If you’ve read any recent posts on here, you may know at least one of two things:
- I’ve been planning a two week, 500km ride up through Wales for August.
- I got thrown off my bike and smashed myself into the ground last month, separating my shoulder, knocking brain juice out my nose and injuring my wrist & shoulder.
These two things are, unfortunately, mutually exclusive. So it was my only move, but a disappointing one, to postpone my ‘big’ trip until next year.
Instead of cancelling the whole thing completely, I kept the time off I’d booked from work, and did various day trips and stuff with my family.
Among which I borrowed a hammock from a friend and tried out hammock camping.
Still fairly rattled even a couple of weeks afterwards, I stayed close to home – choosing a tiny patch of woodland about half an hour’s walk from our house. A spot that would be impractical to camp using anything other than a hammock, thanks to uneven ground and undergrowth. It was satisfying to see how many more locations a hammock could open up.
This was another one of those super close to home, super short, leave after dinner and get home before breakfast BAMs – but still so much more than the sum of its parts.
I found the hammock to be comfortable, but struggled to sleep due to a lay in that morning.
As is usual for me when wildcamping, I woke regularly throughout the night, each time slightly perturbed to be moving but woke in the morning feeling well rested – if a little cold.
I used only the hammock and a very summer weight sleeping bag, so was lacking the many hammock camping accruements that I’d seen listed as must haves. The fault of my chill was, I think, the lightness of my sleeping bag and an unexpectedly cold night and foggy morning.
Nothing that a quick pack away and five minutes of brisk walking in the morning didn’t sort out.
Almost as if it never happened I was home again. I’ve since bought my own hammock, after much deliberation and research. Borrowing one first really helped to help me work out what I wanted.
For me hammock camping will definitely be a summer thing and something to augment my tent and bivvy options. On longer trips I may take a tent and the hammock, to open up more spots and to use to rest during the day.
So this month’s ‘adventure’ wasn’t quite as planned, but I was very happy to have got out at all.