a large stick and stood facing the sound. Although she stands around five inches shorter than me, every speck of my being inside and out wanted to stand behind her. I didn’t though. Hands on hips, elbow to elbow, we stood together staring into the scrub. Finally, I yelled in my best man voice “HEY, HEY, NO.” A heartbeat. And then, a deep “Hey” came back to us.
The side of my mouth commented to Donna that I wasn’t entirely sure we weren’t in for a bigger threat. With unwavering awareness she nodded and put her knife within arm’s reach. After a brief verbal exchange, we indicated that the thicket-trapped hikers could pass through our site. Uncannily, two well-groomed and twentysomething dudes emerged with absolutely no gear, not a hair out of place, and a story that they were out turkey hunting and had gotten lost. The larger of the two men was ironically bear-like in size, and while his story that they were from North Carolina matched his accent, their lack of gear did not match their tale of turkey hunting. Within the space of a moment or two, it became clear that bear-like guy would have settled in for some neighborly chattiness. But, Donna did not give them an inch. She and I had instinctually anchored ourselves to different sides of the campsite so that they had to pass between us. Stick in hand, she ushered them quickly through our site to the road in true Mama Donna style – quiet and steady with a mix of full-on authority that sent them posthaste down the road, yes ma’aming her all the way.
It was as they passed by me on their way out that I finally noticed the pistol strapped to the smaller man’s leg. I quietly waited a few moments and then crept to the roadside and hunched behind the scrub to stand vigil, monitoring their departure toward the main road. It seems a lovely daydream to go out into the forest and find a place of true solitude. I have visualized hours and days of uninterrupted quiet, penetrated only by the sounds of the natural world. While this is certainly a probable scenario in most cases, the other probability is that anything can happen. This experience will for sure inform my off-grid camping decisions going forward. And, now more than ever, I do indeed see the value in having best friends who will guide you, teach you, and chase off sketchy characters with a stick…and a kick-ass smile.
My first attempt at Zen doodling
A NOTE on lighter pine :Also referred to as fatwood, lighter pine can be identified as a damaged or cut part of a pine tree that has become full of hardened resin, making it an excellent fire starter. In the southeastern United States, it is the long leaf pine that is often associated with this type of wood.
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