⛺️🥾 Novice Overnight Backpack Trip & Clinic by the Campfire 🏕🌳

The featured photo is us last November on the 5th day of our backpacking trip in the North Georgia mountains. If you can see yourself doing something like this but have no idea how to get started, here you go! This can be your first step. 🙂
This emphasis here will be for those at the beginner/ novice level. We will have a 5.5 mile hike into camp on Saturday, with a 3 mile hike out on Sunday morning.
You will need to have and carry all your own gear. This will be a learning and teaching trip, the objective of which will to give you the basic skills in self sufficiency to eventually go out on a backpacking trip such as the one you see in the picture.

For example, I will cover:

Proper tent pitch - pitch it taut & tight!
Water purification -You will be bringing ONLY enough water from home to get you to the campsite. Our water source for cooking, drinking, and Sunday morning will be the pond at our campsite. Everyone will be filtering their own water supply
Learning to use a backpacking stove & backpacking food discussion
Fire starting - You will learn and practice how to start a flame even when windy and wet
Firewood - You will be going into the woods to forage deadfall and bringing it back to camp. I will bring my handsaw to cut into smaller pieces.
Gear review - After we get there\, we'll look at what you brought. That evening we can have a "show and tell" and general Q & A discussion
Sanitation - aka pooping in the woods- very important Please review this information How to poop in the woods

At a minimum, you will need to have

a suitable backpack
small tent -one or two person
sleep system i.e. sleeping bag, pad, I have 2 solo tents and 2 closed cell (non inflatable) foam pads available to loan. You will need to be able to strap these to your pack
food - I would like for everyone to bring a freeze dried meal for Saturday dinner. Plus of course day snacks, and your breakfast for Sunday.
gas stove & fuel canister.
water filter
of these last two items, I have extra stoves and water filters to share if you don't have these.
You need to be in adequate physical condition to hike in with your pack weight.
Gear can be very expensive. But there are many lower cost options out there on Amazon. If you want an opinion on anything, feel free to send me a screenshot and I will be happy to give you my two cents worth.
Lenny 813 838 6834

About your host..... I have 25 years backpacking experience, most recently an 8 day, 7 night solo hike on the Benton MacKaye trail this past April 2026. Other trips most of which have been solo outings, include Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan & Colorado. They've ranged from one night to nine.

There is no fee for this event. Yes! it's FREE. There is no membership fee to belong to Suncoast Outdoors.
YOUR RSVP TO ATTEND A "SUNCOAST OUTDOORS " SPONSORED EVENT IS YOUR EXPRESS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF UNDERSTANDING AND UNCONDITIONAL ACCEPTANCE OF FULL PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY AND LIABILITY FOR ALL ASSOCIATED RISKS.
Possible risks from participation include, but are not limited to:
Injury from a trip & fall, venomous snakes, stinging insects, venomous spiders, wildlife encounters, heat stroke, hypothermia, noxious vegetation, weather related injury, insect or airborne transmissible virus and disease, smoke inhalation, wildfire, falling trees, drowning.