Clue In, Camp Out

August's Eco Article is all about the joys of the great out doors. Stay tuned for some incriminating photos of my various wilderness excursions!

Turn On, Tune In, Camp Out
Becky Haltermon, Boone County Solid Waste Education Coordinator

I’m not the world’s best camper. I tend to wear impractical little dresses and refuse to commit to buying hideous hiking boots. I drop more (vegetarian) hot dogs in the fire than I actually get to ingest and have created more than my fair share of flaming marshmallow. When I attempt a tent set-up, I end up with a structure closer akin to a Christo artwork than a usable shelter. I get cold and complain. I harbor a deep and abiding fear of bears.

And yet, I love to camp. I love the sounds, the open skies, the rich, incense-like smells, the sweat, the sleeplessness, and the simplicity. I love that making dinner feels like an accomplishment. I love lying on the ground and getting filthy dirty. I love the simultaneous sense of isolation and camaraderie, the realization that we’re all tiny components in a much bigger and more beautiful system.

I could wax poetic on wilderness all day long but perhaps we should let one of the masters on the subject have his say. “Our village life would stagnate,” Henry David Thoreau wrote, “if not for the unexplored forests and meadows which surround it. We need the tonic of wilderness.” (Perhaps in addition to poetry, Thoreau provides fertile marketing language… “Kentucky Parks: One-Stop Stagnation Tonic!”)

Despite my serious lack of outdoor skills, I know the joys to be found while camping but for the dubious, there are myriad studies that show that time spent in the woods offers more benefits than charred food and dirt in your hair. Hanging out in natural settings improves mental focus and attention and aids in overcoming mental fatigue (Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989; Kaplan, 1995). Camping helps ameliorate the symptoms of Attention Deficit Disorder (Faber Taylor et al., 2001; Kuo and Faber Taylor, 2004). Individuals who opt to exercise surrounded by foliage don’t feel as anxious, angry, or depressed as those who jog indoors and they reported feeling better restored (Pretty et al., 2005), (Bodin and Hartig, 2003). Our natural environment can help folks heal faster and experience less pain (Ulrich, 1984), (Diette et al., 2003) and could be helpful in improving heart disease, dementia, psychological disorders, developmental and cognitive disabilities, cancer and other conditions (Wichrowski et al., 2005), (Gigliotti et al. 2004), (Eikenaes et al., 2006; Bettman, 2007), (Berger, 2006) (Epstein 2004), (Easley et al., 1990). Of course, any of these health benefits might be negated by an encounter with a bear.

The benefits to roughing it aren’t just confined to those with serious diseases, either. Exercise, sunshine, squirrels, fresh air, and the landscape of our great state – some of the prettiest scenery ever put down on the earth – can relieve you of stress and imbue you with a new perspective on your life. Trust me.

So let’s agree that the “staycation” is passé and the real prospect for summertime adventure and rejuvenation is to be found on the ground, next to a campfire, with something sugary roasting on a stick.

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Becky Haltermon is the Boone County Solid Waste Education and Litter Abatement Program Coordinator. Contact her at 859-334-3151 or bhaltermon@boonecountyky.org.