Skirt Camping

There are some of us who go camping in skirts. Even the men.

Recreation groups, such as Civil War Reenactment and The Society for Creative Anachronism often have their gatherings at campgrounds and parks. This means that those with characters or personae that would wear skirts in everyday life do so. This does create some logistical problems for some of us who are used to wearing pants in regular life, or for camping.

There are some pros and cons to wearing skirts while camping –

Pros

Skirts provide LOTS of ventilation. This means that you can tuck up the skirt to let all the wind through and a little water can do wondrous things for ‘air conditioning’.

Layers are easy to put on. More layers, the warmer it can be. Remember that even if it is 90° during the day, it may well dip to 40° at night when camping. Tents do not have the same insulation as houses.

You can carry heavy loads. I once got an entire bushel of apples into the skirt I was wearing. You can also use an apron the same way.

You can drape a skirt around you to wander out to pee at 1am.

Cons

Bugs. They can crawl up the fabric or your legs without hindrance. It is not pleasant to be wearing a full skirt held out with a crinoline or hoop and suddenly realize that there are hornets in your clothing. Dignity? What dignity?

Too many layers can interfere with going to the bathroom, or more commonly while camping, the porta-potty. I will let you think of the amazing contortions that go on in those small stalls when a large skirt is involved.

The bottom hem is always dirty.

Too many layers, it is too hot, not enough, too cold.

Because of the many differences between reenactment camping and ‘regular’ camping, skirts are just the tip of the iceburg, though you do need to make sure you take the appropriate clothing, no matter how you camp.

And remember, you can always wear shorts under the skirt…