The immense popularity of motor camping is easy to understand when one realizes that this pastime is romantic, healthful, educative, and at the same time economical.
Father can take the whole family for a two weeks’ or a month’s trip in his car at virtually the same cost as staying at home. The room rent he will have to pay on his trip will range from nothing to fifty cents or a dollar a day for the family.
There are many thousands of acres of free camping grounds in the national and state public playgrounds. [[3]]In addition, nearly every town west of the Appalachians has its camp site, while on the Atlantic Seaboard there is a large increase in the number of municipal camp sites every season. The approximately 2,000 civic sites, which are listed elsewhere in this book, make no charge for accommodations or merely a nominal one. The towns in addition to the spirit of hospitality are anxious to have tourists for business reasons. The Executive Secretary of the Denver Civic Association has written: “An auto camp, in my judgment, is just as essential to any city, town or community that wants to thrive and prosper and keep ahead of the times, as a railway station.”
With provisions costing no more than at home, with moderate investment for camping equipment which will last for several years, the family can get a vacation in the open, can see other parts of the country, can get an appreciation of the national life which could hardly be realized in any other way. To the boy living in Connecticut, Georgia can become an actual reality rather than an inch or two of space on the map. The eastern family which has a full summer vacation can readily visit California.
But an extended period of time is not needed in order to enjoy the satisfactions of motor camping. There are wildernesses within a hundred mile range or less of any of our large cities, with the result that many motorists are becoming week-end campers. The New Yorker can find near-by camp sites in the Catskills, and in the State Forests of northern New [[4]]Jersey. The Philadelphian may enjoy the wildernesses in southern New Jersey. Baltimore has a Forest Reserve actually adjoining the city, while near many of the western cities, such as Denver and Los Angeles, are some of the beauty spots of the world.
This chapter has aimed merely to sketch briefly the extent and some of the possibilities of motor camping. The following chapters discuss in detail the subjects with which the motor camper is concerned, such as preparation for the journey in the way of equipment, conditions he will find, where to camp for short or long trips, laws to be observed.
Motor camping is simple. With a little foresight in preparing for the adventure, and the observance of a few common sense principles in traveling any family may start on its camping trip with the assurance of happy days ahead. [[5]]