High tech camping trips are not uncommon

Image by -Abhimanyu via Flickr

Amid Bennaim | Staff Writer

opinion@fiusm.com

While some might automatically relate millennials with hipsters, Facebook and oversized eyeglasses, the truth is that our generation is about so much more. Millennials like to enjoy the simpler things in life as much as any generation before them; with the added benefit that we can become instant experts through the internet. While Google won’t necessarily turn a city boy into Bear Grylls, it will explain how to set up a tent, build a fire and how much water one should take on a hike. When it truly comes down to it, we are the first generation of Americans who can truly do whatever we want because we have access to so much information about everything there is to do in life.

When you go camping as a millennial there are a few things that you cannot forget to bring along on a camping trip. There are the obvious things such as tents, water, food, bug spray etc., but millennials have to bring other things such as a cell phone, chargers and speakers. While it might seem like spending a weekend in the woods with a cell phone defeats the purpose of camping, in reality technology is such a part of our life that millennials have come to see it as a tool that we can use to make camping more enjoyable.

The old school way of camping in which one is completely disconnected is a dying beast, and with good reason. It makes no sense to struggle with building a fire when good instructions can be found in 5 minutes using a smartphone. This lets one spend more time relaxing, and less time fanning a dying fire. It also seems cruel to disconnect completely when a simple text message can calm worried parents and loved ones. As a matter of fact, trail maps available online have saved my life the few times that I have gotten lost while hiking.

It seems counter-intuitive to say that it is fine to use technology while camping, but technology is only a part of our lives for the sole purpose of making them easier. Camping isn’t about struggling against nature, it is about enjoying it and relaxing in it. Surely, using a phone is no more cheating than using an RV which has electricity, sewage and television. Not that there is a competition as to who is the most hard-core camper generation, but this does follow the theme of using technology to be more comfortable outside.

The stereotypical millennial would spend a weekend of camping staring at their phone, but the real millennial understands that this is not what camping is all about. The person who will spend their entire time looking at their phone is also the same person that would find an excuse not to go camping. We millennials might sometimes get caught up in whatever is trending on Twitter and miss the world passing us by, but we also know how to do the opposite. While camping, technology doesn’t compete with with nature, but work with it to make it more enjoyable. Besides, if there was ever a competition between nature and technology, nature would win every time, because I have never seen the stereotypical millennial walking through a beautiful trail with earphones on staring at a screen.

 

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